Save the penny or leave the penny?
hurley_108 @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:02 am
Canada has been told to follow Australia and New Zealand and ditch the one-cent coin
$1:
Consider the lowly farthing: a quarter of a British penny, or 1/960 of a pound sterling. For centuries, this tiny denomination of coin circulated in Britain for day-to-day purchases.
...
So what about our own farthing, the Canadian penny? Could you blame a bus driver for refusing to allow you to put a couple hundred of them into the fare box?
A growing number of economists and bankers are urging the Canadian government to give up the penny, as the U.K. gave up the farthing and, later, the halfpenny.
Both Australia and New Zealand removed their one- and two-cent coins in the early 1990s. New Zealand went one step further in 2006 and demonetized the five-cent piece.
...
So what about our own farthing, the Canadian penny? Could you blame a bus driver for refusing to allow you to put a couple hundred of them into the fare box?
A growing number of economists and bankers are urging the Canadian government to give up the penny, as the U.K. gave up the farthing and, later, the halfpenny.
Both Australia and New Zealand removed their one- and two-cent coins in the early 1990s. New Zealand went one step further in 2006 and demonetized the five-cent piece.
I'd be all for this. Pennies are littering the table by my front door, various shelves in my house, my desk at work. I recently needed a couple of washers but couldn't find any so I drilled holes in a couple of nickels (try buying a single washer for less than $0.05).
What do the rest of you think?
Regina @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:34 am
You want a cheap washer that won't rust........drill a hole in a penny. 
Maybe when they discontinue them........they'll finally be worth something.
BartSimpson @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:45 am
It would be better to revalue the Canadian dollar to put the value of the penny back where it should be. Inflation over the years has eroded the value and if the penny is near to worthless then it makes sense to adjust the value of the dollar and not just eliminate the penny.
Eliminating the penny will result in both prices and sales taxes inevitably being rounded UP because you know darn well they won't be rounded down.
The net result will simply be MORE inflation and then we'll sooner or later be discussing ending the nickel and then the dime and so on.
Revalue the dollar.
Keep the penny.
hurley_108 @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:46 am
Regina Regina:
You want a cheap washer that won't rust........drill a hole in a penny.
Maybe when they discontinue them........they'll finally be worth something.
Maybe when they discontinue them........they'll finally be worth something.
Actually, they were for structure not waterproofing. I needed to widen the head of a screw. Penny might have worked, but the nickel seemed stronger.
Brenda @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:50 am
We don't have 1 or 2 cents.. Works fine! 
It is only the end price that is round...
hurley_108 @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:51 am
BartSimpson BartSimpson:
It would be better to revalue the Canadian dollar to put the value of the penny back where it should be. Inflation over the years has eroded the value and if the penny is near to worthless then it makes sense to adjust the value of the dollar and not just eliminate the penny.
Eliminating the penny will result in both prices and sales taxes inevitably being rounded UP because you know darn well they won't be rounded down.
The net result will simply be MORE inflation and then we'll sooner or later be discussing ending the nickel and then the dime and so on.
Revalue the dollar.
Keep the penny.
Eliminating the penny will result in both prices and sales taxes inevitably being rounded UP because you know darn well they won't be rounded down.
The net result will simply be MORE inflation and then we'll sooner or later be discussing ending the nickel and then the dime and so on.
Revalue the dollar.
Keep the penny.
It would be simple enough to enact legislation on the method of rounding and even simpler to see which way rounding goes if you've passed grade 6 math.
How would you go about revaluing the dollar by a factor of five or even ten? That's what would be needed to make the penny as useful as the nickel or dime. How would you adjust everyone's sense of how much a thing was worth?
You might as well ask the US to go metric.
Regina @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:55 am
hurley_108 hurley_108:
Regina Regina:
You want a cheap washer that won't rust........drill a hole in a penny.
Maybe when they discontinue them........they'll finally be worth something.
Maybe when they discontinue them........they'll finally be worth something.
Actually, they were for structure not waterproofing. I needed to widen the head of a screw. Penny might have worked, but the nickel seemed stronger.
Blue_Nose @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:58 am
I think the best solution would be to let sellers charge whatever fraction of a dollar they choose (including fractions of a cent), but simply round the final, cashier total up to the nearest nickel. That way, people aren't gouged by the number of items they buy (as they would be if prices were rounded individually), but the penny is still obsolete.
Brenda @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:58 am
Of course we use Euro's. We just don't use the 1 or 2 cents. Neither did we when we had guilders.
hurley_108 @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:58 am
lily lily:
Brenda Brenda:
We don't have 1 or 2 cents.. Works fine!
It is only the end price that is round...
It is only the end price that is round...
You don't use Euros? I have a one cent euro in the bottom of my purse.
According to the article, they don't use those ones in The Netherlands.
BartSimpson @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:58 am
hurley_108 hurley_108:
BartSimpson BartSimpson:
It would be better to revalue the Canadian dollar to put the value of the penny back where it should be. Inflation over the years has eroded the value and if the penny is near to worthless then it makes sense to adjust the value of the dollar and not just eliminate the penny.
Eliminating the penny will result in both prices and sales taxes inevitably being rounded UP because you know darn well they won't be rounded down.
The net result will simply be MORE inflation and then we'll sooner or later be discussing ending the nickel and then the dime and so on.
Revalue the dollar.
Keep the penny.
Eliminating the penny will result in both prices and sales taxes inevitably being rounded UP because you know darn well they won't be rounded down.
The net result will simply be MORE inflation and then we'll sooner or later be discussing ending the nickel and then the dime and so on.
Revalue the dollar.
Keep the penny.
It would be simple enough to enact legislation on the method of rounding and even simpler to see which way rounding goes if you've passed grade 6 math.
How would you go about revaluing the dollar by a factor of five or even ten? That's what would be needed to make the penny as useful as the nickel or dime. How would you adjust everyone's sense of how much a thing was worth?
You might as well ask the US to go metric.
Plenty of nations revalue their currency so this isn't like I'm proposing something radical or innovative. The thing you're not seeing here is that Canada has been revaluing the CDN$ down but in a gradual process over a period of time.
I'm proposing to correct the real problem of a CDN$ that has been slowly declining in value instead of creating a new and different problem by eliminating a unit of exchange.
Brenda @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:58 am
Blue_Nose Blue_Nose:
I think the best solution would be to let sellers charge whatever fraction of a dollar they choose (including fractions of a cent), but simply round the final, cashier total up to the nearest nickel. That way, people aren't gouged by the number of items they buy (as they would be if prices were rounded individually), but the penny is still obsolete.
That's what happens here.
WBenson @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 12:42 pm
hurley_108 hurley_108:
It would be simple enough to enact legislation on the method of rounding and even simpler to see which way rounding goes if you've passed grade 6 math.
It would also be simple enough to watch stores all adjust their prices to the next $0.05 mark up from where they are now. Rounding only means anything until the prices change.
bootlegga @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 1:01 pm
The poll seems to be broken...
I say get rid of the penny, it's practically worthless these days.
sasquatch2 @ Tue Aug 07, 2007 9:33 pm
Yeah well! Remember that movie/TV plot where a guy programmes the company computer to deposit all the fractions of 1 penny into his bank account?
That's the slippery slope you are heading if you abandon the penny.
Besides Canada would have to get the US to do it too. Just like the KYOTO thing, the americans are not gullible enough to fall for that either.
God Bless America..........