Ever seen a vending machine accept half dollars?

Aha, I didn't know we were going about this in an "after tax" manner; if that's the case, my own $70 a week has to be adjusted, i.e. reduced, to "take home pay"!

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Well, I don't know what I earned before tax. British taxes were pretty high back then but the only number I cared about was the bottom line.

 

Yeah, I think I was pulling down a quarter a week as allowance at that point.

 

Obviously we don't have a Value Added Tax (Yet!) in the United States, but on the other hand we have seemingly forever been saddled with something far more onerous, the infamous Universal Congressional Pork Barrel Enrichment Tax. And so it goes.

 

When I got laid off in 1999 and money was short, McD's was having some kind of special something and hamburgers were 15 cents and cheeseburgers 20 cents. I would buy 20 or 30, whatever the limit was, and the kids would take these for lunch. They told me the other kids were jealous because they got MickeyD's for lunch.

 

Oh, we have plenty of taxes in the US. To go into it all would border on the realm of politics so I won't go there. But suffice to say that total taxes in the US compare to the UK when social security, medicare and health insurance are factored in.

 

I will have to swing by Home Depot in the morning and test this out!

 

I've always assumed it was a two-pronged issue. First, vending machines did not accept them since, prior to the mid-60's, a soda was only 5 or 10 cents. There was really no reason to use a half dollar to buy anything from a machine. Secondly, the perfect storm of the loss of silver in 65 and the assassination of Kennedy which caused the new coins to be hoarded led to an instant "vacuum" of halves in the channels of commerce. No one spent the silver ones because of their bullion content and no one spent the new Kennedys for nostalgia purpose. So they disappeared. As the vending prices increased, vending machine manufacturers didn't upgrade their machines to accept halves since no one used them anyway. Since vending machines didn't accept them at that point, no one bothered to carry them after the nostalgia of Kennedy had worn off.

Thus a vicious cycle of negative reinforcement was put into play by a perfect set of circumstances leading us to today where the half hasn't been minted for circulation in 15 years.

 

It was also easier to reconfigure vending machines to have bill acceptors rather than allow half dollars, which no one uses anyway.
The half dollar is a dinosaur. It is finished. Why carry a coin larger than a dollar coin,
and worth half as much?

 

Considering what things cost nowadays, you are spot on correct. However, those of us who grew up with one or more of those Walking Liberty beauties - if we were that flush at the moment - jangling in our pockets can't help but feel a powerful twinge of nostalgia for the feel and look of those very special coins in our (then) hot little hands. I would compare it to my days of being so fortunate as to cross the Atlantic in the magnificent Lockheed Super Constellations; sure, it took up to three times as long as a modern jet to get from Frankfurt to New York (since back then it entailed re-fueling stops both in the Azores and at Gander, Newfoundland), but boy, it was a flying experience you wouldn't soon, or in my case ever, forget.

 

The only vending machines that I remember taking half-dollars were the old cigarette machines. I don't count the slot machines of the Nevada casinos that are close to us here in Calif.

 

Same can be said for nickels and dimes.

 

That would seem rather odd, because the gold in the coins was worth 1.75 times the face value. Spend a half eagle for $5 when it had almost $9 worth of gold in it? It would be like one of us buying something for $60, giving them a $100 and telling them to keep the change. (and considering people in the military aren't paid all that well I find it hard to believe they would be doing that.) And when you consider that coin dealers would pay 2.5 to 3 times face for the coins it gets even worse.

I suspect if they were spending them it was because they thought they were not legal to own. A LOT of people back then for some reason had the belief that after the gold recall in 1933 ANY gold (other than jewelry) was illegal to own and that they could go to jail if they were caught with gold coins. So they would try to get rid of them.

 

Believe what you want. Alaska was still a territory. My uncle was in the USAF for 25 years and this was at the end of his enlistment. I saw a lot of the coins when we visited him in Coos Bay, OR after he retired.

Chris

 

Not saying it didn't happen, just don't understand why it would and why those underpaid guys would then throw money away. But people do do foolish things.

 

When I go to the bank I often ask for $2 bills. I think I'll also start asking for a roll of halves in addition. I love the look on people faces when I hand over a $2 bill.

I remember back when the SBAs first came out. I saw a few vending machines that were fitted to take them. I don't recall if they were also setup for halves. Then they disappeared. I hear all the time about all the trouble vending machine operators have with the bill changers, so you'd think they would welcome the wider use of half and dollars coins. But I guess it is getting harder and harder to find a venting machine that has much under a dollar anymore, so we may be stuck with the bill changers.

 

VATs much worse.

 

It's regressive, too.

 

As a paperboy in 1953 I regularly received Indian Cents, Buffalo Nickels, Roosevelt and Barber Dimes/Quarters, Standing Liberty Quarters*, Walking Liberty and Franklin Halves and Silver Certificates. Who know what treasures I handled?

Then in 1956, working in fast food I handled tons of silver coins. I disliked them because they were so dirty; I'd have to wash my hands after handling them.

* and learned about the horny cowboy.

 

Great story! An entire dream collection passed through your hands!