My 2 Cents worth - A Centsible Proposal

They said the original 1% RI sales tax was temporary. It's now 7% and every rise in that tax since thaen was touted as a temporary increase. IMO, it was only temporary until the next increase.


As far as rounding, what reality? As long as there are pennies, there's no rounding.
I'd suggest you look at Canada. Rounding works there exactly as I posted.

 

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Like I posted in earlier, Canadians are nice. Of course it works.

 

Yes, rounding already occurs.

Next time you buy gas, look at the price you are paying per gallon. I'll bet the last digit is 9/10 of a cent.

Sales tax tends not to be a whole percent either. In Texas, state and local sales tax adds up to 8.25%

So, if I walk into a gas station and buy a 99 cent candy bar, I would have to pay:

$0.99 x 1.0825 = $1.071675

I'll bet they round that to the nearest cent as I don't have any coins divided into ten thousandths of a cent.

There is no monetary reason to worry about the demise of the cent. It has no buying power. Even if every transaction gets rounded up you're just not going to be loosing enough to rounding to matter.

 

This guy lays out the situation pretty well:

 

Just watch the YouTube post @NeonBlurb . He makes some strong points, but I always cringe when I hear this "Studies show....".

Are these the same studies that said:
1) Saccarhin causes cancer?
2) Egg Yolks are bad for you?
3) There is no inflation?
4) enter your own false study conclusion here....

 

The nice thing about Hank and John Green is that they tend to site their sources.

If you check the video's description you will find sources for a lot of the data they quoted.


Copied from the video's description:
My inflation calculations came from the CPI inflation calculator: http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl

Information about the opportunity cost implications of pennies and the calculations of lost productivity can be found here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/24/AR2006092400946.html


http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2006/07/penny_sense.html


Edited to fix URLs

 

@NeonBlurb , the opportunity cost topic was interesting. I definitely understand that. I also understand the sentimentality of cent and nickel coins.

As for CPI, IMO, it's big time flawed. No energy costs or food? Well we don't use those everday.

Anyway, I enjoyed the post.

 

Studies show that studies will always reflect the needs and desires of those paying for the studies.

 

soooooo way off topic now
I like coins
I think some new coins would be great
a new 2c would be cool
$1 $5 $20 and $100 coins would be way cool

 

Everything under a dime needs to be eliminated. The dime has the purchasing power of a cent in the 1960s. Furthermore $1 bills need to be eliminated and replaced with circulating dollar coins. A $2 coin and $5 coin would have the purchasing power of a 1960s quarter and half dollar.

Reality is this, inflation has rendered the two lowest denominations worthless. When is the last time you even bought anything for a nickel?

 

Actually they still sell "Penny" candy for a nickel at Zebs Country Store in North Conway, N.H. They are also reputed to have the longest original "Penny" Candy counter in the U.S.

 

Cite........

 

A bit of disingenuous false advertising, "penny" candy for a nickel. Should just call it "Nickel Candy".

 

Yep, you got me. Guess my spellering was going off like a loose canon

 

LOL! It happens. Look at me with cannon (Canon) and colector (collector) in some other threads.....

 

yea whee shoold do away with thee sent. knicle two

 

It works very well in some countries here in Europe. May not work in the US though. Denomination aside, the design and the shape are interesting.

Christian

 

I have 1 Euro coins. Which countries in Europe have eliminated their lowest denominations?

 

In terms of euro countries, that would be Belgium, Finland, Ireland and the Netherlands. When you pay cash there, the total is rounded to x.y0 or x.y5, whatever is closer. So while the 1 and 2 cent coins continue to be legal tender, they are not actually needed much any more. Also, this is basically voluntary, so if the store prefers to not round, it's not done. But pretty much every place in FI does it, most in NL, many in BE, and in IE it's still new.

As for the suggestion of doing away with the "penny" in the US only to introduce another low value denomination, I don't think it makes much sense. Coins are change but also means of payment, and if the only reason for having 1 (and/or 2) cent coins is that people hoard or even trash them, the mint will continue making billions and billions that somehow "vanish". Just my, errm, five cents ...

Christian

 

Well, they tried it in 1864 and you see what happened? I do not think the idea of a 2c piece will work. Also, I vehemently oppose the idea.