Abolishing the Cent: new developments

Just ask the cashier that’s asks you to round up if they will round down for you.

 

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My question has always been on the taxation end. State and local in particular. In PA, it's 6% so by their reasoning of rounding up I'd be paying ten percent. Twenty if I buy something in the county to the north. Good grief, didn't we fight a war over this at some point?

 

Do... do you always spend your money a single dollar at a time?

 

Think a little harder. The total sale will be rounded, not the tax rate.

 

And even then, only when paying cash. Credit/debit/check transactions can still be made out in cents. The overall effect of this will be minimal; I find it weird people are even still making this argument that it will have some major detrimental effect. It's been done in many other countries, and it's had negligible effect on actual commerce in those places. Especially since the use of cash is declining world-wide.

 

National Association of Convenience Stores

It's always been suspect accounting when the mint wants to complain about collector coins; more of the overhead seems to land on that side of the ledger. When the narrative is "eliminate the cent", more lands there...

The mint does have large fixed costs (multi-million-dollar presses, security) and difficult-to-apportion costs (e.g. electricity). Additionally, a significant portion of the information (including the costs of planchets) is proprietary and can't be disclosed.

 

No you would still price it at $2.99, then the taxes would be applied (here it is 7%) so it is now $0.21 for a total of $3.20 If it was 6% the total would be $3.17 which round DOWN to $3.15 If the rate was 8% the price would be $3.23 which would round UP to $3.25 The psychological $2.99 works just fine, no reason to drop back to $2.95. If rounding does have to occur (notice it didn't on the 7% rate) about half the time it will round up, and half the time it will round down and in the long run the up and the down will cancel out. There are only two ways you can set it so that it ALWAYS rounds up and that would be to set your prices and then never allow more than one item per transaction (because if you allow more than one item the final price will be back to a random amount that will sometimes round up and sometimes down) Or the taxes are included in the price on the shelf. If you do that then the tax paid rapidly adds up to MORE than you would have paid if you added up the prices and then applied the tax rate This is why, normally, including the tax in the price is not legal.

See my answer above. The tax in PA would still be 6%. Rounding is done to the price after the taxes are applied, rounding would NOT affect the tax RATE. And if they chose to change the tax rate there is no reason (other than outright greed) for them to change it from 6% to 10%, There is no reason they couldn't go from 6 to 7%.

 

Legally you can put any kind of rounding in place the idiots in the leg choose.

Rounding down (unpopular with merchants)

Rounding up (unpopular with consumers)

Then there are the half rounding methods and finally Banker's Rounding which will break most customer's brains

https://www.mathsisfun.com/numbers/rounding-methods.html

 

Here's the sign that's appeared at our local Aldi:



They're rounding in the customer's favor. Even if you're due back a single cent, they'll give you a nickel.

I've seen similar wording on a sign posted in a news story.

Merchants have more important business than screwing you out of a couple of cents on a cash purchase. In fact, I'll bet that they still come out ahead, just on the time saved counting coins.

But if you do find a merchant rounding unfairly in their own favor, name and shame them everywhere you can. They'll come around, or they can take their pennies and go home.

 

No problems with change in my area. The bank said they are not having any trouble and neither is the grocery store.

 

Posted this ATS...

https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IN12572

3 of the 4 were referred to committee at the beginning of the year and nothing has happened.

H.R.3074 was reported out (revised) by committee on 9/4 and has gone nowhere because the House is AWOL.

https://www.congress.gov/committee-...e-report/235

The amended version turns the nickel into a clad zinc/nickel coin.

The cent?

 

A quick Google sez $290 in 1910 would be $10,000 today.

 

A nickel clad zinc five cent piece won't work. It would weigh significantly less than the current five cent piece unless they increase the size of the coin. So the two different compositions 75% copper 25% Nickel, and nickel clad zinc won't both work in the same vending machine.

 

I know. And changing the mass to between 4 and 6 grams is similarly unachieveable.

Where

I too don't see how you get to 5 plus or minus 1 G if you're talking about nickel plated or nickel clad zinc.

 

Did I overlook something or does the legislation abolish the Silver Eagle?

Sec. 5112. Denominations, specifications, and design of coins

(a) The Secretary of the Treasury may mint and issue only the
following coins:
(1) a dollar coin that is 1.043 inches in diameter.
(2) a half dollar coin that is 1.205 inches in
diameter and weighs 11.34 grams.
(3) a quarter dollar coin that is 0.955 inch in
diameter and weighs 5.67 grams.
(4) a dime coin that is 0.705 inch in diameter and
weighs 2.268 grams.
(5) a 5-cent coin that is 0.835 inch in diameter and
[weighs 5 grams.] weighs--
(A) 5 grams, with respect to such coin that
is an alloy of copper and nickel; or
(B) between 4 and 6 grams, with respect to
such coin as described in subsection (c).
(6) [except as provided under subsection (c) of this
section,] a one-cent coin that is 0.75 inch in diameter
[and weighs 3.11 grams].
(7) A fifty dollar gold coin that is 32.7 millimeters
in diameter, weighs 33.931 grams, and contains one troy
ounce of fine gold.
(8) A twenty-five dollar gold coin that is 27.0
millimeters in diameter, weighs 16.966 grams, and
contains one-half troy ounce of fine gold.
(9) A ten dollar gold coin that is 22.0 millimeters
in diameter, weighs 8.483 grams, and contains one-
fourth troy ounce of fine gold.
(10) A five dollar gold coin that is 16.5 millimeters
in diameter, weighs 3.393 grams, and contains one-tenth
troy ounce of fine gold.
(11) A $50 gold coin that is of an appropriate size
and thickness, as determined by the Secretary, weighs 1
ounce, and contains 99.99 percent pure gold.
(12) A $25 coin of an appropriate size and thickness,
as determined by the Secretary, that weighs 1 troy
ounce and contains .9995 fine palladium.

 

ASEs are a separate section, 5112 (e)

 

Freaking zinc lobbyists. Gotta throw some new pork to make up for the death of Zincolns.

If you're going to mess with coin composition and break all the vending machines, USE STEEL. Cheaper, widely available, non-toxic. Yeah, it's harder to strike. Talk to our neighbors to the north, they've figured it out.

Or, you know, stop making ALL the denominations that have less purchasing power than the half cent did when IT was discontinued (15-20 cents in today's money). You're not fooling anyone about the dollar's value by drowning us in trivial denominations.

 

Vending machine considerations are long dead. Most don't even accept anything smaller than a quarter in my experience.

 

I think this is the path we’re on now. Not sure how the cent has made it as long as it did. Had to be lobbyists. I hate to suggest more massive job cuts but if they cut production of all change in commerce and just rounded to the nearest dollar, we’d survive. Would save everybody time. Give anyone who files a W-2 with an income cap, a token tax credit amounting in total to what’s saved for the new inconvenience that might not be an inconvenience at all.
Except I believe they do make money producing the other higher denominations at least for now. So there won’t be a push to eliminate the rest any time soon.