From an article on Vietnam.net, some Vietnamese are rejecting circulating coins, both because they turn very dark from use, and from a preference for banknotes. Can't help wondering whether the U.S. is headed in the same direction; coins produced only for collectors, with banknotes and plastic the preferred transaction media.
Government in the US right now is both the one forcing coin usage and impairing it. If it were not for sales taxes, I would think most coins would disappear since most purchases would simply be rounded to dollars. However, we are in desperate need of one and two dollar coins, but special interests and wimpy legislators won't let that happen. Think about how much purchasing power coins have lost in the last 50 years since they removed silver. Its like if they only had pennies and nickels in the 1960's to use for change, that is what our dimes and quarters are now worth to us. Every night I just empty my pockets into a huge jar and start over the next day. I will never cash that jar in, figuing maybe someday my kids will want to go through it looking for coins.
It is not so much a matter of aversion to coins as it is the fact that coins currently in circulation are only good for things like tax and making $19.95 sound like a better deal than $20. We could stop making all coins under a dime and be where we were fifty years ago when 'dime' stores filled the place of today's 'dollar' stores and a small burger at a fast food place was 10 cents rather than a dollar. When the government stops making paper dollars, we will all use dollar coins just like the Euro countries do. Making it optional means it will not happen. No politician wants to admit that it was on his watch that the dollar was not worth what it used to be so the change won't happen until the US and UK start using Euro type currency (possibly by 2100???).
