What happened to the penny?

[Asher]

And not the least bit tacky!

[SlowwHand]

Tacky would be the driveway at the White House.

[Uncle Sparky]

Penny (knock,knock,knock)...
Penny (knock,knock,knock)...
Penny (knock,knock,knock)...

[-Jrabbit]

Penny who?

[Dauphin]

I once dated a girl called Penny. I always knew I would come in to money.

[Zevico]

This is clearly the fault of trickle down government.

[Asher]

Canada abolished its $1 bill. I'm not inclined to trust Canadian advice on currency denominations.

Coins are more durable.

[regexcellent]

Coins are more durable.

Coins suck. They're heavy. So what if they're durable? I don't hold on to bills for years and years. Replacing $1 bills over and over isn't such a great expense for the government that it's worth trading all that convenience and economy activity that having a convenient currency denomination provides.

[Asher]

It's also why Canada is so far ahead of America when it comes to electronic transaction rates.

I can't remember the last time I paid in cash.

[Felch]

Asher's weed guy takes Visa? Canada sounds awesome.

[Asher]

Lots of people use email transfers these days.

[regexcellent]

It's also why Canada is so far ahead of America when it comes to electronic transaction rates.

I can't remember the last time I paid in cash.

First of all, no it's not.

Second, I paid in cash about...oh, 15 minutes ago, when I used a vending machine. And at around noon today, when I bought some office supplies.

Besides, having good electronic transfers isn't justification for something as dumb as a $1 coin.

[Asher]

It's not stupid.

The GAO has said the US would save billions by switching to a one-dollar coin as Canada has.

The US government just likes wasting money. Maybe you guys should suck it up.

http://m.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/top-business-stories/should-us-have-a-loonie-worth-a-bit-less-of-course/article622862/?service=mobile

Should U.S. have a loonie? Whatever would we do without something we can call the greenback?

A new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office recommends replacing the U.S. dollar bill with a coin similar to Canada's loonie . Friday's report, the latest of several, points out the billions of dollars the U.S. would save, although Americans aren't all that keen on the idea.

The suggestion is that Congress do it anyway, as Canada did despite public opposition. Americans would soon get over it, the GAO says.

"In Canada and the U.K., the public also preferred low-denomination notes to coins, but the governments nevertheless switched from notes to coins to achieve financial benefits," the report says. "While the public initially resisted these transitions, opposition dissipated over time with no alternative to the note."

This marks the fourth or fifth time in about 20 years that the GAO has reported on the issue, finding each time that the government would save money. (No doubt that, by this point, those savings would be eroded by the costs of the never-ending studies.)

The GAO found that, because coins are more durable that paper and don't need to be replaced as often, the government could save about $5.5-billion over 30 years. But to make it work, the government would have to stop producing notes to leave no alternative.

There are actually five different $1 coins in the U.S. now, including the Eisenhower coin, the Susan B. Anthony coin, and the Sacagawea coin, along with the Presidential and Native American coin series. Because of "limited public demand," the Federal Reserve has more than 1 billion $1 coins sitting in storage.

Some interesting tidbits from the findings:

"The federal government experiences a financial gain when it issues notes or coins because both forms of currency usually cost less to produce than their face values."

Canada estimated the conversion to the loonie in 1987 would save $175-million over 20 years, but later found it saved $450-million between 1987 and 1991 alone.
"Among the rationales for replacing notes for coins cited by foreign government officials and experts are the cost savings to governments derived from lower production costs and the decline over time of the purchasing power of currency due to inflation." The U.S. dollar, for example, now has the buying power of a quarter in 1975.
"It is common for people to take coins out of their pockets and store them at the end of each day rather than retain them in their wallets as they do notes, for use the next day. These factors cause coins to circulate with less frequency than notes."
"Senior officials at the Federal Reserve and Mint told us the increased circulation of $1 coins could increase the risk of counterfeiting, and senior Secret Service officials told us that counterfeiting of coins is an ongoing problem in the U.K. ... In Canada, however, counterfeiting is minimal."

[giblets]

"In Canada and the U.K., the public also preferred low-denomination notes to coins, but the governments nevertheless switched from notes to coins to achieve financial benefits," the report says. "While the public initially resisted these transitions, opposition dissipated over time with no alternative to the note."

So the US is a democracy while Canada and the UK have their societies engineered from the top down?

$1 coins are already available and no one wants to use them. Spending a few billion on something that hundreds of millions of people prefer is not a waste.

[Hauldren Collider]

The US could save money by not minting any more of those goddamn $1 coins. The fascists try to give them as change at metro stops and have parking meters take them downtown to try to convince us that they are worth the hassle. They aren't.

Have you ever tried to pay for something with a US$1 coin? The cashier looks at you like you are a space alien or some other undesirable freak. Then he tries to find space for it in the cash register and the line gets held up and you are now branded a menace to society.