
Is It Time to Kill the Penny? - jpkoning
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2020/07/14/890435359/is-it-time-to-kill-the-penny
======
UI_at_80x24
Yes.

Canada stopped producing pennies in the fall of 2012. [0] The sky didn't fall.
There was no great debate, no public opinion polls and politicians swearing
heartily about the demise of our great nation. (Ok that's probably not true.
For too many politicians that's all they do.)

There was resistance when Canada dropped the $1 bill in favour of a Loonie (a
$1 coin with the image of a loon on it). People bitched about having too much
change in there pocket, pockets became too heavy, etc. I do however see more
coins in tip & donation jars now then I ever saw paper money.

This is a key difference between US policy & Canadian policy that I have
informally noticed while growing up on the border (with family ties on both
sides).

Canadian government: We think it's a good idea, so we're going to do it.

US Government: Lets have more opinion polls, and countless politicians
swearing against any decent public reform or change to the status quo. Watch
the media whip the public up into a frenzy. I guaranty that this will create a
more frantic response and airtime then the BLM & Police Reform protests did.

Side note: If you drop the penny, for the love of $diety change your sales tax
structure so that it's a multiple of 5. 5%, 10%, 15%, etc... Since Canada
changed but left the taxes the same (14% in Ontario IIRC) there seems to be a
lot of rounding-off in favour of companies instead of consumers. $0.01-$0.02
per transaction * millions of transactions per day has got to make some
accountants happy.

[0][https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/canada-s-penny-withdrawal-
all...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/canada-s-penny-withdrawal-all-you-need-
to-know-1.1174547)

~~~
nayuki
> Since Canada changed but left the taxes the same (14% in Ontario IIRC) there
> seems to be a lot of rounding-off in favour of companies instead of
> consumers. $0.01-$0.02 per transaction

This assertion is wrong. If the item you buy is $1.00, then after your 14% tax
it will be $1.14, which is rounded up to $1.15. If the item is $2.00, then
after tax it is $2.28, which also rounds up to $2.30. But if the item is
$3.00, then after tax it is $3.42, which rounds down to $3.40. If the item is
$4.00, then after tax it is $4.56, which rounds down to $4.55.

Secondly, the rounding to nearest nickel is done per transaction, not per
item. So if you go to a supermarket and pick up 3 items costing exactly $1.00,
then the total you owe is $3.42 (which becomes $3.40 in cash), and it is that
amount that is subjected to rounding, not the individual items (which are
$1.13 and would round to $1.15).

I live in Toronto and have analyzed my retail receipts. (I'm aware the HST is
currently 13% but that's not relevant to this argument.) The rule about
rounding to the nearest nickel is sensible enough, but I've witnessed various
weird behaviors. For example, each vendor has a different kind of wording to
show how they rounded your cash transaction. Some use a negative sign to show
that the penny rounding deducted money from your total owed, while some use a
negative sign to show that the penny rounding increased your total owed (as if
you paid negative money). Also, a few vendors always round down to the nearest
5 cents (to appear nice to the customer), which causes a surprise when I'm
trying to prepare the correct amount of change. Finally, some vendors don't
display cash rounding on their receipts, so for them it is an oral culture
that isn't formally written down.

~~~
Loughla
Regardless of what the practice is in Canada, I have zero faith in literally
any US business to round down on anything, at anytime, for any reason at all.
It will, I guarantee, be round up on everything.

~~~
crdrost
Note that you can also, while you're at it, abolish rounding.

You already have this in some sense on gas pumps: the price advertised has
taxes included so you are not always playing guess-the-final-total with your
money. Just pass a law that requires fair advertising of the actual amount the
purchaser will pay, taxes etc. included. If there are special circumstances
that might make certain people exempt from a tax -- SNAP is sales-tax free,
for instance -- there are several ways to handle that but it's clearer when
phrased as a discount rather than as an evasion of a tax.

~~~
Pamar
Well, yes, this... I am European and during my brief stay in the USA the fact
that taxes were added at the cashier was awkward. I am sure you had your
reasons and if you grow up in that sustem you won't notice much, but it looks
a bit counterintuitive to foreigners.

~~~
roywiggins
It's insisted upon by anti-tax advocates, so that Americans always get
reminded about exactly how much the government is adding onto the price.
Otherwise, the theory goes, we would get too happy about taxes.

~~~
thekyle
Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think there is any law that says businesses have
to add sales tax on separately. Since it's the business who actually pays the
tax not the consumer they could just take it out of their own profits.

However, the reason I think stores do this is: If store A is selling candy
bars for $1 (+ $0.05 tax at register) and store B is selling candy bars for
$1.05. Most people would buy their candy from store A because their prices are
lower.

~~~
roywiggins
Sometimes stores will structure sales that way ("we pay the sales tax" sales),
so I expect you're right.

The situation where it comes up is the idea of an American VAT. Because it
applies the tax before the store even sees the good, the tax ends up baked
into the price. And people like Grover Norquist have argued against a VAT
specifically because of that: "The VAT is embedded inside the price of a good
(as opposed to the U.S., where sales tax is transparent and on top of the
price). As such, people forget they pay it, and European governments have
found it too easy to raise the tax repeatedly over time."

[https://humanevents.com/2010/04/23/dont-give-obama-a-
vat/](https://humanevents.com/2010/04/23/dont-give-obama-a-vat/)

~~~
Entalpi
I love how the argument being played is that VAT is used to fed a big
government. Like the US is huge, it requires a large government..

------
gojomo
The best plan is to re-base all pennies to be worth 5¢, as described by Austan
Goolsbee here:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/01/business/01scenes.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/01/business/01scenes.html)

This is (very) mildly stimulative/inflationary, and in the time leading up to
en expected re-basing, accelerates the phase-out of the 1¢ penny (as people
hoard in expectation of a 5x return). But as of the moment of re-basing, it
flushes all those penny-jars out into spending/circulation.

Congress could do this tomorrow, effective immediately or in a week or month.
Maybe the Treasury Department/Administration could do it on their own
authority.

(The only significant opposition is likely to be from suppliers of nickel-
minting metals. So maybe we just rebase pennies as 10¢.)

~~~
ebg13
> _The best plan is to re-base all pennies to be worth 5¢_

But they say "ONE CENT" on them.

~~~
gojomo
They also say, 'Liberty', 'In God We Trust', & 'E Pluribus Unum'. Lots of
writing on government-issued materials is false, ceremonial, outdated, or
overridden by later acts.

If it really bothers you, you can file that off your pennies before spending
them at 5¢ value. We won't mind.

~~~
saagarjha
I would check 18 U.S. Code §331 (fraudulently defacing currency) before doing
that.

~~~
gojomo
There would be no fraud in scratching 'ONE CENT' off of pennies that were, by
law, worth 5¢.

But also, when was the last prosecution for defacing a coin in the United
States?

What sort of monster would call the police on a fellow person for passing a
damaged penny?

How would the prosecution's burden of proof be met?

(Be a currency hacker, like Satoshi or Woz –
[https://hackaday.com/2012/08/03/woz-prints-and-spend-his-
own...](https://hackaday.com/2012/08/03/woz-prints-and-spend-his-own-2-bills/)
– not someone whose actions are limited by obscure dead-letter laws.)

~~~
InitialLastName
How is Woz a currency hacker in that link? He literally just buys sheets from
[0] and glues them together.

[0][https://catalog.usmint.gov/paper-currency/uncut-
currency/](https://catalog.usmint.gov/paper-currency/uncut-currency/)

~~~
gojomo
The $2 bills are currency. He recombines them to create funny & thought-
provoking situations, including encounters with local police & Secret Service,
that test the boundaries of what's allowed & what's trusted.

What other definition of 'hacking' do you use?

------
klyrs
As an American living in Canada, I gotta say. Pennies and dollar bills SUCK.
We have $1 and $2 coins and they're actually useful. Every time I visit home,
I end up with piles of pennies and wads of stinky, tattered, overcirculated
garbage bills.

If you accumulate a pile $1 and $2 coins, nobody looks askance if you plunk
down a stack of them. But god, the glares if you want to spend $20 in dollar
bills.

I say take it further: nickels should go too, and probably dimes.

~~~
hoorayimhelping
It wasn't until I went to the UK in my late 20s that I realized how badly
America needs coins in the dollar and two dollar denomination. Having spare
coins with weight and mass rather than loose dollar bills helped me get a
sense of how many loose singles I had, and being able to drop a couple coins
on a counter to pay for cheap items (a bag of M&Ms, a cup of coffee) is
somehow, I don't know how, but somehow more ergonomic.

~~~
frosted-flakes
The US actually has one dollar coins, and it's common for vending machines to
spit them out as change. They're the exact same size as the Canadian loonie.

~~~
kps
So is a 2p coin. But the only machines that can't tell them apart are candy
dispensers and old mechanical parking meters.

------
dhosek
When someone posted an article about the coin shortage on Facebook recently, I
realized that I haven't used cash for a purchase since sometime before the
lockdown started. And even before that, my primary use of cash was the
collections basket at church—which the lockdown has ended up transforming into
a credit card transaction now. Our formerly cash transactions for our cleaning
lady have converted into Zelle payments. Friends who also commented mentioned
tipping delivery people although I prefer contactless delivery and always
include the tip in the original payment rather than have to come close enough
to a delivery person to hand off cash. Cash has long been on a decline and I
think the pandemic is accelerating this to the point where it's going to end
up being moot.

~~~
dhosek
Coin-only laundry machines are probably the biggest drivers of persistent cash
usage in most of my acquaintances' lives. I'm guessing that apartment
buildings big enough to have in-building laundry rooms but small enough to not
be able to justify a cashless payment system may just end up shifting to not
charging for laundry.

~~~
jedimastert
I think that gap is growing smaller.

Sample size of one incoming, but the building I live in only has 16 2-room
apartments and has a app-driven option for the machines (they take coins, but
there's no change machines and I've never seen anyone actually do so)

------
Cactus2018
In the Netherlands

> In 1980, production of the 1-cent coin ceased and was demonetized three
> years later.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_guilder#Coins](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_guilder#Coins)

> In 1999 replaced by the Euro, and gained 1-cent and 2-cent coins.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2_euro_cent_coin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2_euro_cent_coin)

The one- and two-cent coins were initially introduced in order to ensure that
the introduction of the euro was not used as an excuse by retailers to heavily
round up prices. However, due to the cost to business and the mints of
maintaining a circulation of low value coins, Belgium, Finland, Ireland, Italy
and the Netherlands round prices to the nearest five cents (Swedish rounding)
for cash payments, producing only a handful of those coins for collectors
rather than general circulation.[3] Despite this, the coins are still legal
tender and produced outside these states, so if a customer with a two-cent
coin minted elsewhere wishes to pay with it, they may.[4]

The Dutch Bank calculated it would save $36 million a year by not using the
smaller coins. According to a Eurobarometer survey of EU citizens, 64% across
the Eurozone want their removal with prices rounded; with over 70% in Belgium,
Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands and Slovakia.

~~~
Mediterraneo10
The claim that 0.01€ coins produced elsewhere remain legal tender in the
rounding countries, does not hold for Finland. No supermarket is going to
accept 1- or 2-cent coins for payment even if you had enough to add up to the
nearest 5-cent unit.

~~~
eMSF
That doesn't mean they aren't still legal tender in Finland (which they are).
Somewhat relatedly, some places also don't accept all the banknotes – that is,
the largest denominations – a rule which clearly has nothing to do with the
rounding rules of cents.

~~~
Mediterraneo10
It feels like the discussion of "legal tender" on this thread is based on how
things work in the USA. In Finland, one can be compelled to pay all kinds of
debts and obligations by bank transfer, and cash is not accepted. Even banks
won’t take the 1- and 2-cent coins, and so these coins are de facto so
marginalized that calling them "legal tender" misses the point.

------
pottspotts
About 10 years ago my friends and I made a Web site, removethepenny.com (no
longer active) and starting calling around to see who would support us. I
recall speaking to someone who was very angry that we cared so little for the
metal industry.

I think this has been known for a long time but special interests have kept it
on life support for obvious reasons.

~~~
lostapathy
I'm not sure the reasons are so obvious. Surely very little metal is turned
into pennies compared to the quantities consumed by industrial processes.

~~~
jdhawk
last year they made 8.4BN pennies, which would be about 21 million KG of Zinc,
worth about ~$40 million?

~~~
lostapathy
That's a lot of money, but not "change public policy" levels of cash, either.

On the other side, handling pennies is expensive for businesses and banks, I
bet it costs at least that much. There are special interests on both sides of
this.

~~~
jdhawk
I'd imagine you also have to take into account all coin to cash machines that
issue gift cards for change, and take decent percentages. They probably make
several orders of magnitude more than the mineral companies.

------
Brendinooo
The melt value of a copper penny (1982 or prior) is worth more than the face
value. However, it's illegal to melt down legal tender currency. AND, fun
fact, it's illegal to leave the US with more than $5 worth of pennies, so you
can't drive to Canada with a bag of pennies and melt them there.

So some people are now starting to hoard copper pennies, waiting for the day
when pennies are no longer legal tender, and then...they'll make a modest
profit, I guess.

~~~
x3n0ph3n3
> it's illegal to leave the US with more than $5 worth of pennies, so you
> can't drive to Canada with a bag of pennies and melt them there.

What law would that violate?

~~~
bazzargh
[https://twitter.com/crimeaday/status/739973139539632128](https://twitter.com/crimeaday/status/739973139539632128)

"31 USC §5111(d)(2), 31 CFR §82.1(b) & 82.2(a)(2) make it a federal crime to
leave the US with more than $25 worth of pennies in your pocket."

Most of that is about penalties but 31 CFR §82.2(a) has the $5 and $25 rules:
[https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/31/82.2](https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/31/82.2)

(I just guessed A Crime A Day had tweeted about this, US law seems to be
mostly legacy code...)

------
MH15
At some point us in the US will have to figure out how to cope with the issues
our Democracy has with making changes and overcoming momentum. It seems our
government is uniquely unsuited in this capacity in comparison to other modern
democracies as seen with healthcare, income inequality, and the recent
pandemic response.

~~~
hagy
I think the best approach is for the US to move more concerns to the state
level. E.g., it would be great if states would start implementing their own
universal healthcare for their residents.

States commonly have more internally aligned political goals and therefore can
move quicker. It also has the benefit of allowing different states to
experiment with different solutions and all states can learn from the results.

Lastly, inter-state mobility is much higher than inter-country and this will
allow residents to congregate in a state that matches their political desires.
E.g., if someone doesn't like the tax burden of states that provide more
services then they can move to a state that provides fewer.

~~~
lostapathy
Trivial inter-state mobility is a big obstacle for states doing grand social
programs individually.

If a state provided universal healthcare for residents, it'd quickly be
overwhelmed with "hard cases" from other states where coverage is a problem.
Which would drive up costs, and taxes, and drive productive/healthy people
out.

See the current inter-state shipping of homeless people, especially those who
suffer mental illness, that is often done via bus tickets paid for by local
governments looking to shed those people.

~~~
eumenides1
Canada it is a "state"/provincial system. All provinces manage their own.
Canada doesn't get inundated with Americans because if they do come, patients
will be charged like private health care. If the patient's home province has
universal health care, both province's will just work it out.

In general, we don't dump problems on to other provinces. It's bad form and
federal courts will fix that quick especially with so much money on the line.
If Florida state sends patients to a universal health care NY state for care,
you can bet, NY State will be suing either residents of Florida for medical
bills or Florida State directly.

~~~
theluketaylor
The system here only works because the Canada Health Act requires every
province to have a universal health insurer for provincial residents and
mandates each province accept the insurance of the others. If only Ontario had
a provincial insurer or the provinces didn't have to accept each other's
programs there would be a ton of game theory style manipulation.

Any state trying to implement a single payer system would get crushed as tons
of individuals and even other states tried to milk the system (like putting
homeless people on a bus with a one way ticket).

States would need a "suicide pact" of sorts to ensure a bunch of states made
the leap at the same time. There actually is such a plan to subvert the
electoral college to ensure the popular vote winner always wins the
presidency, but that's a relatively simple pact around single law. Health care
laws a incredibly complex and rather than try some kind of weird multi-state
pact you're better off fighting for a national law.

------
einpoklum
I really like it that they offer you, instead of a site with a lot of junk and
JS, a plain text version! That's much nicer news than the story itself :-)

... that said - why _don't_ you guys cancel the penny?

> Penny defenders' strongest argument was that eliminating it would hurt
> consumers. All those $9.99 products? The prices would be jacked up to an
> even $10!

That sounds like an argument made up retroactively to try to justify
something. Seriously?

1\. The time and effort to handle penny change costs more.

2\. Those bargain prices will become $9.95 , and some other prices will rise
slightly to compensate; or not.

~~~
talideon
Where I'm from, shops started using .95 pricing _long_ before the idea of
scrapping 1c and 2c coins was raised, purely because handling those coins
wasn't worth it.

A key difference is that we have VAT, which is built into the price, rather
than a US-style sales tax, which is not. In the US, if you're handling cash
you still have to deal with 1c and 2c coins because of that. That made it
easier for us to scrap 1c and 2c coins, but creates resistance for any US
attempts to do the same.

One other thing we did was introduce symmetrical rounding rules on the final
price of cash transactions: [https://www.centralbank.ie/consumer-
hub/rounding](https://www.centralbank.ie/consumer-hub/rounding)

Applying rounding was entirely voluntary, and all the Government did was
gradually take the 1c and 2c coins out of circulation. After that, it was a
matter of time for the problem to go away.

~~~
einpoklum
> if you're handling cash you still have to deal with 1c and 2c coins because
> of that.

I don't think so. The same way you don't have to handle sub-1-penny tax
amounts, you won't have to handle sub-nickle tax amounts later. There'll be
some sort of rounding mechanism just like you described.

~~~
talideon
Well, yes. That's why I mentioned the rounding mechanism later. However, US-
style sales taxes make the process of applying that more difficult because you
can end up with weird numbers, whereas with VAT, you can pre-round things to
minimise the disruption.

------
DrBazza
I remember reading years ago that the reluctance to get rid of a penny is
usual the unease in the central bank of a particular country to accept that
the currency has inflated.

I imagine retailers would still price things at £9.95 instead to perpetuate
the 'psychological trick' that "it's not really £10!".

~~~
Ensorceled
They certainly have continued the $xxx9.99 tradition here in Canada.

------
jlengrand
I come from France, where we use pennies and live in the Netherlands where we
don't.

It's always a great deal of fun seeing the family come over and try to hand
over / or wait for their pennies after doing the groceries; struggling to
really understand each other because of the language barrier.

There is something very charming about it .

~~~
wartijn_
You should be able to pay with 1 and 2 cent coins in The Netherlands. You just
won't get them as change and the amount charged will be rounded to the nearest
5 cents in most, but not all, shops. But I wouldn't be surprised if many
cashiers don't know they should accept those coins.

~~~
jlengrand
Interesting. I've tried in quite a few places and never got them accepted.

~~~
wartijn_
Here is the government website that says so and its translation (with a really
long url, but the translation is better than that of Google Translate).

Appearantly every shop should have stickers telling customers that they round
cash payments. I've never noticed that anywhere.

[https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/geldzaken/vraag-
en-...](https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/geldzaken/vraag-en-
antwoord/mogen-winkeliers-betalingen-afronden-op-0-eurocent-of-5-eurocent)

[https://www.deepl.com/translator#nl/en/%20Mogen%20winkeliers...](https://www.deepl.com/translator#nl/en/%20Mogen%20winkeliers%20betalingen%20afronden%20op%200%20eurocent%20of%205%20eurocent%3F%0A%0AWanneer%20u%20contant%20betaalt%2C%20mogen%20winkeliers%20in%20Nederland%20het%20totaalbedrag%20afronden%20op%200%20eurocent%20of%205%20eurocent.%20Zij%20moeten%20wel%20duidelijk%20aangeven%20met%20raamstickers%20of%20kassastickers%20dat%20ze%20de%20afrondingsregel%20toepassen.%0AAlleen%20afronden%20bij%20contante%20betalingen%0A%0AAfronden%20mag%20alleen%20wanneer%20u%20met%20contant%20geld%20betaalt.%20Met%20betaalmiddelen%20zoals%20een%20pinpas%20of%20een%20creditcard%20betaalt%20u%20het%20exacte%20bedrag.%0ARekenvoorbeeld%20afronden%20betalingen%0A%0AHet%20eindbedrag%20op%20de%20kassabon%20wordt%20bij%20contant%20betalen%20afgerond%20op%200%20cent%20of%205%20cent.%20Zo%20wordt%20%E2%82%AC%2023%2C37%20afgerond%20op%20%E2%82%AC%2023%2C35.%20En%20%E2%82%AC%208%2C89%20wordt%20%E2%82%AC%208%2C90.%0A1%20en%202%20eurocent%20blijven%20wettig%20betaalmiddel%0A%0ADe%20munten%20van%201%20en%202%20eurocent%20blijven%20een%20wettig%20betaalmiddel.%20U%20kunt%20met%20deze%20munten%20afrekenen.%20Heeft%20een%20winkelier%20vooraf%20duidelijk%20gemaakt%20dat%20hij%20afrondt%3F%20Dan%20hoeft%20hij%20geen%20munten%20van%201%20en%202%20eurocent%20wisselgeld%20te%20geven).

~~~
jlengrand
Geen vertaling nodig hoor :P. Thanks for the link! I can't say I have seen any
of those stickers either. I'll have a more attentive look in the future

------
tacocataco
All I want is for all paper cash to be plastic so I can wash the covid off of
it. I support getting rid of the penny, but I feel that plastic cash would
make more of a difference.

CGP Grey has a wonderful video on the penny, he is my favorite YouTuber.

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=y5UT04p5f7U](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=y5UT04p5f7U)

~~~
andrewxdiamond
“Paper” cash is actually linen. You can wash it with hot water no problem

~~~
jmcqk6
Everyone knows money laundering is against the law.

------
parenthesis
I'm old enough to remember halfpenny coins here in the UK. I've got a few
someplace that I kept.

When they were withdrawn in 1984, they were worth more than 1.5p in today's
money. The country survived, so I dare say we could safely discontinue 1p (and
2p) coins.

~~~
vmilner
I remember Polo mints going from 4.5p to 5p in ~1975. (I was 7 and such things
were important...). It's curious that the minimum possible percentage increase
then was 11%, but now, when Polo mints are around 60p, the minimum possible
increase is 1.7%. Getting rid of all coins < 5p would return us to the same
"granularity". (And possibly be inflationary.)

------
ipython
Even as far back as the 90s I remember the PX on military bases rounding to
the nearest nickel. Surprised more places don’t do the same.

Ah apparently it’s on overseas bases: [https://www.aafes.com/exchange-
stores/faq/#11](https://www.aafes.com/exchange-stores/faq/#11)

------
zeepzeep
Yes, we don't need such small amounts of money. Just always round up, when
paying and when giving the rest back.

> All those $9.99 products? The prices would be jacked up to an even $10!

Only logical thing, I know this "wow less than 10$" tricks people into buying
stuff, but it's just stupid that it's the default to give me back 1 penny
whatever I buy.

~~~
bruce511
Actually, the pricing of individual items doesn't change. (Not least because
of GST the price you pay at the till is not the sticker price.)

Where I live the 1c and 2c coins were killed some time ago. The smallest coin
now is a 5c.

The way it works is that you go to the checkout, get a final total. If you pay
cash then the change is "rounded up" to the nearest 5c mark. If you pay via
card you pay the exact amount.

It's really not complicated, and frankly no-one cares about it.

------
cascom
I’d rather we do a reverse split of the dollar - say 10:1 - 10 old dollars = 1
new dollar, essentially take us back to 1950’s pricing, coins become relevant
again! + it has the added benefit of undoing all the changes in laws/refs that
were not inflation adjusted. Not holding my breath...

~~~
war1025
If you think about it this way, it really does make a decent argument for
switching larger denominations to coins.

Personally, I just use my debit card for everything and only use cash when the
vendor specifically doesn't allow credit, which is increasingly rare with
square and other methods of taking payment from a smartphone.

------
cgrealy
Do it. In NZ, we got rid of everything below $0.10 and pretty much no one
cares.

That said, a large portion of the country is cashless anyway. I almost never
have cash on me.

~~~
mkl
And we started a long time ago. 1 and 2 cent coins were demonetised in 1990,
$1 and $2 coins replaced notes in 1991, all notes were switched to tough
washable polymer in 1999, 5 cent coins were dropped in 2006 (and most other
coins were reduced in size at the same time). I also almost never use cash.

It's not like we have a low-value currency unit either (e.g. Yen). Prices in
NZ dollars are usually less than double the US dollar price in the US (and our
prices include sales tax and shipping to NZ).

------
crazygringo
Can we get rid of nickels and dimes too?

And standardize on a single sales tax rate across the country?

And then build that into prices instead of being tacked on extra?

Just let everything actually cost increments of $0.25. Let me buy something on
the McDonald's dollar menu with an actual dollar. Not with two dollars and
then dealing with _seven_ chunks of metal in return.

(I mean, as long as we're dreaming. Because if we haven't managed to get rid
of the penny over the past 30 years, I don't see why we'll ever actually
manage to in the future. Sadly.)

~~~
Wohlf
>standardize on a single sales tax rate across the country

My modest proposal, do what Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire, and
Oregon have all done and eliminate it. Sales tax is annoying and regressive.

~~~
jakeogh
I'll take sales tax over income tax; it's unconstutional in more than one way
and an astounding waste of resources. RIP Aaron Russo.

~~~
Dylan16807
> it's unconstutional in more than one way

There was an entire amendment specifically declaring the ability to levy
(unapportioned) income tax. It was sufficiently passed, and overrides
everything else that came before it.

You can't play a game of 'gotcha' and invalidate something like that off the
way you want a word interpreted or some bureaucratic misstep.

~~~
jakeogh
Lets assume the 16th was ratified (it wasnt, but set that aside). One might
ask the IRS Comissioner where the law is, plenty of IRS agents have tried:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNNeVu8wUak](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNNeVu8wUak)

It's also a rather obvious violation of the 5th. The gov does not own us; it's
the other way around.

So far 9 states have removed state income tax completely: AL, TN, FL, NH, SD,
WY, TX, WA, NE. A good start; seems to really bother the authortarians.

~~~
Dylan16807
Where what law is? And something like this can't be undone by being clever.
The intent of congress is for income tax to exist, and so it is enforced by
the executive, under the supervision of the judiciary. That's all that really
matters. And the case law is solid on how to interpret the rules.

The most that could happen is congress going 'oh, that was worded badly' and
fixing the wording.

The 16th amendment cannot be in violation of the 5th. That's not how amending
works.

Also doesn't that argument apply to all taxes? It seems pretty clear that
blocking all taxes was not the intent, based on the rest of the constitution.

> A good start; seems to really bother the authortarians.

Really? I've never seen anyone bothered by that. Sounds fun to watch.

~~~
jakeogh
It's a good doc, check it out.

All taxes: no. Tarrifs for example are... excellent ethical and thoroughly
constitutional.. Otherwise country X can just attack with slave labor.

Inalienable rights aren't called that because they can be overridden.

~~~
Dylan16807
The gap between a sales tax and an income tax is not that big. It's not a
human rights issue.

~~~
jakeogh
Why would the gap be relevant?

Perhaps we should ignore a small % of X Amendment claims? That would be a
small gap right?

The Amendments dont confer rights to the people; they only remind the people
of the things they gov has no power to do. See Amendment 0:

"THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their
adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent
misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and
restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public
confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its
institution."

[https://drexel.edu/ogcr/resources/constitution/amendments/pr...](https://drexel.edu/ogcr/resources/constitution/amendments/preamble/)

~~~
Dylan16807
> Why would the gap be relevant?

Because I can at least understand an argument like "all taxation is theft".

When it's "sales tax is okay, but income tax violates innate rights", that's a
pretty finicky argument. The difference barely matters.

~~~
jakeogh
Inalienable rights and differences in outcome are unrelated things, hence
mentioning tariffs as protection by attack with slave labor. It's the primary
job of a government to protect it's borders, physically and economically.

As that documentary nicely lays out, there is no constitutional law that
anyone can point to on individual income tax. The IRS commissioner admits it.

Recent interview with former IRS agent:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXua-6xr_Kw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXua-6xr_Kw)

She asks in the beginning, "At what percentage is it not slavery?"

------
ryandvm
The US penny is perhaps the most illustrative example of why I am wary that
the US government can do ANYTHING efficiently.

The continued existence of the penny is absolutely ludicrous. Here we have
something that has almost zero economic value to everyone involved. It costs
more to mint them than they're worth. It likely costs more to even transport
or count them than they're worth. It is almost entirely just economic drag on
every transaction that involves them. Yet somehow, we can't find the political
will to _just_ _stop_ _making_ them. Momentum truly is the most powerful force
in politics.

It's sad, because it doesn't have to be this way. I am in favor of socialized
health care. I could even be convinced that some amount of UBI may be a good
idea. I am in favor of a strong social safety net. But the fact that this
country can't even figure out how to stop making a coin that is worthless
tells me that it is probably asking a little too much to expect that the
federal government can competently manage anything as complex as healthcare or
the livelihoods of millions.

~~~
lolsal
> It costs more to mint them than they're worth.

Isn't this largely irrelevant since the producer of pennies makes up for this
when they print any other form of currency?

> But the fact that this country can't even figure out how to stop making a
> coin that is worthless tells me that it is probably asking a little too much
> to expect that the federal government can competently manage anything as
> complex as healthcare or the livelihoods of millions.

The worth of a unit of currency should not be measured by how much it costs to
produce. If we're using that metric a $1 note has just as much worth as a $5
note, and a $20 note is equivalent to a $50 note. A single $50 pays for plenty
of pennies in terms of cost.

I honestly don't know where I stand on keeping/removing the penny, but I do
know from personal experience that counting and saving pennies was useful for
me when I was very poor. I know that rounding down saves the consumer money,
but putting the savings in a jar and treating yourself to something when you
cash in your jar is _something_ of value that is lost.

I don't count pennies these days, but I used to, and I definitely picked up
pennies off the street. Should we design economic/currency policy to 'help'
the poor instead of actually helping the poor? Probably not, but I wince when
I hear people say that pennies are worthless.

~~~
dlivingston
If we assume that it takes 2 seconds to pick up a penny, and you were to pick
up pennies continuously, then you would be “earning” only $18 / hour.

~~~
lolsal
Ok, but if I pick up pennies between my car and the grocery store the
opportunity cost is basically nil, and then after a few months I'd have a non-
trivial amount of cash.

~~~
dlivingston
If you picked up 10 pennies a day, you would only have $3 at the end of the
month. Assuming you are not living in poverty, these sort of hyper-frugal
behaviors are quite interesting to me from a psychological perspective.

------
Symbiote
There's a list of countries which have removed their smallest denomination
coins on Wikipedia.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cash_rounding](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cash_rounding)

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
For one political party in the US, the fact that other countries have done it
is considered proof that it is an anti-American idea.

------
jpkoning
Go for it, America. We got rid of the penny up here in Canada in 2012. Doing
so removed a degree of hassle from everyone's commercial lives.

------
el-salvador
My country uses the US Dollar as currency but since tax is added to prices we
dont use pennies as much as in the US.

* Most prices are given in 5 cent multiples. * The pennies I get are usually from change in supermarkets or from produfts with _.99 prices_ Vending machine and parking machines don't accept pennies

I _do_ find the Dollar Coin annoying, which we use instead of the Dollar Bill.
It's very easy to get lots of dollar coins as change.

I wish we used the $1 and $2 bill though. It would be very useful for the
average transaction amount we have here. Our neighbouring countries all have
bills near that amount.

(Minimum wage $1.78/h)

------
ThePadawan
I moved from a country that has pennies (Germany, so EUR cents) to one that
doesn't (Switzerland, CHF) age 18.

The smallest coin is 0.05CHF. It's still worth enough that you might use a
handful of them to make change for a small amount like, say, 0.40CHF.

Grocery prices either have a resolution of 0.05CHF (all major retailers) or if
not, your bill will be rounded to a resolution 0.05CHF to the customers
advantage (e.g. at Lidl).

I have never ever once missed the equivalent of the 1- or 2-cent EUR coin.
They were a pain to have in your wallet, and an insult to any tip jar or piggy
bank.

I have no rational idea why the concept hasn't caught on more widely.

~~~
undersuit
I guess the question is... do you feel good about wasting one, two, three, and
four?

------
jscipione
There are billions more pennies lying in jars in people's houses than are in
regular circulation. Even if we were to stop minting new pennies today we
could coax the population to turn their pennies in and we wouldn't run out for
centuries to come. There is no shortage of pennies. I don't care what Canada
does, you're not going to take my pennies away.

~~~
coding123
A good way - a single day where each turned in penny gives you 3 "cents" in
exchange. Of course you would be giving out only dollar or higher bills in
such a program.

------
dafoex
I know this is about the US penny, but from a UK perspective I think it'd be
much more useful to kill the two pence piece. Those coins are massive and, in
my experience, never used except to put in those charity buckets. One pennies,
however small their monetary value, at least help you make up odd prices, but
twos are always just too much to make up a £2.47 bus fare.

~~~
jayflux
Most likely both the 1p and 2p would go and prices would be rounded to the
nearest 5p (so you wouldn’t need a penny to make up the odd price). But the UK
govt already said they’re not doing this.

------
OldHand2018
> By the 1990s, Kolbe says, he was introducing new legislation to kill the
> penny with every new session of Congress. But he kept facing resistance —
> for example, from the speaker of the House at the time, Dennis Hastert, who
> represented a district in Illinois, the home state of Abraham Lincoln.
> Lincoln, of course, is on the penny, and Kolbe says that proved to be a
> major roadblock.

I hear this a lot, and I think its a weak argument. The original coinage act
(1792?) authorized a $5 coin. Replace the Lincoln penny with the Lincoln $5
coin; you continue to have a Lincoln coin, you trade a useless coin for one
that will be very useful for the next 100 years, and now all US currency with
Lincoln on it is $5. Win-win-win.

------
donatj
Honestly, I've wondered from time to time what effect (if any, clearly)
penny's having an actual metallurgical value goes towards stemming inflation
and creating not a "gold standard" but rather an accidental "copper and nickel
standard"?

------
tehjoker
It's really funny to talk about the government making or losing money when
producing money ("seigniorage"). It really shows how money is just pretend
numbers and the foundries can create or destroy it at will depending on the
political winds (inflation being good for debtors and deflation being good for
creditors). There's a reason the monied interests are against inflation of
more than 2%, and it's because it would cause the debts logged as assets in
their books to be worth less. Honestly, they would prefer deflation, but they
were forced to accept some inflation as the cost of a growing economy.

------
drapery
One time I was in Krogers and saw a man buying 6 onions with nickels, dimes,
pennies. He took a long time but he bought his onions.

I personally don't care one way or another but those who miss the penny the
most, won't likely get a voice.

~~~
efa
I'm not sure I understand your point. Are you saying getting rid of the penny
would hurt poor people?

~~~
drapery
Yeah pretty much. Most of the poor are unbanked and every penny counts.

------
logicalmonster
My favored strategy would be be to put Harriet Tubman on the penny as the best
path forward. This puts a wanted social change into the culture (Putting a
black person on US currency) without removing any president from existing
bills (Lincoln still stays on the $5) and erasing history. Additionally, the
first black person on US currency should appear on a coin rather than paper
money as they’re harder to deface. Given the media situation in this country,
I’m 100% sure the media will find or invent some disfigured paper bills with
racist slurs to generate controversy and inflame racial tensions even further.

~~~
analog31
I've never understood the "erasing history" thing. Isn't the history the same?
If I deface a penny, am I losing a certain quantity of history?

------
AceyMan
Early on in the current administration I half-joked that it'd all be worth if
if at the end of it we (a) switched to ISO216, (b) bailed on Fahrenheit, and
(c) ditched the penny.

Now _that_ would be a legacy any POTUS could be proud about.

------
baron816
All coins are pretty terrible. When the US was trying to push those dollar
coins, there was an argument that the government would make money by selling
the new coins (through seigniorage), but that argument was counteracted by the
fact that people just wouldn’t use those coins and it would end up sitting in
a jar somewhere rather than in a bank earning interest (the velocity of money
would be reduced).

The government should put less money into designing and minting/printing new
money and instead focus its resources on making the “unbanked” banked. Doing
so through the post office has been talked about for years.

------
Asooka
There is a much simpler solution. Obviously people want their "0.01" coin, so
we should instead envalue the currency. Cancel the dollar, make dollar2.0
which is exactly 10 times as valuable and done. You eliminate everything below
10cents effectively, the metal industry is happy to supply material for new
coins, coin collectors are happy to get new coins, banks are delighted to make
a bit of profit skimming a few dollars off people's accounts when converting
their currency in their databases, everybody[1] wins!

[1] for some fraction of "everybody"

~~~
saalweachter
If you envalue by 100:1 you could probably start making silver dimes, quarters
and dollars again.

------
hilbert42
Australia dropped the copper 'penny' (one cent) along with its two-cent coin
ages ago and nobody complained except for a few electronics people like me who
used them as heat sinks for diodes and other electronic components. (Yuh
simply drill a hole and solder them onto the wire leads of hot components.)

At exactly one cent each, they were much cheaper than their proper catalogue
equivalents, we were left all adrift when our cheap source of coppers ran out.

So guys begin stocking up now while you've still the chance.

------
bane
I've actually found that I virtually never use cash anymore, virtually every
place has a PoS now that accepts some kind of card of digital payment system.
Heck, my favorite BBQ place which is run on weekends out of a vacant gravel
lot uses square.

I also travel overseas a bit, and it's always strange to visit a country
that's pretty cash heavy _Japan_ _cough_ _cough_. But even then we mostly get
by with our credit cards.

------
jchook
In Chile they have 1 peso pieces so small and light you can blow them from
your hand like fairy dust.

The only stores that use them are big chains that operate on enormous
economies of scale, e.g. Hiper Lider.

When backpacking there (on very little $) a homeless person asked me for some
change. I dug into my pocket and offered him some change and he just
lauuuughed at me.

Interestingly, $1 USD = ~800 Chilean pesos in 2020, but was over 2000 Chilean
pesos in 2006.

------
hinkley
The Japanese 'penny' is (was?) made of aluminum. It looked less like currency
and more like a token from a deluxe version of a board game. It was just too
insubstantial.

As we've moved to zinc with a thinner and thinner copper jacket the US penny
has drifted in that direction, but the relief is much more pronounced and
makes it look more 'real'. Probably more expensive to make though.

~~~
patrickmcmanus
a 1 yen coin has a mass of 1 gram - which can be handy for measuring stuff.

------
femto113
Do not understand why we still mint them--there are enough pennies in
existence to last forever, the problem is they are just sitting in jars on
shelves. Instead of minting new ones the treasury (through banks) should just
start buying them for 2 cents each until enough come back into circulation.

~~~
jedberg
Lobbyists is the one and only answer. The zinc lobby is strong.

------
jhoechtl
Wow that text only version is great, can I have that of every website please?
(Without an ad-blocker)

------
aahhahahaaa
Kill every coin except the quarter.

------
manicpolymath
April 10, 2025 is when the penny should cease, so we can commemorate it on
nickel/dime/quarter day 05/10/25\. And yes, it should be April 10 and not
October 05 because this will be an American holiday dang it.

~~~
smileysteve
May...

------
JoeAltmaier
Go further. I haven't used coins in 10 years. Get coins - put them all in the
'penny tray'. Or give them to the cashier. Or hand them to somebody nearby.
All else fails, toss them in the trash as I leave the store.

~~~
jhoechtl
Trashing money is illegal and sounds very unethical to me.

~~~
jcims
Why unethical? You’re giving everyone a small gift of deflation.

~~~
DonHopkins
It's more ethical and efficient to burn paper money, if that's your goal.

------
esturk
One thing this Pandemic brought about is the importance of contactless
payment. Exchanging cash is unhygenic. Signing credit card receipts is
unhygienic. Doing away with pennies should just be a starter.

~~~
fiblye
Replacing all money with copper-coated currency like pennies would probably be
more hygienic, considering copper is one of the most effective anti-microbial
things out there.

------
greggman3
Seems to me it mostly doesn't matter if 95-99% of all transactions go digital.
So basically it's less work to do nothing about the penny because the issue
will solve itself.

------
Uhhrrr
The first time I read a proposal like this I thought it was a terrible idea,
but the penny has lost more than half its value since then. I'm much more
sympathetic now.

------
spartas
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tyszHg96KI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tyszHg96KI)

------
ZacharyPitts
And the nickel, and the dime... and maybe the quarter

~~~
umvi
So the minimum you can pay for something is $0.50?

That kind of stinks... individual fruits and other produce currently cost less
than $0.50. I think $0.10 should be the minimum because then you can just drop
the hundredths digit and prices will be, i.e. "$3.2", "$99.9", etc.

------
shmerl
I'd like this dumb trend to price things with #.99 to go away. It's so
annoying. May be dropping pennies will help that.

------
ShaneMcGowan
No, coin collectors have enough problems as it is

------
inoffensivename
It was time to kill the penny years ago. Australia got rid of one and two cent
coins in 1992 and nobody missed them.

------
all_blue_chucks
The only coins we need are dimes. Round cash transactions to the nearest $0.1.
Make everyone's lives simpler.

------
irrational
But then how would we make souvenir flattened pennies for .26 at tourist
traps?

Seriously, I haven’t used cash in so many years that I literally can’t
remember the last time I touched paper money or coins. Maybe 15 years ago? As
far as I’m concerned, we’ve already transitioned to a 100% digital economy and
there is no longer a need for analog money.

~~~
undersuit
The US Mints could just sell blanks to the tourist traps and they in turn
could raise the price to $1.

I use cash all the time. I like to round out my errands with a beer at a
brewery before biking home. Hand the server a $5 bill when I get the beer, so
fast also a strong tip on the cheapest beers. I'm also forced to use cash when
I purchase my medical marijuana. I drink Americanos when I purchase a coffee,
$2 or $2.25 is pretty reasonable but I sometimes can get the exact change for
a place charging $2.15.

I think digital and physical money has it's uses and I will use cash in my
wallet first because any phone or credit card solution is slower.

~~~
jackson1442
> I think digital and physical money has it's uses and I will use cash in my
> wallet first because any phone or credit card solution is slower.

Surprised you've had that experience, I've always found waiting for the
cashier to make change to be a long and arduous process, while I can simply
tap my watch on the reader or insert my card and move along with my day. Not
to mention that I have no interest in carting around a pocket full of coin
change.

------
FartyMcFarter
I guess it's easier to kill the penny than to divide all prices by a factor of
2.

------
atlgator
I'd rather see us move away from physical money altogether.

------
robbrown451
Pennies are just extra surfaces for coronavirus to ride on.

------
ggm
why not rebase the currency /100?

two upsides:

* we can do counting on our fingers again for shopping

* large numbers of C-list celebreties are no longer millionaires

------
corpMaverick
Yes, please do it. They are just a hassle.

------
crobertsbmw
Yes. Let’s kill the nickel too!

------
uneekone
Yes you are right agreed with you

------
fit2rule
Why kill it?

Why not just re-value it instead?

For example, make its value $1000.

Would maybe be a neat solution to the 1% problem.

~~~
nordsieck
> Why not just re-value it instead?

> For example, make its value $1000.

The US used to have $1000 bills (and $10,000 bills, but those were only for
internal gov't use). I'm pretty sure we're stuck with $100 as the top
denomination to make organized crime more difficult.

Also, it's WAY easier to counterfeit a coin than a bill.

~~~
latch
Singapore & Brunei (1) had a $10000 bill until 2014 (worth ~7400 USD), and
still have a $1000 bill (as does Switzerland with its better exchange rate)

(1) I don't know what the word is (linked?) but their currency is
interchangeable. You can go to a Singapore bank with $100 BND and get $100 SGD
(no fee) and vice versa.

~~~
nordsieck
> I don't know what the word is (linked?) but their currency is
> interchangeable. You can go to a Singapore bank with $100 BND and get $100
> SGD (no fee) and vice versa.

I believe the term is "pegged"[1], although what you describe sounds like it
is much more involved.

___

1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_exchange_rate_system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_exchange_rate_system)

------
gonational
The nickel then becomes the new penny.

This propaganda is part of the inflationary process, which is intended to
increase economic velocity at or faster than the rate of savings, at the
expense of savings.

Soon, a dollar will be thought of the way we think of a quarter, and the
quarter will become the new dime. Decent family homes will cost north of
$2.5MM, and people will say, “back when I was a kid...”.

~~~
undersuit
This comment is at the very bottom of the comments right now and I'm glad I
looked for it.

I agree by killing the penny we essentially force inflation to happen. Bread
priced at $.99 can be sold at $.98 far more easily than bread priced $1 can be
sold at $.95. By removing the penny our jumps become more volatile. Something
increasing in cost by a penny or two might take a product from 99¢ to $1 or
reduce the profit margin a bit now, but when there is no penny the $1 product
that needs to cost 2¢ more is going to cost $1.05.

------
Blueskytech
We shouldn't kill the penny because it is a reminder that our currency has
been inflated and is no longer worth a small fraction of what it once was.
Never forget that pre-1965 coinage besides the penny was made of 90 percent
silver. A face value of 1.40 in pre-1965 dimes and quarters is worth 20.00
today, the fact that a penny, not even made of copper, is too expensive to
make should be concerning.

~~~
arcticbull
(1) Inflation doesn't matter if you're not hoarding cash. By and large, real
estate tracks inflation across the United States. Stock indices exceed
inflation. Inflation doesn't matter to you if you aren't holding cash.

(2) It doesn't matter how we got here, we're here, and it's useless.

~~~
Blueskytech
You are of course correct until Exters pyramid collapses which becomes more
and more a distinct possibility as the currency is debased.

