[ECHOES]

I saw a news segment about the penny. Pesty things, aren't they? I think so anyway.

It costs 1.7 cents to make a penny!!

You can't buy anything for a penny. :head_slap:

The person being interviewed said we keep them because they are part of our history; it was the first coin to honor a president. (as the song "Pennies from Heaven" played in the background)

I think they make us think of our childhood, simpler times. When I was a kid you coulc buy several pieces of candy for a penny, a whole little paper bagful for a quarter!

What did you buy for a penny?

Should we keep the penny or get rid of it?

... and btw, it costs nearly 10 cents to make a nickel...

[Perna]

I mostly bought penny candy. But pennies add up. I was impressed with a book I read that said, if someone wants to give you a million dollars in pennies, tell them where to deliver it on your lawn (you can pay someone to roll it or deliver it to the bank if need be) as it's still a million dollars. The New Ageish book's point was that people look down on, won't pick up a penny in the street, but if you don't pick up a penny, why should the Universe entrust you with more? You have to care about the small stuff before the big stuff will come.

[ECHOES]

hmmm. yes but.. we used to have half-pennies too. we are doing okay without them

[splitimage]

I think they're a necessity - without them to deal with odd numbers created by sales taxes, merchants most likely simply round up, and it all adds up. I've taken to periodically cleaning out my wallet and dumping excess change into a jar (largely pennies) about once a year I have a rolling day to take the change to the bank. Last time it was over $150. Small change does add up.

--splitimage

with sales tax the way it is you have to have pennys
or things would not be able to be marked odd numbers.
as 9.98
and so on.....

[ECHOES]

right. everything would be in increments of 5 cents.

no more digging out 3 or 4 pennies. you'd either have the nickel or not.

much simpler to me... for everyone involved..

[mandazzle]

I hate pennies they're so annoying. In my garage we have a huge container filled with pennies.

[jacq10]

have you seen those new machines at some banks? You can bring in all your change that you have, and you put it on this conveyor-belt thing and it counts it for you, gives you a receipt, and you can re-deem it at the teller for CASH!

So keep those pennies (or dimes or nickels) they can add up!

[chalmette70043]

I got loads of Katrina pennies. Anybody want them.

[Mark_C]

Who needs pennies? They just keep 'em around so the FBI can get everybody's fingerprints. It's a damn conspiracy.

No but seriously, try telling any major corporation that pennies don't add up when they round up that extra cent on the tax on every transaction.

Example: If something is 43 cents for instance, it should be 45.58 cents with a 6% sale tax. So you pay 46 cents. That extra .42 of 1 cent goes into the company's pocket.

When I worked at CVS Pharmacy, I saw a report that showed that the company made about $20,000 a year that way. That was about my yearly salary at the time. That's why they don't want to get rid of pennies for real.

An old rhyme I know would be useless without a penny so keep the penny to save a rhyme....

See a penny pick it up and all day long you will have good luck.

[Perna]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
jacq10 said:
have you seen those new machines at some banks?

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post"> And grocery stores. I turned mine in and got $124 credit with Amazon (the ones not in one's own bank charge a "fee" if you want the money but if you get a gift cert/credit with certain stores, they give you all the money). I could do that all day, have already started saving for my next one.

We had one cent pieces that cost something like two point five cents to make. We had two cent pieces that cost something like five cents to make too.

Got rid of 'em.

Now our smallest coin (talking about both NZ and Australia here - even though we have different currencies) is five cents.

What do we do?

We use the Swedish rounding system.

if it costs one or two cents then you round down.
if it costs three or four cents then you round up.

When you buy in the supermarket (or whatever) they add it all up together and THEN apply the swedish rounding system on the total. It isn't done on every single item (which would of course have more impact). Works well, I think.

I kept finding pennies in my wallet when I was in the US. Liked to dump them in the 'leave a penny take a penny' jar, but aside from that...

[ECHOES]

yeah they can add up.. .but so would nickels... and even faster!

[sarahlilianne]

I remember the pennies we would save till Halloween to put in the UNICEF banks! At that time you could get 3 little licorice candies for a penny. We also use to wear pennies on our lofers for luck!
Lily