Change Our Currency's Denominations? - My Latest Coins Rant.

Besides, if we do away with small figures, some corporation will just lobby for a way to keep it on paper, like the oil companies did with the mill, so that they can round prices UP. We'll let them get away with it again too. A politician will be paid off, and we won't say a word.

I put "for it but leave bills alone" but the $1 bill should be trashed. We have dollar coins that we don't use, and the bills have to be printed again and again. But for 1, 5, and $10 to be coins... people would REALLY hate all that jingle weighing them down.

Then again, it would be cool to see a $10 coin, lol

Reounding will likely go upwards no matter what. When a retailer is going to be faced with either losing a couple pennies or gaining 5 - anyone associated with the majority of business will know which way they will go.


I don;t understand the idea of the common man saying, "Please - charge us more money!"




There are many of us put here who do not want, need, or (sometimes) have the means for electronic transactions. In fact electronic transactions likely helped, to a great degree, America going from a society where people OWNED their houses and cars to a perpetual state of debt. I have no credit card debt b/c I pay cash. If I cannot afford it at the moment - I somehow survive in life without the luxury until I can pay cash. I have taught my kids to do the same. Think outside the metropolitan areas - there are a lot of us out here (and loving it ).

@allranger
Changepurses:
My grandfathers and father all used the little, oblong, rubberized change holders that you squeezed to open. I was fascinated (for some reason) with them as a kid. The men's were not very large. I remember my dad coming home from work at night and emptying excess change out on the his dresser to keep the top seam of the holder closed instead of bulging open. The reason I remember this is he had a mechanical bank he let us kids put the excess change in.

ASteve



I am afraid I can toss this right back to you with your response though. I am not sure how much actual experience you had with the transition while I was right there.

The facts of the matter are that any solution to any problem, if done efficiently, is going to follow the scientific method. The number one rule of science and true fact is observation. Only by the reports of eyewitness accounts (written or verbal), can we discern what has happened in the past. How do we know for a fact Romans like chariot races? We get this from the writings of the historians who were there or who were close to that time period.

It is a new "buzzword" tossed around on blogs to naysay the experiences people lived through as "anecdotal" and this somehow is seen as a dismissal of any experience/facts that occurred.

The word anecdotal is defined (online dictionary):
"not necessarily true or reliable, because based on personal accounts rather than facts or research"

So then we come to a fact - what is a fact (same dictionary)?
"a thing that is indisputably the case"

However,, how do we know that these dictionaries did research in order to define these terms? Is the definition the dictionary lists just "anecdotal?"

ANYTHING can be claimed as anecdotal is a person so desires. Its an escape hatch to use (mostly misuse) when faced with an actual occurrence or experience from someone who was there.

So where do we draw the line? Since eyewitness accounts have historically been used for finding the facts of our own history, and these also can be labeled "anecdotal" by someone desiring to do so - then where is fact?

The newspaper articles the Canadians pointed me to are a part of the written history of the people and the mindset of the day. The mindset occurring at the time was recorded by a writer who knew the general masses of Canadian people would know exactly what he was saying when he said it was time to reinforce their pockets yet again.

What this boils down to is that we can call anything anecdotal and choose not to accept it as soon as something has actually been penned/said!

The psychological factor of a dollar being pocket change was something I got from Canadians describing it to me at the time. I did not do a multi-million dollar government project to discern the reality of it at the time. I simply accepted the concept from the Canadian people I was surrounded by and who, b/c I was a coin collector trying to learn of the impact of such a coin, was interested an and struck up conversations about. When I saw the same sentiments being echoed in their news, I just accepted the "anecdotal" evidence as a reality that was happening around me instead of deciding I would not ignore what was happening and put in my own thoughts.




Besides just a gumball - not much by itself. But instead it saves small bits of money here and there so when I pay for a .99 item - adding PA sales tax of .06, I end up not having to shell out 1.10 but can save a nickel. I don;t know, I'm just one of those people who like my own money (no matter how small an amount) to be in my own pocket.

The argument of "well, we are only talking about a few pennies here," is a concept I have never understood b/c over the years these few pennies even add up. But, again, I also am speaking from the position of a person who prefers to stay out of debt (and am besides a house payment) and prefers to pay cash.




Is this anecdotal?

It was not all that long ago that Canadians had to pay a GST and PST (two different taxes) depending on the nature of the item being bought. For example, if nuts were salted when you bought them, they were considered a snack and so you payed both taxes totalling .15 on the dollar. If the nuts were undsalted, they were a healthfood and so the incredibly complicated tax laws only charged you PST. The code was so confusing, that stores simply posted prices including the tax instead of someone having to wait until at the cash register to find what surprises they would come up with in having both taxes, rather than just the one, applied. Many Canadians told me that the code was so ludicrously complicated, they just let retailers/etc. worry about it and paid the prices.

More recently however, the Canadian government decided to get rid of that tax law where people would sometimes not be charged the .07 GST and made it so that everything, all the time, has a .15 tax on it.

Now if this is any indication that costs are lower in Canada now - the definition of the term "lower" needs be examined.

Also, and any Canadian will know what I mean, the staple of the Canadian diet - a double double or triple triple (dare go for a quad quad?) - definitely has been increasing over the years.

There are a lot more factors going into Canadian pricing and rising of costs that would take another book. Overall, their prices are not down anymore than our own are. Ask any Canadian about milk, meat, and gas prices and see how far "down" they are.



Another comment was made about hoarding pennies here. Are you aware that Canadians say they end up hoarding Loonies/Toonies instead of carrying a lot of them around? I believe it was a CCF member who wrote that he didn't like carrying them so he put them in a jar and cashed them in at the end of the year. I know my other Canadian friends do the same.

They throw their "pocket change" into a jar and cash it in at the end of the year.



Banks still need to pay to ship these in to exchange for larger bills. People with any vending machine business do the same. These were the people who incur the larger costs and pass it on to consumers.


In the 70s, my grandfather's private business involved taking close to 1000.00 each week to the bank (not keeping it ). An online inflation calculator says this would be 10.400.00. So if there were no paper bills, since the dollars come in one at a time (like in vending machines), the people having similar businesses would be toting around 10,400 at 8.1 grams each or 176.8 pounds. vs. 22.93 pounds of paper.

I guess if a person were Bruce Banner this would not make a difference. I am glad that when my grandfather got older, and still loved his business, at 70, he did not have to tote around this much weight.

When people have a choice - they are better off. technically the government claiming they are saving taxpayer dollars (when they miss some of the actual costs incurred), they are saying that the people are benefiting. Since the taxpayer money came from the people anyway, and the government sure is not going to return any of the "savings" to the people, let the people have their own way.

What the entire crux of this boils down to is whether or not the American government should force us the people to do something that is not necessarily as clear cut a "savings" as the governmental studies have said.

What is so horrible about people having choices? Especially since trying to compute actual savings is a lot more complex and a lot more troublesome.

I admit I personally never will understand someone willing to give the government the OK to force anything on the people. Its part of why America was founded - getting out from under an oppressive system when the actual outcome is not going to really be all that much better for the common good.

"Should" is a good term in this case. What will happen in practice? Its all speculation. Trends from history of human nature unfortunately favor the little guy being the one who pays.


Let's face it, people cannot even make change without a calculator/computer anymore - would hey really notice?




In the day we live in, the people are told black is white and believe it.

I do not remember any point in my life I wanted to carry change around. For me it has always gone in a jar. I think once paper currency gets to the point of being trusted, it naturally displaces heavier items.

In your new world, if I purchase some items and it came to 41.20 I would get ( I suppose ) three dimes, a half dollar, three one dollar coins, a five dollar coin, and a ten dollar coin.

Now I either carry around these coins for buying power, or put almost 19.00 in my piggy bank at the end of the day. I don't care for either scenario.

Or... I can get three dimes, I throw them in my piggy bank that night.
And I still have 18.00 in my wallet, not weighing down my pocket at all. And you know, for me 18.00 is still a good amount of money.

1. Get rid of the penny and nickel.
2. Have all higher denomination coins bi metallic, they are harder to counterfeit.
3. All notes should be co polymer, they last up to 5 times longer than paper notes, and are also much harder to counterfeit.
4. Have coins of 10 cents, quarters, half dollars, dollars, and 5 dollars. Coins last MUCH longer than notes.
5. Largest coin need not be more than 25mm diameter nor weigh more than 10 grammes.
6. Lowest note denomination 10 dollars.
7. State taxes should be included in the final sale price, not added on, which produces the current inconvenience of hoarded small change.

With such a system, to U.S. Treasury would save squillions per year in currency manufacturing and distribution costs.
All business in the Country would squillions on low value sales costs. The states' tax systems would need minor adjustment to accommodate rounding on low value sales.

Polymer notes were also mentioned on another thread dealing with this issue. I think it might be a good way to keep everyone happier. Make the coins and let people who want them use them. But also let the people who prefer bills have polymer notes.

Who knows? The ACTUAL savings by making polymer notes may be closer to fact than studies that missed some of the problems. The only people who would not be totally happy are those that, for some reason, have a desire to have implemented their own personal desires.

Personally, I don't want them to get rid of the dollar coins or the bills b/c, as a coin collector, I like the variety. But I admit, after being around a few years, I do not like to see unnecessary changes forced upon me. If it was ipso facto that the coins were actually going to be a HUGE savings, then I could better see them getting rid of paper. But even in this there are still debates as to whether or not the savings will be as large as they say due to other factors besides those mentioned already - like adding in dollar devaluation over the amount of time to actually see the "saved" taxpayer dollars etc.

What looks logical on paper (no pun), can easily have no actual bearing on the reality of the situation.

And the concept no more small paper bills can be said to be "working" in other countries - but all that means is that they switched over. Whether or not the actual savings would be realized, and the people be happy with it, would indicate a true "working" solution for us.

@coinskelly
The point of the matter of not wanting the dollar coins has to do with physical issues of the convenience of paper vs toting metal. This was also the only reason I was ever given as a kid as to why people did not carry around half dollars - they were a nuisance for size/weight in the pocket. And albeit the small dollar coins are less in size than JFK's, as can be shown by visiting Canada, it is not uncommon for the consumer to end up with lots of Loonies and Toonies.

The only way to make them acceptable and keep everyone happy, is to simply alter the gravitational constant (plaent-wide of localized) so the coins' weight becomes similar to the current weight of a dollar bill. - then no one would notice them.


Something that also, always comes in the back of my mind when these discussions start up.

I do not know - but always assumed that paper bills were introduced for the very reasons stated here - weight issue. Silver dollars were a lot larger back then so this made sense.

But, bear with me as I enter the sci fi realm. I can also imagine a scenario of an alternate universe where the only thing ever made for lower denominations than 5.00 were coins. Then Mr. Make M. Polylinen comes up with a bright idea of using polymer/"paper" sheets to get rid of the "annoying" heavier coins" from a persons' pocket.

The government releases a study showing they would be "saving taxpayer dollars" b/c now people would stop leaving their money-in coin form - home in jars. The result would be the mints' product would actually be used, and not taken out of circulation. So less production of money would be required and the taxpayer dollars are saved.

Stepping out of the realm of fantasy, if the above scenario had been our actual reality, it seems to me (note that phrase) a scenario like this would not be hard to make a case for in today's society.

Well...