Canada doing away with the penny, US should follow suit...

[AC0FP]

No No No Hell No: that would mean every time the price went up it must do it a 5 cents at a time. What about taxes Think People. We have 9 cents on the dollar it would automatically go to 10 cents. If a tax increase was needed they would have no choice but to go to 15 cents. Every thing would go up that was $X.95 by a nickel. 5 cents on every thing you buy, go to wal-mart buy 35 items on your grocery list that's 35 nickels. That is $1.75 for those in Rio-Linda as Rush would say. In a years time that would some real money.

This would be just another way to raise taxes!

[KA3TRX]

It is not possible for the United States to abandon the "penny"! There is no such coin minted for use in the United States now and there never has been such a coin minted. The lowest value coin now minted is the United States One Cent Piece! Many years ago, there was the half-cent but that coin has been abandoned for well over a century and a half.

To make a valid argument, and discussion, on eliminating the lowest value coin, one must use the correct terminology!

Glen, K9STH

Around here gasoline is 3.69 and 9/10 cents. I went to the bank and asked for some 9/10 cent pieces but they refused me.

They should eliminate ALL money. That way I wouldn't feel so bad not having any.

[NZ9Y]

.The current dollar coin is a viable coin and vending machines should be REQUIRED to accept it.

(Emphasis added)

Required? There is no requirement that a vending machine take paper money. There is no requirement that one take pennies. If you want to eliminate the vending industry overnight, then REQUIRE that they all take some obscure new coin.

[AB2T]

No No No Hell No: that would mean every time the price went up it must do it a 5 cents at a time.

What about taxes Think People. We have 9 cents on the dollar it would automatically go to 10 cents. If a tax increase was needed they would have no choice but to go to 15 cents. Every thing would go up that was $X.95 by a nickel. 5 cents on every thing you buy, go to wal-mart buy 35 items on your grocery list that's 35 nickels. That is $1.75 for those in Rio-Linda as Rush would say. In a years time that would some real money.

A graphical introduction to swedish rounding as will soon be implemented in the Canadian VAT (national and provincial sales tax) system.

Income tax, which is not paid by cash transaction, will likely be charged to the one-cent. All countries which use cash rounding do not round for debit or credit purchases. The statistical model behind the elimination of low-value coins is not rocket science. The roundings are spaced so that in the end the net value of purchases and net consumer payment has not changed. Any fiscally responsible country has an interest in maintaining a stable inflation level.

Rush Limbaugh does not set the fiscal policy of any nation. Unfortunately he has millions of Americans enthralled to his complete absence of charity and logic. There is nothing to be done about that, sadly.

73, Jordan

[KI4NGN]

No No No Hell No: that would mean every time the price went up it must do it a 5 cents at a time.

What about taxes Think People. We have 9 cents on the dollar it would automatically go to 10 cents. If a tax increase was needed they would have no choice but to go to 15 cents. Every thing would go up that was $X.95 by a nickel. 5 cents on every thing you buy, go to wal-mart buy 35 items on your grocery list that's 35 nickels. That is $1.75 for those in Rio-Linda as Rush would say. In a years time that would some real money.

Not quite accurate. 9 cents on every dollar does not mean that the tax has to go up: 9 cents on one dollar is 90 cents on ten dollars, 9 dollars on 100 dollars, etc.

Only the final total on sales would have to be adjusted for the lack of the penny in our currency.

I'm against it for the problems that would introduce, but there does not have to be an impact on pricing and taxes, just the determination on who benefits from the rounding on the total.

[ZL2MGS]

I quite agree. We had this debate here a few months ago. To those who object, I say come back in a year or two and we'll see if Canada has survived. Smallest coin in New Zealand these days is 10 cents. I think Australia still has a 5 cent.

Yes, and here in NZ I still pay things to the exact cent, regardless of the fact that we have not had a 1 cent coin for many years.

[ZL2MGS]

I'm in favor of keeping the penny because I know that NOTHING will EVER be rounded down. Does anyone really seriously think any cheapskate business is going to round down? It will NEVER happen. And if something is worth 27 cents, why should I pay 30 anyway? Screw that.

It is dumb, however, to spend more than a penny to make a penny, only the government could screw that up. Until that is fixed, we should have a penny drive to encourage penny hoarders to cash in their change jars. That might take some of of the pressure off for a while.

Actually, the way it works here is shops use Swedish rounding, so sometimes the accumulated total is rounded up and sometimes it's rounded down - there is no impact at all on taxes and if you pay by cheque or electronically then you pay the exact number of cents for your purchase - and plenty of things are still priced in something other than an exact multiple of 10 cents (our smallest coin).

[W2ILP]

When I visited Australia there were no penny coins used there. If you paid for anything with cash, it was rounded out to the nearest nickle but if you paid with a credit card the bill was figured to the penny. I think that that will eventually happen here when we will be using some form of credit or debit card for everything that we could possibly buy. Some say that people won't even need credit cards when their eyes, noses or finger prints can be scanned to identify them and linked to their bank.

Wex, w2ilp (I Like Pennies)...Copper is a good conductor of low monitory value unless rare in the form of old coins. Old British and US pennies were once the size of quarters. Those days are surely gone forever...

[K4KYV]

A healthy post-industrialized economy inflates by about 3% a year. Inflation is an important part of a fiat-currency system. There has to be a safety valve to account for the rising relative value of goods and services over time. Planned inflation provides for this natural expansion.

What economic theory tells you that? There is no legitimate excuse for a steadily dwindling buying power of the currency. Goods and services that undergo a real increase in value should simply command a price increase. The prices of goods and services that did not rise in real value should stay the same. Goods and services that lost value should cost less.

For example, a modern car has more intrinsic value than a Model T because it performs better. Therefore it should be more expensive. OTOH, a pair of blue jeans serves the same function to-day is it did in 1945. So why should it cost more; shouldn't the price stay the same? A VHS tape has been rendered obsolete by improved technology. Therefore, it follows that it should cost less than a Blue-Ray or DVD (if anyone still manufactured VHS tapes).

One of the causes is increasing the money supply beyond the total value of the goods and services that exist in the country. More money chasing the same goods and services means each unit of currency has less buying power.

One of the uses of planned inflation, is a gimmick to effectively reduce the national debt. 12 trillion dollarettes is a smaller debt than 12 trillion real dollars that would have kept the same value that they had when the debt was incurred. Planned inflation is a stealth tax imposed on everyone. To add insult to injury, to-day's interest rates on most bank accounts don't even keep up with the devaluation of the dollar. But the meagre interest payment the bank adds to your savings as "interest" is still taxed by the IRS as "income", even though you are really losing money in that account.

Prices of commodities and services will vary due to many market factors including supply and demand, so (real) prices can be expected to have ups and downs. But a nation's currency should represent real buying power, not artificially inflated. The fact that a unit of currency loses a little buying power every day shows that something is fundamentally wrong with the system, and we are being ripped off as a result.

[W5BIB]

None of it makes any "CENTS" to me...