Dollar Coin

[eljefino]

Trays in most cash registers have four bill slots and four coin slots.

To introduce a dollar coin, one should simultaneously stop stamping out pennies and make their acceptance optional. Have a sign on the shop entrance saying "no pennies" and round to the nearest nickel. Stuff will be $1.95 before tax instead of $1.99 so no loss there.

Since dollar bills will be worn out within a year, make that slot good for $2 or $5 bills... if fivers, then the leftmost slot can be $50s. Now they don't have to stash big bucks under the coin tray.

Cash is great at restaurants for splitting bills. Why waitresses don't do seperate checks. Most people just have $20s, eg, "Yuppie food stamps" and the tip winds up being outrageous. One can blow through $100 in hard earned small bills making change for everyone at the table.

 

[Shannow]

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Now, think what you want about the penny, IMO removal of it from circulation will result in all businesses taking advantage of the situation and pricing everything so that the final valuation is always rounded up to the next 5c in the final price, or else they would likely simply round up the original price to the next 5c, making everything more expensive for no real reason. Pennies, you say? well add an extra 2.5-4c onto every single item you buy, and see how fast it translates into extra dollars... Im sure retailers are chomping at the bit to get rid of pennies.. Im not so sure.

JMH

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I was dead against removal of 1s and 2s when they did it here, for exactly the same reason, but the way that it was worked was that 6s and 7s round down, and 8s and 9s round up (unless paying credit card, when you pay the exact amount).

On the whole, I have as many grocery bills round down as round up.

An enterprising destitute guy used it to his advantage by buying single button mushrooms at a time. They were 2c each, and therefore cost him zero.

 

[oilyriser]

6's and 7's round down?

 

[Dark Jedi]

I know at military bases over seas dont do pennies. they just round. they said they loose money shipping pennies back to the US.

I like the dollar coin idea alot. while I was in the air force and went on a TDY to Fairford England. they gave me a coin and I was like whats this. they said 1 pound. I was like dont you have 1 pound bill. they was like the no and the coin is easier. I wasnt open minded to this but after a few days I loved it. I liked not having to pull my wallet out every single time to pay for something and everyone sees how much money I had. just reach in the pocket and pay and get out. I was sad leaving england and their money system. even though I didnt understand having a 1 penny then also have a 2 pent peice(SP)

but dollar coins would make life easier in the states. its just we dont like change and if we got rid of the bill. then washington wouldnt have a bill with his face on it. I would think alot of americans wouldnt liek the idea of the founding father not having his face on a bill. even though they wouldnt care before hand.

 

[JHZR2]

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About 100 years ago in the US the 1/2 penny coin was dropped, leaving the penny the smallest denomination. If you adjust for inflation, a penny 100 years ago has about the same value as a dime today. So yes, dropping both the penny and the nickle would make sense.

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The half penny was dropped in 1857 , when they want from large cents and halves to just small, thick (through 1864) Cu-Ni cents (1856 if you count the first copper-nickel flying eagle cents). They tried making small substitute pennies as far back as 1837, at least... but they never took.

They made 2c and 3c pieces of various compositions, 20c pieces, as well as $1 gold coins, $2.50 and $3 gold coins.

We have a lot of neat old coinage that never took. Maybe it is time to re-evaluate the 2c or 3c piece in 'penny' form (more inline with its value), as well as a $2.50 coin, and bring back the double eagle, half eagle, and quarter eagle. The double eagle could be of composition and size like an Ike dollar, half eagle the size of a half dollar, etc., etc. maybe all duoble metal compositions. Since $20 counterfeiting is apparently a bigger and bigger problem, having $20 coinage in addition to (less circulated) $20 bills might help a bit.

Heck, these days they could make 'less than metal value' double eagles and half eagles out of a 90% or 40% silver alloy, to give them more clout and people a feeling of value for their money, encouraging use...

JMH

 

[Shannow]

JHZR2, I seriously doubt that any modern Govt really wants the currency to reflect the intrinsic value of the materials that produce it.

 

[Shannow]

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6's and 7's round down?

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any bill that ends in 1, or 2, gets rounded down to 0.
3, 1nd 4 round up to 5.
6, and 7 round down to 5.
8, and 9 round up to 10.

 

[JavaMan]

"Why have dollar coins been a failure so far?"

I think our coins have to have be made of silver, gold, platinum or whatever that has a value. Making coins out of virtually worthless metals, well, they have no value.

 

[moribundman]

Dollar coins have been a failure because nobody ever bothered designing one that was practical. Look at the huge Liberty dollar the guy at the corner store gave me today. Going by its size it should be a ten dollar coin! Dollar coins are either too big, too small, too thin, too thick -- what's up with that?

Trivia: Do you know the English word "dollar" comes from "Taler" (old German coin)?

 

[rpn453]

I like our loonies and toonies better than $1 or $2 bills.

I'd like to see pennies, and maybe even nickels, disappear.

 

[tom slick]

slightly

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I know at military bases over seas dont do pennies. they just round. they said they loose money shipping pennies back to the US.

I like the dollar coin idea alot. while I was in the air force and went on a TDY to Fairford England. they gave me a coin and I was like whats this. they said 1 pound. I was like dont you have 1 pound bill. they was like the no and the coin is easier. I wasnt open minded to this but after a few days I loved it. I liked not having to pull my wallet out every single time to pay for something and everyone sees how much money I had. just reach in the pocket and pay and get out. I was sad leaving england and their money system. even though I didnt understand having a 1 penny then also have a 2 pent peice(SP)

but dollar coins would make life easier in the states. its just we dont like change and if we got rid of the bill. then washington wouldnt have a bill with his face on it. I would think alot of americans wouldnt liek the idea of the founding father not having his face on a bill. even though they wouldnt care before hand.

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When I was in the middle east AAFES issued their own paper coins, no metal coinage. They had cool pics of tanks, helos, guns, great military stuff!

 

[Papa Bear]

Eljefino said "Trays in most cash registers have four bill slots and four coin slots."

The tray in our cash register at the store has 3 bill slots and 6 coin slots.

 

[oilyriser]

If there were $1, $2, $4, $8, and $16 coins, you could make up any amount up to $31 by carrying just one of each coin.

 

[TallPaul]

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The tray in our cash register at the store has 3 bill slots and 6 coin slots.

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Yep, the Canadian version cash register drawer.

 

[javacontour]

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6's and 7's round down?

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When you are doing nickels, yeah.

The PX/BX did this in Germany when I was over there in the late 80's early 90's. No pennies.

So something that rang up to $1.97 would take $1.95 to purchase and something that rang up to 1.98 would take $2.00 to purchase when rounding to the nearest nickel.

 

[Papa Bear]

Clicked a pic of my cash register this morning .... quite colourful.

 

[CivicFan]

For some reason, the ugliest notes I've seen are the new US dollar bills. The old ones were quite nice and dignified.

 

[Papa Bear]

CivicFan, you will have to remove that photo. You aren't allowed to say G0D here.
Your bill must say "In *** We Trust"

You don't see G0D on our Canadian bills...we have the Queen instead.

 

[JavaMan]

"The most recent dollar coin always worked to my advantage, as people gave it to me as change when they thought they were giving me a quarter."

Yep, that's why I don't use them. There needs to be a discernible size difference. I can see a 1,5,10 etc.. on a paper bill, but, for me it's easy to mistake a quarter size dollar for a quarter.

 

[BrianWC]

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Ugh, not again. This is the fourth time in my short lifetime the feds have tried another $1 coin. Kennedy dollar, Liberty dollar, Sacagawea dollar and now this one.

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Kennedy was a half dollar. For the first ten or so years of my life, I think I got Kennedy $.50 pieces on every remotely special ocassion. In rarer instances, I got $2 bills or Eisenhower dollars.

I really didn't mind the Sacagewea dollars at all. Just never saw enough of them.