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The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

cnn.com

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Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#101

Post by totallykvothe »

nayuki wrote: post #20

We eliminated pennies in Canada in 2012 and the transition was a non-issue. The vast majority of retailers would round cash transactions to the nearest $0.05, but a few would round down to the nearest $0.05 in favor of the customer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Withdrawal_of_low-denomination... Canadian cash is better than American cash in several ways: No penny, durable polymer banknotes (instead of dirty wrinkly c…

I'll agree on all but one point. The cotton/linen notes feel so much better in the hand than the candy wrapper plastic of Canadian bills. I know it's a dumb reason, but I just hate the feeling.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#102

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

giantg2 wrote: post #79
simonw wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In addition, the law covering the federal food assistance program known as SNAP requires that recipients not be charged more than other customers. Since SNAP recipients use a debit card that’s charged the precise amount, if merchants round down prices for cash purchases, they could be opening themselves to legal problems and fines, said Jeff Lenard, spokesperson for NACS.

So how do they account for people who use coupons or rewards cards today? Those create a discount that technically result in charging some customers less than others, including SNAP users. In the case of rounding, you wouldn't be charging SNAP user any more that other users who use cards for payment. The point of the law was to prevent stores from charging surcharges etc on food stamp users back in the day.

Rewards are taken from merchant fees. The retailer isn't party to that rebate. Likewise, coupons are almost always funded by the manufacturer who returns those monies to the store.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#103

Post by phantasmish »

thayne wrote: post #56

I'm a little worried this will encourage vendors to increases prices up to the next 5 cent mark, which will cause inflation that we really don't need more of right now.

Gas stations price to the tenth of a penny per gallon. There is no 1/10 cent coin. Works fine.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#104

Post by revicon »

nayuki wrote: post #20

We eliminated pennies in Canada in 2012 and the transition was a non-issue. The vast majority of retailers would round cash transactions to the nearest $0.05, but a few would round down to the nearest $0.05 in favor of the customer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Withdrawal_of_low-denomination... Canadian cash is better than American cash in several ways: No penny, durable polymer banknotes (instead of dirty wrinkly c…

There are several US states where, by law, retailers are not allowed to give preferential treatment to credit card paying customers over cash paying ones. Which means, in those states, retailers will be required to always round transactions to the cash paying customer's benefit, where in other states the retailer is allowed to round to the nearest 5 cents. This is going to cost large retailers millions.

Interestingly many of them had already put the work into updating the cash register software to allow for this due to the penny shortages during covid.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#105

Post by [deleted] »

ianferrel wrote: post #48
simonw wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The linked article raises a few problems that the US could have with that solution: > Four states - Delaware, Connecticut, Michigan and Oregon - as well as numerous cities, including New York, Philadelphia, Miami and Washington, DC, require merchants to provide exact change.

This seems like a non-issue as long as they round the price down. Because there's no law that the store can't discount their total by a small amount and then provide exact change. "Congratulations customer, we have a special coupon today for $0.03 off your purchase. Here's your change :)"

[deleted]

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#106

Post by MrZander »

thayne wrote: post #57
ianferrel wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Setting prices to avoid the need for pennies is probably technically challenging given the combination of requirements to post prices and sales taxes that don't always round the same way. If the effective tax rate is 7.432%, you can price single items so that the price plus tax ends up in a multiple of $0.05, but if you get a purchase with multiple items, you either need to round somewhere or post prices that are lik…

sales tax should be charged per item, not for the total transaction, so that it's possible to list prices that include the sales tax.

Sales tax varies by state/county/city. It is generally not cost-effective to have each individual store label all their products with local sales taxes applied.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#107

Post by throw0101d »

So Obama wanted to wanted to ban the penny, but it was deemed illegal to do so and efforts to get rid of the law requiring it did not pass:

* https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/02/10/trump-us-mi...

* https://www.local3news.com/obama-wants-to-retire-the-penny-b...

It's not that keeping the penny around is (necessarily) a good idea, but that there are, you know, laws, and people (including the President and cabinet folks) should kind of follow those laws. So has the law been amended to not require the minting of the penny anymore?

* https://abcnews.go.com/US/trumps-order-scrap-penny-make-cent...

* https://www.npr.org/2025/02/10/nx-s1-5292082/trump-penny-min...

Is there some 'new interpretation' that has been 'found' that allows Sec. Treasury to not mint pennies? Or is this change one made by fiat / executive order?

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penny_debate_in_the_United_Sta...

There's only semi-consideration been given to this; the retailers want official rules passed on how round should be done

* https://www.rila.org/focus-areas/finance/main-street-busines...

For example, one subtly:

> Ensure rounding for cash customers does not violate terms of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The SNAP program sensibly requires that SNAP customers cannot be treated differently than other customers.2 These provisions prohibit treating SNAP customers less favorably or more favorably than other customers. That means that rounding the price of food for a cash customer in either direction risks creating a violation of SNAP regulations for stores that participate in the SNAP program.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#108

Post by FredPret »

stetrain wrote: post #85
SoftTalker wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't know why we don't get rid of nickels and dimes as well. What can you still buy that costs less than $0.25?

Yes, the quarter is pretty much the smallest useful unit of US currency and even that usefulness is shrinking pretty quickly. If we would adopt a policy of including local sales tax in advertised prices, skipping to whole dollars would be pretty painless. The main reason to keep at least quarters is all of the various coin-op machines that are still in service.

The US has too many tax permutations for this to be practicable. Companies would have to make prices a bit higher to accommodate unexpected sales tax increases in some or other jurisdiction.

There's a small industry that specializes in knowing what the sales tax for a particular transaction should be at the moment it goes through.

Re: The last-ever penny will be minted today in Philadelphia

#109

Post by bongodongobob »

revicon wrote: post #104
nayuki wrote: post #20

We eliminated pennies in Canada in 2012 and the transition was a non-issue. The vast majority of retailers would round cash transactions to the nearest $0.05, but a few would round down to the nearest $0.05 in favor of the customer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Withdrawal_of_low-denomination... Canadian cash is better than American cash in several ways: No penny, durable polymer banknotes (instead of dirty wrinkly c…

There are several US states where, by law, retailers are not allowed to give preferential treatment to credit card paying customers over cash paying ones. Which means, in those states, retailers will be required to always round transactions to the cash paying customer's benefit, where in other states the retailer is allowed to round to the nearest 5 cents. This is going to cost large retailers millions. Interestingly…

It doesn't cost anyone anything. They can just raise prices 3 cents or whatever.
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