How is it Possible to Have a Coin Shortage?

Back in the day when I would eat out I would drop all coinage as apart of my tip as I hate carrying coins.

what is truly stupid is the number of things that end up 3 cents over a dollar up to about a quarter of a dollar.

Fractional costs actually waste a not insignificant amount of time in the retail space, one would hope retailers would pony up gRab their ears and pull their heads out of their rear and use this as a learning experience to make things cost an even amount of money after applicable taxes
(God forbid)

 

we had a restaurant here that wouldn't give you your change unless you asked for it.

 

I like the Oregon model.

First of all, no sales tax. So, when you walk to the register, you know what something costs you. And, if you are like me, while waiting you already have the exact amount counted out and in hand.

Second, if you shop at Dollar General, nearly all of their prices are "on the dollar," so no need for coins....except for those pesky bottle/can deposits.

 

i like the no tax part

ain't gonna happen in taxachusetts

 

You would think they would do the same with the rest of the land they stole but they still want to steal from everyone to this day.

 

Oregon makes it up with their income tax.

So, Washington state has no income tax.

Oregon has no sales tax.

What bliss if we could combine the two. LOL!

Of course, something has to pay for govt. programs.

If I had my choice, no income tax. Less forms....

 

no income or sales tax when i lived in nh, but property tax? oy vey!

 

i give all my ones to mrs b

 

But how.

TMI here though.

 

Sweden has, without realizing it, been preparing for this for quite a while now: it was reported last year if not earlier that in Sweden more and more stores had signs up saying: "No cash accepted" -- everything has gone electronic.

As for "pennies"... I have read that US one-cent coins actually cost more than 1 cent to manufacture.

Australia got rid of "copper" coins several years ago, and the smallest coin is now a five-cent one; credit/debit-card transactions are for exact amount, but if you use cash, prices are rounded up or down to the nearest 5 cents. No "paper money" either: one- and two-dollar bills were replaced by coins long ago, and banknotes are long-lasting Tyvek with many security features.

 

Amazing, I walked into my local bank with 4 jars of coins all sorted one denomination to a jar. The bank was deserted except for 5 tellers. They proceeded to dump each jar onto a counter and then every teller got to counting the coins. No machine to count coins. There was one to count paper money. They actually had a promotion going that I wasn't aware of before where, if you handed over $100 in quarters, you got a ticket for a drawing awarding a $50 gift card.

So quarters must be the need.

As someone said above, tips aren't recycling coins like they used to. And low income folks or no income folks are holding on to every form of money they can.

I was rewarded by finding a penny on the floor in Walmart later.

 

They can't have my car wash fund. I keep a small baggie of quarters for our vehicle hand wash locations.

You just doubled your CD interest for the year!

 

Fortunately I bought I-bonds instead. They give a fixed amount of interest plus the rate of inflation. Of course with GDP down 39.2% in 3Q20 not much inflation. Though I notice gas is up 25 cents in the last week here.

 

I wish I'd bought more when the fixed rate portion was 3+% in 2000-2001.

 

Actually I should have said my wife bought the I-bonds. At the time, she worked for the treasury and it was good internal politics to be supporting bonds. So every pay day, she bought some, one for her and one for me. Now are we as well off as we would be if we had been buying stock? No. But we sure have slept better knowing all our eggs were not in one basket. Reminds me some of those may be maturing, guess I better check.

 

Interesting. My local carwash has a change machine, or at least the last time I was there it did. It would make change for up to a $20 bill. I wonder if it's still working.

 

A reasonably diversified investment portfolio contains several baskets (and potentially many sub-baskets). The I-bonds are for just one of those baskets.