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Canadian_Nickle
Penny Hoarding Member
Canada
938 Posts |
 Posted - 09/28/2006 : 00:07:06
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Poll Question:
Farewell, my lovely penny
By EARL MCRAE -- Sun Media
2006-09-27 04:28:31
Jar full of coins (Photodisc/Getty Images)
OTTAWA -- Penny Psychosis. What's happening to us? I was in a store and a guy accidentally dropped a penny, and he knew he dropped it, and he didn't pick it up, he walked out, he couldn't care less.
Worse: Neither did I.
I didn't pick up the penny, I left it there lonely and abandoned, and you want to know something? It bothered me. Because I remembered.
I remembered when I'd never have done that. I remembered when I considered a penny precious money. I remembered: Find A Penny, Pick It Up, And All The Day You'll Have Good Luck. A penny was a wonderful little thing.
When I was 12, I found a penny on the sidewalk. It was a great feeling. That night, when the girl I was interested in let me hold her hand for the first time, I credited my good luck to the penny.
I had that penny for a few years until, horrifyingly, I lost it, and even though bad luck sometimes visited me, I never blamed my penny for losing its touch, I figured it was just resting, but I always credited my penny for any surprising good luck that came my way.
I don't know whatever became of my lucky penny, but if it fell through a hole in my pocket I hope somebody else found it, picked it up, and discovered the good luck through it that I did.
Today, ladies and gentlemen, the once beloved Canadian penny has become a social outcast. It is probably heading the way of the New Zealand penny and the Australian penny. Those countries eliminated them from circulation in 1987 and 1990 respectively. This summer, legislation was introduced in the U.S. Congress to dump the American penny.
KILLER'S LUCK
I despair for Brian Kilrea, GM and head coach of the Ottawa 67's. If the penny goes, what'll he do? Nobody in the world is better at finding pennies than Brian Kilrea, who picks them up because he says they bring him good luck.
Until then, until the penny is no longer, I'll just have to live with my guilt which, I must confess, is becoming less and less.
I can't stand a pocket full of pennies. I can't wait to get rid of them. If I'm in a store and something comes to, say, $2.35, I'll drop down a toonie and -- even though I have a quarter and a nickel -- 35 pennies while the clerk gives me a look that could kill.
Some shops display little trays containing pennies that customers have left because they don't like pennies, either, and if you have to make up a penny or two for what you've bought, the clerks, who also can't stand pennies, will let you use the pennies the customers couldn't stand.
More and more, however, if something comes to a penny or two more than what you have, the clerk, detesting pennies, will let it pass. And more and more, customers (I'm one of them) will say "It's okay, keep it, that's fine" if an item comes to one or two cents below the toonie or loonie they've given the clerk. Anything to get rid of the dreaded pennies.
HELPING KIDS
That's why I like going to Tim Hortons. For the coffee, but also for their coin collection boxes on the counters. They're full of coins, mostly pennies, from people culling their herds of pennies. The money in the boxes goes to the Tim Hortons Children's Foundation Camps.
That's terrific, but if you're like me, you're not putting your pennies into the boxes of the 2,600 TH outlets across Canada to send underprivileged kids to the six camps (five in Canada, one in the U.S.) every summer, you're doing it to blessedly get rid of your pennies.
I phone Dave Newnham, executive director of the foundation.
"Dave, how much money is raised through your counter coin boxes?"
"Last year, $5 million. Not all pennies, but it's mostly pennies."
"FIVE MILLION BUCKS? Wow. Still, that's a LOT of pennies."
"It is. Twelve thousand kids went to our camps."
"Dave, I have a question. Who's the poor soul who has to roll all those coins?"
He laughs. "We have people at the foundation who roll them and they're deposited at the bank."
Dave Newnham says the pennies are pivotal to the funding of these special camps. That's good news for my pennies-dumping guilt complex, but still not enough to make me pick up a penny on the ground and save it for a TH box.
It happened to me yesterday. I saw a shiny penny lying in a parking lot. I walked on by. One more damn penny I do not need. Not even if it was a penny from heaven. Not even if it had magic in it.
The Canadian penny.
The last roll call is coming.
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Frugi
Administrator
USA
627 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 00:29:26
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The US cent should be around at least until and beyond 2009 since it has been decided it will be getting a makeover in that year. A complete design change. As long S doesnt HTF pennies will still be made. they are the primary tool to measure inflation, and as far as US cents go people say federal reserve loses money on each zinc cent made, well they also make $0.08 for every dime made, $0.19 for every quarter made, and so on ----these figures are based on what the FED sells the coins to the US banks for.
Real Eyes Realize Real Lies |
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81 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 02:20:50
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i dont think the penny is going anywhere. or at least someone can figure out a way to round everything to the nearest nickel without overcharging customers.
fact is state tax is the cause for the penny to still be around. if it werent for that the penny would be gone IMO. so would the nickel and maybe even the dime. |
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143 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 02:41:34
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| i think the canadian government should allow the copper pennies Tim Horton collected to be melted, and thus more money is raised, and sold back to the mint; same for the pure-nickel nickels too |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 11:37:35
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I expect we will see a steel or aluminum cent in the near future. Most likely aluminum because they could tint them a copper color. The nickel will go that way too.
________________________
If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it. -Napoleon Hill |
Edited by - Ardent Listener on 09/28/2006 11:38:34 |
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81 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 13:54:59
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they make aluminum cents im hoarding those too.
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pencilvanian
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
2209 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 16:28:12
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The Euro cent is copper plated steel, so steel plated cents could be in the future.
I wonder if they will ever make a "paper penny," put a one cent postage stamp on a piece of cardboard to use as a cent, like many did during the Civil War/War Between the States.
I doubt a counterfieter would Bother turning out a fake cent, made of metal or paper. |
Edited by - pencilvanian on 09/29/2006 20:45:58 |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 09/28/2006 : 18:22:40
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I have seen people send postage stamps in the mail to pay for small debts.
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If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it. -Napoleon Hill |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 09/29/2006 : 09:33:04
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Looks like they will goo with steel coins.
Price of making money going up.
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Price of making money going up
Business First of Buffalo - 7:32 AM EDT Thursday
by Elizabeth Carey
Business First
Gibraltar Industries is keeping a close eye on the U.S. Mint, which is slated to end its fiscal year on Saturday, September 30th.
"This year, because of what happened with the metal to make the penny and nickel, they'll lose $40 to $50 million just making pennies and nickels," said Ken Houseknecht, vice-president of communications and investor relations for Gibraltar. Houseknecht estimates the U.S. penny costs 1.2 or 1.3 cents to make and the nickel 5.7 or 5.8 cents, due to rising metal prices.
Gibraltar has an interest in coin production because it rolls steel for the Canadian Mint. Steel processed at the metals plant on Military Road is used in Canadian pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters. It's only a small portion of Gibraltar's business, but it requires a lot of teamwork and intense processing to meet strict guidelines.
"A coin has got to be precise weight, thickness and hardness," Houseknecht said. "So that it works effectively in all applications, like a vending machine." Last year, Gibraltar was named supplier of the year by the Canadian Mint.
Company officials say the U.S. could save money by changing the composition of U.S. coins and using steel. That would require an act of Congress, but it wouldn't be the first time. In 1943, the U.S. made steel pennies during WWII. The current penny composition has been in place since 1982.
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If you can conceive it and believe it, you can achieve it. -Napoleon Hill |
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pencilvanian
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
2209 Posts |
Posted - 09/29/2006 : 20:29:38
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If steel cents are in our future,
1. All copper and zinc pennies will be hoarded because coin collectors will want them (obsolete coins, especially in no longer used metal, always brings a good price)
2. Metal detector hobbyists will have to get a new machine to locate “good” steel from junk steel, or else go looking for coins with a strong magnet
3. They will have to copper coat the new cents like they do in Europe, since the mint remembers what happened when they made steel pennies in 1943, everybody thought they were dimes!
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73 Posts |
Posted - 10/01/2006 : 07:15:09
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quote:
Originally posted by Ardent Listener
I have seen people send postage stamps in the mail to pay for small debts.
Not to go off topic but that just reminds me of when my brother had like a $0.27 long distance bill an the university he was attending, they sent 3 or 4 reminders for him to pay that bill, each reminder cost $0.34 each (or whatever the cost of the stamp was back then) so basically they spent more buying just one stamp to notify him of the bill when it would've been cheaper wipe that debt clean. Instead they paid quadruple the cost of the bill by sending him several notices to pay up...just thought that was funny. |
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Which will disappear first?
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