Say good bye to the Canadian penny

[Christianlibertarian]

Thought this was interesting and that some of you would think so too. Kind of scary.

http://m.yahoo.com/w/news_america/blogs/sideshow/canada-says-going-pull-penny-circulation-221558392.html?orig_host_hdr=news.yahoo.com&.intl=us&.lang=en-us

 

[WilliamC]

There is still copper in circulation, but not for much longer I'm guessing...

 

[onlyrp]

I love how people make it a big deal about how it's some lost money or lost convenience. The question is, why do people and businesses still use it?

 

[Zippyjuan]

Now they will round up to the nearest nickel. What would have been say eight cents would be a dime. Multiply that by millions of transactions.

They are also changing all of their "paper" (if it is like the US- linen actually) notes into plastic polymer notes as well.
Another link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/30/business/global/in-canada-the-pennys-time-to-shine-is-over.html

 

[LibertyEagle]

Use it or lose it. They've been wanting to go electronic currency for a long time. When that happens, kiss any vestige of privacy bye bye.

 

[Lishy]

Good riddance to the penny. I'm saving em' just to show off though.

I'm Canadian, so I'm aware about the plastic thing, but don't see why it's a bad decision. Isn't plastic money more durable too? And cleaner to produce?

 

[RonRules]

eh there,

I just made some Canadian election 2011 charts here: Post #81
http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?369316-Evidence-of-election-fraud-piling-up/page9

 

[Phil]

Canadian pennies will still be in circulation here though

 

[Lishy]

Sometimes I get American pennies from vending machines o.o

 

[kezt777]

Ive held the new polymer money when i got $100s from the bank (and then put them on groceries, so precious little time with the pretty new bills) and the 50s are out now too..... but I have since heard that they are not as durable as first portrayed a couple years ago when the news broke. I clearly recall the newsies saying that you can even wash them and they won't get wrecked. a good thing for those who dont check pockets when doing laundry, right? well --- ive since heard many stories about how the bills do not survive the DRYER. oopsy. I cannot test this myself yet because i am not putting a 100 or 50 dollar bill in the dryer lol. I will wait patiently for the 5s to finally come out in a year or so, then test the theory on my own So i cannot answer the durability Q fully for awhile yet

As for the penny, apparently it costs more to produce now than it's worth. So while it's prob good to get rid of it - we have to wonder what that means about our money. Weve been doing great against the US dollar for a long time (shopping on Ebay is fun for me right now), but that's where the fun ends. The Canadian dollar doing well against a failing US dollar is nothing to crow about!

As for the copper part, we have been collecting the old pennies for a long time, the ones that actually have copper in them,1996 and older, and the last time I checked, $2 of our old pennies is worth over $4 for the copper if we were to sell them all right now. It's more of a fun thing for us (we are saving 1967 and older silver coins as well) but hey - we might really need that cash one day!

 

[Lishy]

So each penny prior to 1996 is actually 2 cents?

I'll keep that in mind and collect them for when their value goes up...

 

[kezt777]

So each penny prior to 1996 is actually 2 cents?

I'll keep that in mind and collect them for when their value goes up...

My bf and I did some investigating online after checking the copper price on the stock exchange tickers, and found tons of sites listing the amount of pennies needed to match that weight and it was about $2 worth of pennies, 4 rolls, that made the $4 price at that time. The price goes up and down. The last time I peeked it was at $3.81 but I just keep in mind that 4 rolls of pennies equalled the weight for the stock exchange prices and go from there. Like silver - we bought a few silver one ounce coins from a few coin dealers in town when it was $18/oz and it went up to $44/oz or so in a year, now it's like $33/oz or so. But it is higher than what we paid so yipppeee lol. We plan to hold onto them for a long time, and add more as the dealers around here decide to let a few go, to see what they will be worth eventually. I wish we had found more at $18 a piece but the dealers were hoarding I think lol.

 

[ronpaulfollower999]

Thats what happens when you debase a currency.

 

[Lishy]

TBH all the Canadians I speak to DON'T miss the penny!

 

[eduardo89]

Ketz, regarding polymer notes...they do not withstand heat very well! Mexico has had them for about 10 years and they do melt!

 

[eduardo89]

TBH all the Canadians I speak to DON'T miss the penny!

Yeah well just wait until a nickel is also worthless, then a dime, then a quarter...pretty soon you wot even be able to buy a liter of gas with a loonie...oh wait, you already can't.

 

[kezt777]

I guess what I don't like is the rounding up part... someone talked about how places will have to change their prices so you don't end up with '.98' or '.37' but that is also a cost to businesses that is forced on them. Places like Walmart always have items sold for .88 as a gimmick, for example. At least our GST went down to 5% awhile back, so that will help more than the 7% gst would have lol. Things that were always 99 cents will be priced at $1.00 now, unless the business decides to go with 95 cents instead, which is doubtful. So in my mind, the little tiny price increase that will result from this is a price increase that all of us will have to carry and it will add up. I have no idea when the penny wont be in circulation anymore - I assume that it will take awhile because I remember when the $1 and $2 bills were axed for the loonie and toonie - stores could still accept them for ages and banks would trade them for the new coins for a long time... I guess this could mean longer lines at the banks while people go through all their penny jars to make sure they don't lose out on trading them for other cash.

Another thought - my kids' school's biggest fundraiser for the longest time has been the Penny Drive. It raises more money than ones where products are purchased because I guess people have a lot of pennies sitting around and they sure add up fast. I helped count two diff years and we could barely lift the penny buckets lol. But that will end now I guess? At least once they are out of circulation. So maybe we will have to do a nickel drive from now on? I don't know if that will bring in as much cash because they are heavier and worth more, and fewer people may be willing to part with their nickels than their pennies... we shall see.

 

[eduardo89]

I'm pretty sure pennies will continue to be legal tender, just they won't be produced anymore.

 

[kezt777]

Yeah well just wait until a nickel is also worthless, then a dime, then a quarter...pretty soon you wot even be able to buy a liter of gas with a loonie...oh wait, you already can't.

Gasoline is 1.12/litre in my city despite being in the middle of oil and gas heaven... my father in law lives in a sask city 2 hours away and it went up to 1.279/liter yesterday. Friends near toronto have been paying more than 1.34/litre for ages... booooooooooooooo. People will have to be extra careful when filling their tanks so they don't accidentally go over $40.00 in case the store rounds it up on them. Right now the ones around here will round it down if you hit .01 or .02 but who knows. We already pay enough as it is.

 

[kezt777]

I'm pretty sure pennies will continue to be legal tender, just they won't be produced anymore.

Ya they would still be legal tender but that does not mean businesses will accept them after a certain point. We could still collect pennies at the school because you just have to take them into a bank to get it totalled up and exchanged for 'current' currency, but there will be less pennies exchanged at stores once prices change so not as much for things like Penny Drive fundraisers (have been very popular)... that's not a major problem, it's just one of the things I thought about when saying bye bye to the penny. I worked in a gas station when the two dollar bill died and we did not accept them after a certain date because the boss did not like taking them to the bank separately from the rest of our deposits. At that time, he had to take them to his major branch across the city instead of taking them to the smaller branch that was close by. I often wonder what would happen if I showed up at a store with my old $1 bill I have - I imagine the young people working there would not know what it was and be confused about accepting it haha. Many stores refuse to accept 100s and 50s (old style) at all due to counterfeit problems so they can certainly refuse to take pennies if they decide that.