Why do we use Pennies???

Question

I honestly cant think of anything that is worth less than a nickle. I've bought gum for a nickle before, but I've never found anything that is worth 4 cents or less. so is there really a need for pennies??? couldnt you just round up/down things that are worth like $1.99?? Cause i dont think anyone would really mind paying 3 extra cents for something. So is there another reason why we use pennies??? And do you know of something that you can actually buy for 4 cents or less??.

P.S. it would probably help to NOT have pennies, people wouldnt have to carry a whole bunch of pennies around to buy something.

Answer 1

There is no inherant reason to use pennies anymore. Plenty of straw arguements out there.

They will round up: they may or may not, the market will decide that.

A corporation buying hundreds of .03 washers, so what, they will just

base it on the total purchase, still only a ,04 max on a large pruchase.

Answer 2

Sure, but what about when a company buys thousands or millions of 3 cent washers or 8 cent washers.  If we round to the nickel; $300 is cheaper than $500 and $800 is lower than $1000.  The extra rounding you suggest may cost them thousands.  I don't know about you, but the difference between the two is important to me.

One could argue then, that we do not need nickels, quarters and dimes.  Wouldn't it be easier to just use a dollar as a penny, a five as a nickel and so on as long as the purchasing power is kept the same?

What you are discussing is price level and the value of currency. Zimbabwe just made $10 billion dollars equivalent to $1.  The new $1 denomination will buy the same as $10 billion the day before.

Answer 3

They would probably round UP instead of down. And what about buying things in bulk..? Like the $1.99 things?

Answer 4

This is one of my pet peeves.  Pennies are useless.  We should round everything to the nearest nickel.  And that argument about washers is just stupid.  If you by 1,000 washers at 3 cents each, your bill is $300.  No pennies required!  Pennies cost more to make than they are worth.  Same for one dollar bills.  Did you know that in Switzerland, the smallest bill is 10 Swiss francs, which is very close to $10.  And the smallest coin is 5 centimes, which is worth a nickel.  The biggest coin is 5 francs, which is like $5.  And we Americans think we're "advanced"?  In some things, yes, but not necessarily in all things.  We would save millions if we just discontinued the penny.

Answer 5

i would mind...

if you want to just stop counting in cents and drop the last decimal all together, that's fine, but as long as you're going to count in hundredths of a dollar, you need to actually be able to spend a hundredth of a dollar.

Answer 6

Pennies are good for hoarding, keep them and melt them down when they are no longer in circulation.

Answer 7

The point of the 1.99 or something .99 is for the phycological aspect of the purchase. You see the on in the price so you think it is cheaper than it actually is. also we may stop producing pennies soon. the cost of the zinc and copper that goes into the penny is more that the value of the penny itself. and finally there is a gumball machine at the grocery store that sells 1 cent gumballs.

Answer 8

without finding pennies no one would have good luck.

but seriuosly, i think it's a vast conspiracy on the part of the various copper mining companies out there.  b/c if suddenly all the pennies in and out of circulation were to be recycled for commercial use, the increase in supply would lead to a large drop in copper prices.