[Guest_chris c-t_*]

A small, but significant event in a planned and intentional inflationary process....

http://www.usatoday....enny/53911656/1

Quote

Canada is dropping its penny - will the U.S. follow suit?
TORONTO (AP) – They clutter your dresser and cost too much to make. They're a nuisance and have outlived their purpose.
"The penny is a currency without any currency in Canada, and it costs us 1.5 cents to produce a penny," Flaherty told reporters.

Edit to add, I didn't realise New Zealand, Australia, the Netherlands, Norway, Finland, Sweden and others have gone 'penniless' - really? no euro-cent in NED?

This post has been edited by chris c-t: 01 April 2012 - 01:03 PM

[long time lurking]

chris c-t, on 01 April 2012 - 12:58 PM, said:

A small, but significant event in a planned and intentional inflationary process....

http://www.usatoday....enny/53911656/1

[b]


Edit to add, I didn't realise New Zealand, Australia, the Netherlands, Norway, Finland, Sweden and others have gone 'penniless' - really? no euro-cent in NED?

I don`t know the cost of producing the penny in the above currencies but I would bet the UK penny is costing far more to manufacture than the face value ,and not to long ago it was worth more as scrap metal ,not to sure about this moment in time as the price of scrap of steel is falling

[anonguest]

chris c-t, on 01 April 2012 - 03:10 PM, said:

Copper decimal pennies in the UK, (i.e. pre-1992) weigh 3.56g and as such have 1.9p worth of copper in them.
(based on Cu price of £5.28 /Kg, $3.84/lb)

Based on on total mintage numbers since 1971 their proportion, in a random selection, should be about 30% I believe - but if you do simple sample tests you find it typically well under 15%. Which suggests to me that, since the whole face value vs metal value thing became more common knowledge/publicised in last few years, that they are being 'filtered out' of circulation in significant numbers - either by officialdom or by the wider public.

One would expect that such actions as dropping the penny from use would have the effect of powerfully driving home to the man/woman in the street just exactly how the money in their pocket is losing value? But, from past conversations, I have come to the view that the average Joe/Joanne just doesnt get it or care sufficiently and it is this inability to understand or care that TPTB exploit so well - to pursue policies that continue to debase our money.

When some of the coinage (e.g 5p and 10p coins) were made smaller, to their present size, I could halfway understand/sympathise with many peoples comments/attitude that it was great cos the 'old' coins were so big, weighed down your pocket, etc. BUT to effectively concede that a coin/unit of currency which within just a few tens of years has gone from being able to pay/meaningfully part pay for small but useful things (e.g bus ticket, chewing gum, newspaper, box of matches, etc) is now so worthless that it may as well be scrapped is quite a sobering indictment of ongoing monetary inflation. Will people care any greater when it inevitably becomes the turn of the 2p coin - and the smallest 'practical' unit of our currency will be only a 1/20th of a pound rather than 1/50th?

This post has been edited by anonguest: 01 April 2012 - 03:31 PM

[this_prisoner_is_opting_out]

No 1ct or 2ct in NL, everything is rounded to nearest 5ct.

[Self Employed Youth]

long time lurking, on 01 April 2012 - 01:11 PM, said:

I don`t know the cost of producing the penny in the above currencies but I would bet the UK penny is costing far more to manufacture than the face value ,and not to long ago it was worth more as scrap metal ,not to sure about this moment in time as the price of scrap of steel is falling

5p and 10p's are now being minted in steel as of the start of this year, take that as a sign of inflation to come

Copper 1ps and 2ps have now nearly been removed entirely from circulation, not long left now.

[TheBlueCat]

The Canadian 1c costs about 1.6c to make, so it's clear why it's going. I can still remember ha'penny coins and stamps in the UK. It's all part of the long march of inflation.

[anonguest]

Seasonally Employed Youth, on 01 April 2012 - 04:20 PM, said:

5p and 10p's are now being minted in steel as of the start of this year, take that as a sign of inflation to come

Copper 1ps and 2ps have now nearly been removed entirely from circulation, not long left now.

agreed its sign of significant inflation to come...but i thought that the date for the change/introduction had been pushed forward a bit recently? No? Or are they already minting them?

This post has been edited by anonguest: 01 April 2012 - 05:08 PM

[Take Me Back To London!]

tbatst2000, on 01 April 2012 - 04:55 PM, said:

The Canadian 1c costs about 1.6c to make, so it's clear why it's going. I can still remember ha'penny coins and stamps in the UK. It's all part of the long march of inflation.

I remember those as well. Also we have seen the demise of the original and larger 5p, 10p and 50p including the 1 and 2 shilling coins to be replaced by micro coins and the pound note making way for the £1 coin. The odd thing abut the UK, even though it was introduced over 30 years ago, the £50 note is still not in wide use and is never dispensed by cash machines, unlike in Europe were the 50 euro note is common and sometimes you even get 100 euro notes out of ATMs.

And Boycie disagrees about the new 5p coin in this advert.

This post has been edited by Take Me Back To London!: 01 April 2012 - 05:24 PM

[bmf]

Take Me Back To London!, on 01 April 2012 - 05:17 PM, said:

I remember those as well. Also we have seen the demise of the original and larger 5p, 10p and 50p including the 1 and 2 shilling coins to be replaced by micro coins and the pound note making way for the £1 coin. The odd thing abut the UK, even though it was introduced over 30 years ago, the £50 note is still not in wide use and is never dispensed by cash machines, unlike in Europe were the 50 euro note is common and sometimes you even get 100 euro notes out of ATMs.

We are in the absurd fiat world where when coinage becomes truly worth the amount printed on it this is a problem necessitating reissue.

http://www.zerohedge...money-literally

In the time of Adam Smith people used to complain when coins didn't have their true worth. Radio 4 Analysis had a recent issue on the value of money. Spoke to the BoE in which they said it was an offence to melt down coins and when the interviewer asked if she could issue her own currency they said that too was illegal and that legislation was there "to protect the public". I suppose it would get confusing if there were several people issuing fraudulent paper instead of just the BoE.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...rammes/b01dtlzn

[interestrateripoff]

Take Me Back To London!, on 01 April 2012 - 05:17 PM, said:

The odd thing abut the UK, even though it was introduced over 30 years ago, the £50 note is still not in wide use and is never dispensed by cash machines, unlike in Europe were the 50 euro note is common and sometimes you even get 100 euro notes out of ATMs.

That's because it's impossible to spend. Walk into 99.9% of shops and you'll get we don't accept those....

About the only place that will accept them are banks.

I can only think it's because shops daren't risk losing £50 if it's a forgery?

Although the 1p can't have long, however if the 1p goes so will the 2p.

[Take Me Back To London!]

bmf, on 01 April 2012 - 05:38 PM, said:

We are in the absurd fiat world where when coinage becomes truly worth the amount printed on it this is a problem necessitating reissue.

http://www.zerohedge...money-literally

In the time of Adam Smith people used to complain when coins didn't have their true worth. Radio 4 Analysis had a recent issue on the value of money. Spoke to the BoE in which they said it was an offence to melt down coins and when the interviewer asked if she could issue her own currency they said that too was illegal and that legislation was there "to protect the public". I suppose it would get confusing if there were several people issuing fraudulent paper instead of just the BoE.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...rammes/b01dtlzn

The original one pound coin, the British gold sovereign requires over £250 to buy now.

There was a gang of old school bank note counterfeiters sent down at the Old Bailey a few years ago, they did say that they were only doing quantatitve easy.

It is illegal to deface coins, but I wonder why those Penny Press machines have never been seized. The last time I went to Tower Bridge, not far from the BoE, there was a machine that squashed copper coins into souvenir medals.

[Take Me Back To London!]

interestrateripoff, on 01 April 2012 - 05:47 PM, said:

That's because it's impossible to spend. Walk into 99.9% of shops and you'll get we don't accept those....

About the only place that will accept them are banks.

I can only think it's because shops daren't risk losing £50 if it's a forgery?

Although the 1p can't have long, however if the 1p goes so will the 2p.

In Europe 50 euro notes are very common, like our 20 pound notes here. A £50 note used to be "big money", now it only buys a second hand jerry can and 20 litres of fuel. ATMs in Austria dish out 100 euro notes and I have had no problem in spending them in the shops. I will have to get some £50s and try out if shops will take them. I expect we are going to see more of electronic money printing in the UK, as opposed to seeing £100+ banknotes.

This post has been edited by Take Me Back To London!: 02 April 2012 - 09:03 AM

[long time lurking]

chris c-t, on 01 April 2012 - 03:10 PM, said:

Copper decimal pennies in the UK, (i.e. pre-1992) weigh 3.56g and as such have 1.9p worth of copper in them.
(based on Cu price of £5.28 /Kg, $3.84/lb)

In 2003-4 the penny was costing 0.04 pence less than the face value to make and the price of steel was way lower than it is today and copper for the plating was probably 25% of what it is today
I know plenty of peps who work there and have done so myself

[Neptune]

this_prisoner_is_opting_out, on 01 April 2012 - 03:57 PM, said:

No 1ct or 2ct in NL, everything is rounded to nearest 5ct.

wish theyd do it here. Copper is a pain in the rear. The wife seems to collect vast amounts of the stuff in her purse, weighs a ton.

I usually bin the stuff when I find it or if its nearby into the charity box on the shop counter

[Russe11]

interestrateripoff, on 01 April 2012 - 05:47 PM, said:

That's because it's impossible to spend. Walk into 99.9% of shops and you'll get we don't accept those....

About the only place that will accept them are banks.

I can only think it's because shops daren't risk losing £50 if it's a forgery?

Although the 1p can't have long, however if the 1p goes so will the 2p.

utter rubbish, i've not be refused purchases with £50 notes for quite a few years now, but even the local chipshop took them, when the new ones came out I couldn't get one changed in a local bar, but that was only because trade was so poor they had not accumulated enough in the till.

what I can't belive is if the police stop you with more than £1000 cash on you they have the power to take it off you with out reason! like you have to be doing somthing criminal to have that amount of money.