Scrapping Penny Pondered

Thursday, April 03, 2008 03:59 AM

Prince George, B.C. - Should the Canadian penny may become a collectors item?

A New Democrat M.P from Winnipeg has tabled a private member’s bill calling for the Canadian Mint to scrap the penny.

The penny is 100 years old this year and while there are some 60 thousand tonnes of pennies all over the country, they are not in circulation. New Democrat MP Pat Martin says the pennies are piled up in jars and cookie tins. Martin says in addition to having a birthday party, there should also be a funeral.

This is the third time in 20 years that an effort has been launched to scrap the penny.

The Royal Canadian Mint says it costs 0.8 cents to make a penny, Martin said that just covers the metal. When you include the cost of labour and shipping, Martin says the more realistic price tag is 4.5 cents each, or $130 million a year and that is a lot of coin for something Martin says no one uses or wants.

That’s the Opinion250 Question this week. Should the penny be scrapped?

Register your answer on the “Poll Question” on the left side of the home page. We have to resist offering "A penny for your thoughts."

We will publish the results next week.

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Posted on Thursday, April 03, 2008 03:59 AM in News by 250 News

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Comments

Posted by: whitewater on April 3 2008 6:23 AM

That will make no cents.....

Posted by: YamaDooPolCat on April 3 2008 6:44 AM

A nickle for your thoughts..? Like in I don't give a plug nickle..?

Yup, the nickle has to go also.

Posted by: YamaDooPolCat on April 3 2008 6:49 AM

I'm blind - either that or Home Page is missing Poll Question on my screen.

Posted by: bohemian on April 3 2008 6:57 AM

Yes, it should, but implementation will be tough. With so few paying for anything with actual cash today, with everyone carrying around a networked computer (cell phone) one wonders how long physical currancy will last, never mind the penny.

Then again, when there are beautiful coins like this (Royal Mint - designed by rookie 26 year old - awesome), maybe we should continue to carry culture in our pocket:
http://www.royalmint.com/newdesigns/designsRevealed.aspx

Posted by: northman on April 3 2008 7:57 AM

Its getting to the point where the copper is almost worth more then the penny itself anyway.

Posted by: Norm1 on April 3 2008 8:02 AM

opinion250.com said:
_________________

Register your answer on the �Poll Question� on the left side of the home page. We have to resist offering "A penny for your thoughts."

---------------------------

I searched and searched and can not find "the needle in a haystack"

Is the poll missing?

Posted by: acrider54 on April 3 2008 8:14 AM

Me niether. Get rid of the penny....expect everything to go up 4 cents. 12.01, you'll pay 12.05

Posted by: Andyfreeze on April 3 2008 8:27 AM

Oh no!!!...if we get rid of the penny,there will be no more "penny pinchers" and we will no longer be able to give a "penny for your thoughts"!
It will change the english language forever!
(do they say that in french?)"
And a "penny earned" will no longer be a "penny saved"?
Oh well,with the way the costs of things are going,we need to become looney pinchers anyway!
Get rid of the penny, it is no longer relevant in our monetary system.
As an example,I saw where someone had scattered a bunch of pennies on the ground in the Overwaitea parking lot a while back.
Maybe about 15 or 20 of them it looked like.
3 days later,they were still there and people were walking and driving over them!
(including me!)
Guess nopbody wants them anymore.

Posted by: northman on April 3 2008 8:45 AM

I will take all your pennies off your hands if they are that much of a problem. And just think you wont even have to see them ever again. Win Win situation.. I like pennies you dont.. And i can provide a legitimit service.. Any takers? Should i post my mailing addy?

Posted by: rightwing on April 3 2008 8:59 AM

Hey Northman, The pennies only use a small amount of copper since 2000. Its like 3%, They are made mostly of steel

Posted by: realitysetsin on April 3 2008 9:22 AM

Why not get rid of all paper money and coins?

Most have embraced paperless transactions haven't they?

The only time I need bills is to pay the babysitter and that means a special trip to the bank to get the money which was a pain. So now I use that interac email transfer. SO much easier.

Posted by: owl on April 3 2008 9:42 AM

Australia no longer has on cent pieces. Fiji is about to get rid of their two smallest denomination coins.

http://www.fijitimes.com/story.aspx?id=83703

New Zealand has removed the 5 cent denomination.

http://www.ird.govt.nz/technical-tax/general-articles/qwba-gst-5cent-coin-rounding.html

I tend to think that we should follow New Zealand's example. 10 cent increment seem to be about right. I think when most stores have penny cups next to the till, that should be a good sign of the meaning of the penny with repsect to financial value.

BTW, those are very nice coins from the British mint.

Posted by: Bridge on April 3 2008 9:55 AM

We had better have a national referendum on this issue. The Mare will have to travel to Fiji and New Zealand to see how they did it cause we dont understand these things in our great City.

Cheers

Posted by: lostfaith on April 3 2008 10:05 AM

Posted by: realitysetsin on April 3 2008 9:22 AM

Why not get rid of all paper money and coins?

Most have embraced paperless transactions haven't they?

The only time I need bills is to pay the babysitter and that means a special trip to the bank to get the money which was a pain. So now I use that interac email transfer. SO much easier.

If you get rid of paper money and coins then how can we do work under the table.
With money in circulation we can do work under the table and there is no trace.
I have heard rumours for years that this is exactly what the government wants. Then they will beable to track what everyone is doing and always get what they think is thier share.
Never get rid of money, that would be rediculous.

Posted by: editor on April 3 2008 10:17 AM

Sometimes, computer glitches can be so annoying, and SOOOOOO embarassing. The "poll" is on this site....somewhere, I know because I posted it. Why it isn't showing up is beyond me.. I have some technical people working on it.

Elaine Macdonald
Publisher

Posted by: He speaks on April 3 2008 11:16 AM

Get rid of the penny. It just copper and aluminum any way. go with 5 cent increments. Get rid of the $5.00 bill and replace that with a coin.

Or just devalue our money. Make a $100.00 worth $10.00 Then we will look after the pennies more carefully. New coins and bills of course.

Don't get rid of paper and coins. How are the drug dealers going to survive. What about all those people evading taxes going to do.

Posted by: realitysetsin on April 3 2008 11:28 AM

Haha.

Good point lostfaith. Good point.

Posted by: Harbinger on April 3 2008 11:32 AM

Any penny problems in Zimbabwe? I thought not.

Posted by: socredible on April 3 2008 12:26 PM

Everyone's a millionaire in Zimbabwe, thanks to Comrade Bob.

Losing the penny just shows the riduculous nature of the economist's assertion that money is a "store of value".

Keep the penny. Get rid of the politicians that've allowed it, and all our money, whether it's in the form of coin, cash or bank deposits, to decline in terms of what it'll buy.

Posted by: caranmacil on April 3 2008 12:55 PM

I am surprised that more people arent upset about calls to remove cash transactions! I mean on one hand, with no cash you would have a hard time doing any illegal transactions. On the other hand, with no cash it would be hard for you to keep anything you did private from the powers that be. Now there's a discussion! Do we trash cash and thus reduce petty crimes (including tax crimes) and thus give up another of our freedoms?

Posted by: lostfaith on April 3 2008 1:10 PM

I hear an echo

Posted by: Death to Socialism on April 3 2008 1:55 PM

Who's talking about getting rid of cash? The punters on here or someone with credibility?

Posted by: woodwoman on April 3 2008 2:43 PM

Yes, let us send at least 3 members from City Council on an another trip - New Zealand sounds pretty good - to check out their penny problem solution - and per diem should be a bag of pennies!!!

Posted by: socredible on April 3 2008 6:41 PM

Cash will likely go the way the cheque is increasingly going. To extinction. Most business is already conducted using electronic transfer of deposit balances.

Posted by: Chester on April 3 2008 7:40 PM

I have a suggestion, why not completely replace our entire currency? Might temporarily screw up the underground economy that apparently represents 50% of our business transactions. What am I talking about, you may ask? Painters, drywallers, mechanics, plumbers, electricians, welders, autobody repair people and painters, carpet cleaners, furnace repair people, baby sitters, computer repair people, carpenters, and on and on. How many people work for cash and do not claim it?

All that drug money, unlaundered cash, etc. Nice way to clean up a few things. The cost you ask? Why worry about the cost? When you spend 4.5 cents to make 1 cent, economics have already gone out the window. Chester

Posted by: thereasonableman on April 3 2008 9:15 PM

Why don't we take the pennies out of circulation and use them to fill all the potholes ?

Posted by: Old Hippy on April 3 2008 9:18 PM

Hey, why not do away with all coins and paper money up to the $100 bill and do all transactions in multiples of 100? Of course we would have to have a $100 coin so we could get chocalte bars and chips from the vending machines.

Posted by: socredible on April 3 2008 9:51 PM

It wouldn't be long before the $ 100 bill would cost more in paper and ink to produce than $ 100. And we'd be making a $ 1,000 bill the new 'penny'.

Why don't we make our monetary "figures" fit the "facts" of which they're supposed to be a numerical reflection? We have a constant flow of goods and services coming on to the market, all with Prices attached to them.

But do we have a simultaneous, and equal, flow of Incomes coming into the hands of the would be Consumers of those goods and services? The economists say we do, but if that's so, then why are debt levels, overall, always increasing?