12-13-2016, 04:16 PM
(12-10-2016, 11:15 AM)Odin Wrote:(12-10-2016, 11:09 AM)Anthony Wrote: What if we abolish the penny, which costs the U.S. Mint 1.6 cents to produce, as Canada, Australia, New Zealand etc. have already done, round up all retail purchases to the next higher nickel (and round all paychecks etc. down to the next lower nickel) and use the resulting breakage to reimburse health care facilities for giving charity care to the poor?
No mandates, no penalties, no unwieldy bureaucracy, and as they would say across the pond, it's jolly regressive - a 96-cent cup of ramen noodles becomes $1.00, while a $4,999.99 diamond ring becomes $5,000.00 - taking the right's #1 argument away: That it would "redistribute wealth." Plus it would maintain the "charity" paradigm that the moral judgmentalists require.
I'm all for abolishing the penny, but it will never happen for the same reason we will never switch to only using $1 coins or to using the colorful plastic bills other developed countries are now using, we are a stupidly stubborn people and the moment the idea is floated you will get the usual screams about "UN BLACK HELICOPTER COMMUNISTS TURNING US INTO EUROPE!!!".
I've been opposed to abolishing the penny, because then the nickel just becomes the penny, and the mindset of inflation just makes it so. But, it might be time now.
In any case it's irrelevant; changing our methods of currency is not going to abolish Reaganomics.