A Cool Penny Trick

This little trick with pennies is a good gag to play with friends or family.  Basically you bet someone that you can correctly predict a number by pulling that exact number of pennies from your pocket. To set up the trick you have to cut a penny in half.  Then pull 4 full pennies and one of your 1/2 pennies out of your pocket and put them in your hand.  Tell the person you are betting against, that you will correctly choose the exact number of pennies based off of the number they pick.  Then tell them to choose any 2 digit number.  Then have them split up the digits and add them together (ie. if they picked 27, they would add 2+7, if they pick 76, then 7+6, etc.). Then they need to subtract the total of this addition problem from their original number (ie. 27 - (2+7) = 27 - 9 = 18, 76 - (7 +6) = 76 - 13 = 63, etc.).  Then they need to add the two digits of the result together (ie. 1 + 8 = 9, 6 + 3 = 9, etc.).  then they need to divide that result by 2.  They will get 4 1/2 every time.  Be sure to emphasize that you have the exact number of pennies in your hand as their result.  They'll think they've won, since there's "no way" you can have 1/2 a penny in your hand.  Then reveal your 4 1/2 pennies and laugh all the way to victory!

WSJ article

So last month Jo Craven McGinty had a penny article in the Wall Street Journal. The only point that I don't really like in this article that doesn't take a stand on either side, is that the penny and nickel get used over and over again so that makes it "worth it".  Hello people! Even if these pennies and nickels were each used in millions of transaction, they would still not be "worth it"! Why?  Because the federal government only gets paid for them ONCE.  The secondary market for any good or service does NOT add value to it.  With the trillions and trillions of pennies that have been minted, you'd think that the penny "market" would be supersaturated now, and that they would be utterly worthless. If you're thinking this, then you are absolutely RIGHT!  They are not even worth the 1 cent value they are supposed to represent.  Imagine instead that the pennies were Rolex watches.  If there were trillions of Rolex watches out there, nobody would want one anymore.  Each person on the planet would have a hundred or more of them, and you wouldn't be able to give them away.  People would start throwing them in the trash, and the landfills of the world would fill up with Rolex watches.  This is what the penny has been reduced to.  A worthless copper colored disk that nobody wants or cares about.  Here's a bulletin to the US government: We throw pennies away because they are worthless! Stop minting them.

Worthless Pennies

Mike Hall from the Topeka Capital Journal is my new friend. Read his article on getting rid of the penny. It's short and to the point.

The End of Money

Has anyone read this book out there?  It looks pretty interesting.  Here is a link to an excerpt from the book. It looks like it might be an informative read.

Edit: I have now read this book.  It's a pretty good read.  It gives you a good perspective on money and monetary policies, and just exactly how a cashless society would work.  3.5 stars out of 5.

Fear of $1 bills?

So, I had an interesting experience earlier this week.  In addition to my accounting job, I also deliver pizzas a few nights a week.  Now in our delivery area, there are nice areas and not so nice areas, and then there are down right scary areas.  I delivered an order to a home in the "not so nice" area and the guy's order was $21.37.  He gave me two $20 bills.  I said, "So I guess your change will be $18.63," and proceeded to dig into my back pocket for my "$20 bank" I get from the store to make change on deliveries.  It's got two $5s, nine $1s, and $1 worth of coins.  As I'm pulling the little bag out, the guy says, "Just give me $15."  OK, so I pull out the two $5s and start to count out five $1s and the guy says, "Never mind, just give me ten."  So I was very happy.  I just got an $8.63 tip, instead of $3.63. But I could tell the guy really, really did not want five $1 bills in his pocket.  In fact it was worth at least $5 to him NOT to have any ones!  And of course, he definitely did not want the coins either.
Delivering pizzas now for almost 2 years, 3 or 4 nights a week, I've delivered hundreds, maybe even thousands of orders.  I can count on 1 hand the number of times, someone has wanted coins for their change.  Most nights I don't even use my $20 bank for change.  And I've never used the coins on a delivery order, except maybe 3 or 4 times total.
If I had to guess, probably 65% of the orders are paid by credit card, and the other 35% with cash.  So that puts it into better perspective.  But when I'm actually in the pizza store and someone comes in to pick up and pay for their pizza, I always have to dig out the coins to use as change.  Maybe it's just the retail environment that conditions people into believing that they must get their change to the exact penny.  But if I run out of pennies, I don't get more from the safe, I just round off everyone's transactions after that, and nobody ever complains or says anything.
Seriously people, with stories like this, it's quite obvious that the penny is completely and utterly useless, and the majority of people (at least those that pay cash for their pizza deliveries) do not want them!  Let's get rid of them now, and everyone will be happier and richer!

Penny Pranks

So I linked in the past to this guy who pranks people by trying to pay with pennies.  He's got a whole series of videos on youtube here.  He goes all out trying to buy jewelry, dinner, cars and loads of other expensive stuff.  I love the people's reactions.

Found a Canadian Penny Yesterday

So I found a Canadian penny in my till at work yesterday.  So how does a discontinued Canadian penny find its way to south Texas?  Your guess is as good as mine.  I'll have to look at it again, because it had the older style picture of Queen Elizabeth on it.