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Dollar coins are in wide use. Just not in the USA.

Head down to Ecuador and pay for something with a five dollar bill. (Ecuador, El Salvador, and a few other places use the US dollar as their official currency). You'll get dollar coins in change.

It works great. Coins have value. Especially since nobody uses pennies down there. Everything costs a multiple of five cents. Hopefully this little bit of 3rd world efficiency will trickle up the the 1st world.

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Several years ago I vacationed in Bali (my employer was paying -- woohoo!). At the time, the exchange rate was 10,000:1. So I'd walk into a bank with $100US, and walk out as a "millionaire" in Indonesian Rupiah.

When you buy something in a store there, they pretty much ignore the two least significant digits. They make up the rounding error for you by giving you a handful of mints.

As has been pointed out, coins were "accepted" elsewhere once notes were withdrawn.

Looking at the title provides clue to human behavior: then there is no need to ask "why do people resist accepting what they hate."

Simple principles of shaping behavior suggest one simple principle: reinforcement: offer discount for using coins (i.e., $1.01 of merchandise for a $1 coin) or transaction penalty for paying with notes.

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