$100 bill surpasses $1 bill in circulation for first time in U.S. history | Hacker News Reader

$100 bill surpasses $1 bill in circulation for first time in U.S. history

upi.com

13 pointshker8 comments

USA could stand to have a major update in how it treats currency. As an easy example: why is the penny still legal tender and widely used? Every other first world country had been essentially rid of cent level denominations for years now. Canada is too easy, let’s instead look at Ecuador who uses USD as currency. In Ecuador, outside of touristy areas, salary and prices of everything are in general at most 1/4 of what USA charges. Yet somehow, Ecuador functions without the penny. All prices are rounded to the nearest 5 cents and Ecuador has not imploded from the rounding issues. Why is it that we insist on pricing and dealing with pennies? Every other first world country had adjusted their own currencies accordingly.

> Every other first world country had been essentially rid of cent level denominations for years now. Canada...

Japan is a first world country much larger in both population and economic size than Canada and has a common coin worth 6% less than a penny.

> Every other first world country had been essentially rid of cent level denominations for years now

Apart from Japan, in the Eurozone we also have a one cent and two cents coins.

They are a pain in the butt though, I'm very much in favor of getting rid of them. When I get some they usually go straight to my "red" jar along with the 2c and 5c (they are all copper).

Apparently some countries like the Netherlands aren't minting them anymore already.

Nothing is wrong with a penny, really the problem has been inflation. Like about a hundred years ago a penny had the same value as quarter today. Given a enough time with constant inflation a dollar itself will be about like a penny today. Although, I’ll probably be dead before then assuming no sudden changes.

The dollar could be rebased in that time period to make the units still make sense. Like 100 “old dollars” equals one “new dollar”. Like we are talking 200-300 years from now to where a dollar that furture year is about the same value of a penny today. Again assuming no sudden inflation rate changes.

Sure, but until then, we should phase out useless coinage. I avoid cash largely because I have having a pocket full of coins. Eliminating the penny (and preferably the nickel and dime as well) would encourage me to use cash again.

Or we could fix the root problem...

In part, due to lobbying by the company that provides all the blanks for making pennies.

https://youtu.be/_tyszHg96KI

It will never happen, but I wish that the US would keep all currency but revalue it at ten times the present value. Within living memory, the dollar was worth ten times what it is now, and back then, pennies, nickels, dimes, and so on were useful.

This makes a lot more sense to me that changing the physical coins.

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