DOGE takes aim at the penny

Wow I'd always thought pennies came from fountains. This Doh-jee job sure is great.

Good. Here's the one thing I agree with with this administration. Now I feel gross and dirty,

Pennies are stupid. Having things cost $2.03 or whatever is just a waste of time and energy when you are paying cash.

As John Waters once said, "Pennies are only good for insulting waiters." (Or something to that effect)

We left pennies behind years ago

Offering me a nickel for my thoughts is way too expensive.

If this is their starting place, we’re going to see a lot of trivial stuff from this.

What game-changing insight! So much for the high IQs on this committee.

Ramaswamy does remind you of a penny, right?

Now go after the African-American white buffalo and the nickel.

[quote]In fiscal year 2023, taxpayers spent more than $179 million producing over 4.5 billion pennies, with each coin costing more than three cents to make.

That's less than 1/2000th of Elon's net worth.

I throw pennies in the trash. It’s not worth holding on to them.

Yes let’s get rid of the penny. This is a drop in the bucket of the federal budget

I would agree if they round everything DOWN to the nickel.

^^^^ never happen

Is it weird the department is Department Of Government Efficiency or DOGE while there is crypto called DOGE meanwhile Trump and Elon push crypto?

Krypto's our hero!

[quote] In fiscal year 2023, taxpayers spent more than $179 million producing over 4.5 billion pennies.

This is also probably No. 179,000,000,000 down on the list of things that I will impact my life in a positive way.

Canada did it over 10 years ago. Retailers need to round up or down. It’s not rocket science.

[quote] Is it weird the department is Department Of Government Efficiency or DOGE while there is crypto called DOGE meanwhile Trump and Elon push crypto?

Have you been in a coma since November?

Get rid of all cash. What's the point of it when all financial transactions have been completely computerized? And get rid of checks as well. They are relics of the past.

bad doge! bad!🗞

Retailers are probably responsible for the delay in getting rid of pennies. Everyone seems to want to price things at 3.99, because that seems psychologically cheaper than $4.

How was the United States ever able to function without a Department of Government Efficiency and geniuses like Elon Musk? This is what the country needs to be focused on right now.

Fuck off to hell, R18.

Cashless CUNT FACE!

Big 🤔 thinkers deserve the big bucks 🤡 🎪

Let's say we get rid of the penny. There are counties here that charge 6% or 7% sales tax. How is the county government going to collect that money? Who wants to raise sales taxes?

Now U.S businesses will charge more for everything. They'll round everything UP in price

[quote]This is also probably No. 179,000,000,000 down on the list of things that I will impact my life in a positive way.

The journey of a thousand miles (or even 179,000,000,000 miles) begins with a single step. I think the DOGE spending cut initiative is not going to be derailed by commentary about the initial cuts being small.

If the government can't even cut small spending, how could it cut large spending, which would be much harder to get agreement on?

Getting rid of the penny is a bold move. What’s next..,the nickel.

I’ll tell you what brilliance in advertising is: 99 cents. Someone thought of that.

It’s just like FDR’s first 100 days. Except full of stupid shit instead of reforms that helped suffering Americans.

r18 going cashless hurts the poor, unsurprisingly.

I’ve lived in a country that had a chronic small change problem. Places like supermarkets would deliberately price items in odd numbers and then round up when you got to the cash register. You think it’s just a couple cents? Imagine how much they were raking in, day after day.

Germany, r31?

I remember their cashiers being militant about paying with exact change.

Not Germany but I remember a coin shortage in Italy pre euro. They’d give you a piece of candy. Of course you couldn’t pay with pieces of candy.

Forcing everything to be rounded up to the next nearest even number would actually have an unintended (intended) beneficiary: the government. The penny is largely kept alive by taxes rates on consumer goods.

Given the migration of so much of commerce to a cashless society, it’s probably not necessary. I only carry cash when I go on vacation for tipping and when I need to up lottery tickets. Nobody carries cash anymore.

[quote] The journey of a thousand miles (or even 179,000,000,000 miles) begins with a single step. I think the DOGE spending cut initiative is not going to be derailed by commentary about the initial cuts being small. If the government can't even cut small spending, how could it cut large spending, which would be much harder to get agreement on?

The DOGE will fail because it is a fraud. There is no way to cut government spending without touching social security, Medicare, defence, and interest on the national debt. Fiscally, the penny issue is a huge joke.

The Doge.

R24, I can’t tell if you’re trolling or if you actually were born without a brain in your head.

More meaningless distraction from a corrupt asshole's adminisration.

Yeah, R38, and at least 70% of Americans will fall for it.

Yeah...about DOGE...

Dreamy Andrew Yang vocally advocated for this a few years ago.

This is an obvious move that should have been done decades ago - but there were always some asshole groups against it.

There is no way to cut government spending without touching social security, Medicare, defence, and interest on the national debt. Fiscally, the penny issue is a huge joke.

You are so right. Just like there were never going to be mass deportation because of all the red tape involved. Even with Noem in her cowboy cosplay all they can do is terrify people. Even destroying US soft power and other beaucracies will not give them the $ to finance all their tax cuts for the rich.

Here is a Time article from 1977 (!) about getting rid of the penny.

[quote]Any number of maxims are in trouble if economists at the Research Triangle Institute, a North Carolina think tank, have their way. The institute, commissioned by the Bureau of the Mint to analyze U.S. coin needs, wants the Government to stop producing the penny by 1980, along with reducing the size of the dollar coin and dropping the half-dollar.

The penny has been a zombie for many decades. Time to kill it for good.

Fight back! Use pennies in all government transactions.

R42, how do you expect to make change without pennies? Are you one of those dopes who wants a paperless society until the power shuts down? You want us all to be beholden to credit card companies?

We haven't had any coins under 10c for about 20 years.

@realDonaldTrump

For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful! I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies. Let's rip the waste out of our great nations budget, even if it's a penny at a time.

Treasury Department to phase out the penny after Trump says the coin no longer makes 'cents':