You don't get time to hang a sign on me

[austin_dern]

I've now done my part to encourage the change of those dollar coins from novelty and collectible items into actual circulating coinage in the United States. I had to go to the post office Monday, and there was an awful wait from people mailing in their tax forms in the last days. Truth be told, I was mailing mine just as late, although I have the excuse that I was waiting for a royalty statement from my publishers on the textbook. I never did receive one, but since I didn't receive royalties either I'm going to trust that it's not a mistake to not have them accounted for.

So I went to the automated postage machine, pretty easily getting the proper sticker for my Federal returns. For my State forms, the large sticker the machine wants to print for packages wouldn't fit on the state-supplied envelope. I went through the steps to buy stamps for an ordinary letter-size envelope, but there was some sort of Technical Problem which would not let it disperse stamps for something as puny as an envelope calling for either 41 or 80 cents depending on whether I called it normal-letter or mailing envelope.

Off, then, to the stamp machine, where I put in two cents and a dollar, and discovered that I couldn't buy individual stamps. They only had 20-stamp booklets. (Admittedly, the 'Forever' first-class stamps, so that's not too bad.) So I needed to put in another $7.18. I had a five dollar bill and a twenty. In the twenty goes, and out comes 80 cents in nickels, two pennies, and twelve dollar coins. I like James Madison as well as anyone can, but that's a lot of his face to have in my pocket at once. That much change threatened the stability of my pants.

So, I ventured to convenience stores to find small purchases on which to circulate some of this bulk and gather the looks of curious cashiers. At one I bought a Diet Dr Pepper, and tried to pay the $1.55 with two dollar coins and a nickel. The cashier rang this up as $1.05, asked if I had another fifty cents, and then looked again to examine just what the dollar coins were and why this wasn't working. I'm pretty sure she just punched a 1 where she meant 2 instead. The mass of nickels I was able to dispose of with the timely purchase of a Payday bar.

Trivia: The General Electric corporation was formed in 1892 by the merger of Edison General Electric (shares in the old converted one-to-one to shares in the new) and the Thomson-Houston Company (converted at three-for-five shares). Source: Empires of Light: Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse and the Race to Electrify the World, Jill Jonnes.

Currently Reading: Edison: A Biography, Matthew Josephson.

Comments

[xolo.livejournal.com]

I'm a great partisan of the dollar coins. I'd far rather have those than dollar bills. I still keep running into store clerks who have to give it a second look before they're sure what it is, though. The saddest was the little bargain-basement pop diva at Popeye's Fried Chicken who turned it over several times, gave me this extremely lost look, inspected the coin some more, then finally asked "What is that?" Apparently a picture of a president, "United States of America" and "$1" didn't provide enough visual clues. I'm kind of sorry that I didn't tell her it was a $20 gold piece, as I think there's a good chance she'd have believed me.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I like dollar coins, it's just I got too many of them at once. And, well, nobody gives them as change except post office vending machines, so there's not enough chance for people to figure out what to do with them.

[rcoony.livejournal.com]

I don't care too much for the Forever stamps, myself. They just seem like a lot less fun, and so far have all been pretty ugly. Now what reason would you have to buy sheets of two-cent stamps?

I still have several books of 39-cent stamps, which is pretty much a lifetime supply for me.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Oh, a new set of stamps always starts off weak. Remember the original F series stamps when they weren't sure what the new postage rate would be?

[c-eagle.livejournal.com]

Those buy-a-single-stamp machines seem to be dwindling into rarity... :/

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Oh, those old-fashioned things with the half-elliptical shape that are put in a corner of the supermarket to be covered with grime and dust? ... I haven't seen those in ages either.

[bunny-hugger.livejournal.com]

I like dollar coins because I stick them in the change part of my wallet, and often forget I have them. Then, just when I think I'm too broke to buy a hot chocolate at the cafe or some such treat, I look into my coin pocket and -- oh, wow! I have five dollars I'd forgotten about! It's just one of those little pleasures in life.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I grew really fond of them in Singapore, where the dollar coin has a couple of advantages. Among them, the paper dollar and the penny coin were discontinued about seven years back, and there's very little just-under pricing, and generally the value-added tax will be rolled into the sticker price, so when you see things priced S$1.00, that's that.

They were just right for a can of chilled Milo, too.

[roofae.livejournal.com]

I love the dollar coins too, but just try to find them.. I'm afraid that people think "OMG Collectible" and hoard them. It's stupid to print dollar bills that last little more than a year. It's a literal waste of money.

And also: the Post Office has been phasing out the nice postal vending machines in favor of those clunky, slow, and generally inconvenient Automated Postal Units. Those are OK for parcels, but it's just dumb to get rid of single stamp sales from the vending machines, have to out the credit card now every time I want stamps. But I suspect that's entirely the point.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty satisfied with the Automated Postal Units, although the whole problem for me got going when it had some technical glitch and couldn't print out postage right for the envelope I had to use for my state forms. Really I prefer dealing with people directly, but the 14th of April isn't the day for waiting out the queue.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

I deliberately ask for dollar coins at the bank[*1], in a hope to get them into more thorough circulation; I suspect that they won't until the Mint phases out the dollar bill. But they're dragging their feet on the penny as well, so as not to make inflation look like it's happening as fast as it is.. and I suspect we'll see those both fixed just about the same time: When the current Presidential Dollar series runs out in 2016 (perhaps 2017). As that point nears, I suspect there'll be enough motivation for modest currency overhaul to eliminate the penny, fix the seignorage issue with the nickel[*2], shift over to dollar coins over dollar bills, and the like. I see that 2009 will have four commemorative pennies, and 2010 will have a new design for the penny as well.

Also, this is why I insist upon a wallet with a change pocket, as I always have I do not *like* loose coins in my pocket.

And goodness, civic desires aside, the gold dollars are *fun* for both cashier-confusing and shiny aspects.

--Chiaroscuro
[*1] Usually given in rolls of $25, as I usually take out $100 in cash at a time at my bank. This last time, when I withdrew only $50 (It's a tight month, due to $1000 currently lent to co-workers and a new monitor purchase), the cashier had quite a few loose and gave me $20 in such.

[*2] Which Wikipedia pointed me to an interesting proposal on: Simply replace the nickel with the penny. That is, mark the penny (1.67 cent manufacturing cost) a 5-cent coin henceforth, equivalent in value to the nickel, and stop making nickels (a 9.3 cent manufacturing cost, currently). The compensating inflation of pennies in value would be modest, and it'd make an instant cut in production cost. This proposal has one, as I see it, grand flaw which makes it impractical-- but it's a *cute* idea.

[moonfires.livejournal.com]

They'll circulate once. From wherever you spent it, it'll return to the bank. Or it will just sit in the extra bin in the till with the occasional 50 cent piece and Canadian/Carribean/other money that sneaks in. Eventually that collection will return to the bank too, or to some collection.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

That's the part that frustrates me. Anything bought via a cash register, the dollar coin will probably be left in the cash register. Therefore, I'm stuck with waiter tips and co-worker debts for such.

It's not totally futile, though it's not going to have big impact. But I can be fine with a small impact, which will mostly be familiarity.

[moonfires.livejournal.com]

They're perfect for the vending industry. No need for finicky bill acceptors. I remember a bunch of machines in the basement of Burnside Hall circa 1989 that had been converted to the new C$1 coin, and there was a bill changing machine for your $1 bills. Of course, It was easier to tolerate that piece of metal with the wide use of the C$2 bill at the time. Four dollars in change came in paper, not 4 coins. Of course, then the $2's started wearing out fast and they got coined in 1996. Maybe a US $1 true shift could lead to a resurgence of the $2.

Most waiter tips go into the register for bigger bills.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

I think that a phaseout of the dollar bill wouldn't really increase the use of the $2; but it might. The biggest use of the $2 lately is in the military overseas, because it's half the weight to ship them, interestingly enough.