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If you're in the scrap business and you've got tons of coinage on the books then it's quite sensible not to melt them down. If you collect and melt scrap as a hobby with a backyard furnace you won't have to explain that not all of those bread pan copper ingots originated as recovered electrical wiring.
Thus the mention of pre-1982 pennies.
I remember before they streamlined this stuff, paying by credit used to be MUCH slower than by cash. Now it seems to be faster, at least if we're not talking about the instances you mentioned.
Yeah, I usually carry at least $20 just in case but last time I used cash was at a dollar store over 6 months ago. Only reason was because I had forgotten my credit card.
Might be a problem. I don't know. I have tens of thousands of pennies myself, most pre-1982. I was in the habit of just throwing them in a jar when I got them in change, instead of spending them. Too annoying to carry around change which is nearly worthless. Ditto for nickels. Probably a few hundred dollars worth. I also tended to save mint condition examples of every other denomination, so lots of those as well.
I will gladly accept your challenge!!
Americans' credit card debt has reached one trillion dollars, which is an all-time high.
Government seems determined to make our coins worthless, other than face-value. Somehow, nickels managed to mostly escape that trend. But Pre-1965 dimes, quarters, and half-dollars are 90% silver. Good luck finding them though! One "genius" economist recommended checking all the change you get for those with 1964 on them or earlier. Let's see, in two decades of doing that, I found a grand total of ONE dime. (I'll be honest, I still check though.)
I still check mine and ever so often get a silver dime.Government seems determined to make our coins worthless, other than face-value. Somehow, nickels managed to mostly escape that trend. But Pre-1965 dimes, quarters, and half-dollars are 90% silver. Good luck finding them though! One "genius" economist recommended checking all the change you get for those with 1964 on them or earlier. Let's see, in two decades of doing that, I found a grand total of ONE dime. (I'll be honest, I still check though.)
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It's very rare to see one these days. They weren't uncommon in change until maybe the late 1960s. My father got lots of them from change. He even went to the bank, got rolls of dimes/quarters/halves, and pulled out the silver ones. In fact, you could still easily get silver dollars from the bank for much of the 1960s. My dad got a bunch of Morgan and Peace dollars that way. Once the price of gold/silver went up in the early 1970s, people started checking for them, and pulled most of them out of circulation.Government seems determined to make our coins worthless, other than face-value. Somehow, nickels managed to mostly escape that trend. But Pre-1965 dimes, quarters, and half-dollars are 90% silver. Good luck finding them though! One "genius" economist recommended checking all the change you get for those with 1964 on them or earlier. Let's see, in two decades of doing that, I found a grand total of ONE dime. (I'll be honest, I still check though.)
There are upsides and downsides to both forms of payment. Plastic has merchant fees - often a flat X cents plus a percentage of the gross amount - but can also clear quickly with negligible administrative overhead. Cash may not have upfront cost but has backend costs - handling (with its potential for errors and sticky fingers), counting, security, transportation - and has clearance delays after deposit. How it shakes out for the merchant depends on the particulars of whether upfront plastic costs counterbalances backend cash costs.
No charges to them for debit, right?
AFAIK debit cards have merchant fees, but they're considerably lower than credit card fees. It's why some establishments - Aldi's, Costco (save for one CC provider; presently it's Visa) probably the biggest - don't take credit cards but will accept debit cards.
Those who issue your debit or credit cards can easily switch them off with a key-stroke. Learned that the hard way. I have a Benefits credit card issued in my name from my other full-time job. (Not the one where I'm kicking out obnoxious trespassers at night.) It's supposedly their way of saying "Thank you." Though there have been times I'm at the supermarket, got a cart full of groceries for the week, and the stupid card says "Declined." Meanwhile I know there's more than enough money to cover the purchase. That's when I reach for a different credit card or my debit card.
