I remember many years ago a foreign friend of mine newly arrived in the US asked what a dime was worth when buying a snack and trying to find the correct change. The person he was paying asked "where you from boy" as he was amazed that someone did not know.
It certainly must confuse every tourist in the US until they find out. Mike Payne ----- Original Message ----- From: Andrew Winn To: U.S. Metric Association Cc: U.S. Metric Association Sent: Thursday, 15 April 2010 20:30 Subject: [USMA:47137] RE: Decimal currency & Metrication I have to agree about the $1 bill. But of course this isn't the only problem with the US dollar. Our coins are illogical. The coins say things like "one penny", "one dime", and "quarter dollar" instead of their actual value of 1¢, 5¢, 10¢, and 25¢. The sizes of the coins also don't increase with value. The 10¢ coin is the smallest and the $1 coin is smaller than the 50¢ coin. If you didn't grow up with this currency it would be very difficult to understand. Also some of the coins and bills that are supposed to be in general circulation are not. For example, $2 bills are so rare that some people do not even know they exist. Many ATMs only give out $20 bills so it is rare to see a $50 bill or a $100 bill. And I've never seen the 50¢ coin and the $1 coin given as change. Furthermore, why has it taken so long for them to redesign the bills? They started the current design with the release of the new $20 bill in 2003 and they won't release the new $100 bill until next week, seven years later. But, they won't redesign the $1 or $2 bills. This just makes no sense to me. Unless they're going to remove the $1 bill and $2 bill from circulation, why wouldn't they redesign these bills? - Andrew Winn On Thu, Apr 15, 2010 at 12:07 PM, <[email protected]> wrote: The US coins and the corresponding Canadian coins (through the loonie) are pretty much the same size. The US has no equivalent to the Canadian $2 coin (the 'toonie'). It is an incredible and unfortunate waste that the unnecessary $1 bill is still in production, but the same mentality that hinders metrication also keeps that bill in production. Carleton ----- Original Message ----- From: "John M. Steele" <[email protected]> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]> Sent: Thursday, April 15, 2010 6:32:05 AM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern Subject: [USMA:47129] RE: Decimal currency & Metrication The dime (10¢ piece) is the smallest US coin. Back when we used real silver, it was the smallest silver coin, the quarter, half dollar, and dollar coins being larger (presumably in proportion to weight?). The penny and nickel (5¢) were always base metals. Now, they all are. The modern dollar coin is considerably smaller than than the silver dollar was, about the size of a quarter, but distinctive color and edging. The link gives info on US coin dimensions and weights. Note the utility of the penny and nickel as cheap small balance weights. http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/?flash=yes&action=coin_specifications Fivel nickels and a penny roughly approximate what can be mailed at the 1 oz rate, but won't buy a stamp (44¢). ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- . . . . On 2010/04/15, at 02:30 , Tom Wade wrote: Incidentally, which is bigger: the American 5c or 10c :-; ? Tom Wade
