Round 1: one_man24 vs TruthWithin: My Two Cents Isn’t Worth It Anymore?

The topic for this debate is “The US Penny Should Be Eliminated From Circulation.”

one_man24 will be arguing the pro position and will open the debate.
TruthWithin willl argue the con position.

Each debater will have one opening statement each. This will be followed by 3 alternating replies each. There will then be one closing statement each and no rebuttal.

There is a 10,000 character limit. Excess characters will be deleted prior to judging.

Editing is strictly forbidden. For reasons of time, mod edits should not be expected except in critical situations.

Opening and closing statements must not contain any images and must have no more than 3 references.

Excluding both the opening and closing statements, only two images and no more than 5 references can be included for each post. Each individual post may contain up to 10 sentences of external source material, totaled from all external sources.

Links to multiple pages within a single domain count as 1 reference but there is a maximum of 3 individual links per reference, then further links from that domain count as a new reference. Excess quotes and excess links will be removed before judging.

Videos are not permitted. This includes all youtube links and other multi-media video sources.

The Socratic Debate Rule is in effect. Each debater may ask up to 5 questions in each post, except for in closing statements- no questions are permitted in closing statements. These questions should be clearly labeled as "Question 1, Question 2, etc.

When asked a question, a debater must give a straight forward answer in his next post. Explanations and qualifications to an answer are acceptable, but must be preceded by a direct answer.

This Is The Time Limit Policy

Each debate must post within 24 hours of the timestamp on the last post. If your opponent is late, you may post immediately without waiting for an announcement of turn forfeiture. If you are late, you may post late, unless your opponent has already posted.

Each debater is entitled to one extension of 24 hours. The request should be posted in this thread and is automatically granted- the 24 hour extension begins at the expiration of the previous deadline, not at the time of the extension request.

In the unlikely event that tardiness results in simultaneous posting by both debaters, the late post will be deleted unless it appears in its proper order in the thread.

Judging will be done by a panel of anonymous judges. After each debate is completed it will be locked and the judges will begin making their decision. One of the debate forum moderators will then make a final post announcing the winner.

reply to post by MemoryShock


Thanks to Memory Shock for letting me in, and good luck to my opponent, TruthWithin.

“Oh no! What have I done? I smashed open my little boy's piggy bank, and for what? A few measly cents, not even enough to buy one beer. Wait a minute, lemme count and make sure... not even close.”
Homer Simpson

Good evening ladies and gentlemen of ATS. We all have them. Look in your pockets, the seats of your car, the cracks of your living room furniture. On top of the refrigerator, in the drawers of your desk, under your bed, in the window sill, on the ground at the super market, and even in a bowl on the counter of your local gas station. What am I talking about? Scum? Mold? Germs? NO! But definitely something on paralell, both in size and worth. I am talking about that scourge of the pockets, the most loathed coin of all, the penny. Why even bother? You need at least, AT LEAST one hundred and eight to get a cheeseburger, at least (AT LEAST) one hundred twenty five to get a beer. Modern vending machinies don't even accept them, and have you ever tried to bring them into a bank and exchange them for REAL money? They may take them, if they are rolled, and as long as you don't bring too many. What a pain!

Do you ever find yourself in these situations? Have you ever wondered what life would be like without that zinc filled, copper plated piece of undervalued, oxidized, worndown, stained, lincoln faced piece of monkey *#*# that they call money? Through interpretive dance, I mean, through this debate, and in the following series of posts, I will show you why pennies are both pointless, and not worth the metal they are printed on, literally. By the end of this debate I am confident that we will all be ready to cash in our two cents for something better, something that makes more......cents.

Truth Within's Opening Statement

First, allow me to thank Memory Shock and Semper for putting together another fine tournament. I have been less active in the debate forum as a result of a new job and I cannot wait to get back into it!

The US Penny Should Be Eliminated From Circulation.

I will be arguing the position that the penny should not be eliminated from circulation.

Eliminating the Penny Would be Great Way to Place Enormous Stress on an Already Fragile Economy

The penny provides a key roll in our economy and its elimination would cost tax payers, businesses and consumers hundreds of millions of dollars, if not BILLIONS of dollars in unnecessary costs.

Throughout the course of this debate I will illustrate many obvious negative effects of eliminating the penny from circulation and some other, not so obvious, effects in which the consequences could be extremely severe.

We will also discuss the cultural and sentimental impact that this coin has on our society.

To start, let us consider several areas in the economy that would be significantly effected by the elimination of the penny:

• Consumer Pricing
  
• Business Taxes
  
• Sales Tax
  
• Product Marketing
  
• Stress on the Nickel
  
• Retail and Point of Sale Costs
  
• micro and macro economic catastrophes
  

And the list goes on!

The penny is far more than a:

zinc filled, copper plated piece of undervalued, oxidized, worndown, stained, lincoln faced piece of monkey *#*# that they call money

The penny is viable and necessary element to the US's already weakened economy.

We will discuss all of these subjects at much greater length as the debate progresses, but I wanted to begin by painting a broad picture of the negative consequences that would ensue should the penny be eliminated from circulation.

I now open the floor to my opponent.

Every year the US mint produces more than 7,000,000,000 –that’s 7 billion- United States one-cent pieces. That’s roughly half the coins produced each year. Does anyone stop to ask, how much does all this cost? Does anyone ask the question, is this really worth it?
1. The United States one cent piece should no longer be produced. It is a waste of our time and money to continue producing one cent pieces. It cost approximately 1.26 cents to manufacture each penny last year, and has taken up to 1.7 cents years prior.
www.wisegeek.com...
www.nytimes.com...




Many would argue that a penny is used more than once, and therefore the cost is justified. According to www.retirethepenny.org , it takes over 100 million dollars to produce and circulate roughly 7 billion one cent pieces that are only worth 7 million dollars. With the rising cost of zinc, which comprises 97.5% of a 1982 to present day one cent piece, and copper, the other 2.5%, the cost will only become greater. Added with the fact that pennies have been rendered almost useless by modern vending machines, credit and debit cards, as well as pay phones etc, you have a general disdain from society, not even taking the time to pick free money up off of the ground. How many of these pennies make it back into circulation? The ones that don’t will sit somewhere collecting dust, while the US mint is bound to waste more resources to replace and circulate the money lost. Through research, Dr. Robert Whaples, a professor at Wake Forest University, and an expert on the History of the US Economy, has estimated that the US loses 900 million dollars a year through production and handling of pennies.
www.wfu.edu...

2.It works! (getting rid of it)

Many countries have done it, including Australia, France, Spain, the Netherlands , and New Zealand. New Zealand has been without it for over twenty years, and it did not cause any kind of Economic Collapse, as TruthWithin has suggested.
en.wikipedia.org...
www.answers.com...

It makes absolutely no sense to continue to hang on to such a worthless and time consuming piece of metal that isn’t even worth the material used it’s stamped on.

I would like to begin my first reply by rebutting the two points my opponent made in his first reply and then I will illustrate several of the main points in my opening statement.

1. The United States one cent piece should no longer be produced. It is a waste of our time and money to continue producing one cent pieces. It cost approximately 1.26 cents to manufacture each penny last year, and has taken up to 1.7 cents years prior.

While I agree that it is ridiculous that one penny costs 1.7 cents to make, I never argued that the penny must continually be made of its current materials. There are many alternative materials that would be far more cost effective and still represent the penny.

But, in that same vein, the nickel costs 0.0953 cents to make- almost DOUBLE!

Plastic, aluminum, some other composite etc would all be fine alternatives. Therefore, my opponent's argument holds no ground.

There is a reason why the government continues to pay what they pay for the production of the penny, even though there is current legislation pending that would change the composition of the new penny to be released in 2009.

Where the sentiment might land today, amid the financial crisis, is anybody's guess. Experts and officials are acutely attuned to the issue. Several bills now pending in Congress would allow the Mint to change the coin's composition, and one would require use of steel and copper coloring.

SOURCE 1

Fine by me! The government knows that by eliminating the penny, the US would ultimately have to retool its entire financial system - but more on that later...

My Opponent also states:

2. Many countries have done it, including Australia, France, Spain, the Netherlands , and New Zealand. New Zealand has been without it for over twenty years, and it did not cause any kind of Economic Collapse, as Truth Within has suggested.

Since New Zealand is the only currency with any link to it, I will discuss that.

The current exchange rate of the New Zealand Dollar to the USD is nearly 4 to 1. Meaning that 1 penny in New Zealand is worth .25 pennies in the US - that's 1/4th of a penny - NO WONDER THEY ELIMINATED IT! Therefore, once again, my opponent's argument is refuted.

The other thing to consider is that the majority of the world's goods and services are not traded in the New Zealand Dollar or even the Australian, French or Spanish dollar. These goods and services, oil being among the most frequent, are traded in US Dollars.

So what does this mean? Well...it leads into my argument quite nicely. Allow me to explain...

Consumer Pricing

Imagine if the penny were eliminated and you had to price goods and services in increments of 5 cents as opposed to 1 and businesses were asked to use their discretion as to whether they should round up or round down.

I would imagine that the board room discussion would be brief and the short an sweet answer would be "Round Up!".

This would mean that business would exchange goods and services at a higher rate (rounded up several cents per transaction). Further more, this cost would be passed down to consumers and then rounded up again!

For Example:

10 Barrels of oil is sold for $34.46 (now at $34.50) or $3.46 a barrel to a distributor.

So far 4 cents has been passed on...

Then the distributor sells the gas to ten different stations at 4.46 cents a barrel (now 4.50 a barrel).

We are up to 8 cents passed along...

Each gas station sells 1 gallon of gas at a time (I know that's not how it works, but this is an illustration) If there are 50 gallons of gas per barrel and the price works down to 11 cents a gallon (now 15 cents) then that is 4 extra cents per unit sold multiplied by 500

We end with $8.08 passed along each time this transaction occurs! Transactions like these happen with the US a dollar BILLIONS of times a year. This could add up to be in the Hundreds of Millions of Dollars!

Not just pennies any more, huh?

Business and Sales Tax

You and I have seen weird tax rates all of our lives. I live in NY and my sales tax is 8.375. So what happens if the penny goes away? Well, it would be a real possibility that we would have to round the sales tax.

Would New York's Governor be willing to listen to an argument to take the tax rate down to 5%? I doubt it.

Once again, the meeting would be would be brief and the short an sweet answer would be "Round Up!".


In my next posts we will discuss the costs of making this adjustment, and the magnitude of that will make your eyes bulge.



I open the floor to my opponent.

My opponent TruthWithin did not refute either of my points. All he did was simply try to take the focus off of the facts. Two things he stated are true: it costs more than a nickel to make a nickel, approx 7.7 cents, and congress is discussing changing the composition of the one cent piece. The problem with this is that regardless of the cost of a nickel, and regardless of changing the composition of the one cent piece, he fails to address the heart of the issue we are debating-the ultimate value of the penny in today’s society.

Changing the composition of the one cent piece may in fact lower the cost to something more reasonable, but it will never change the attitude of the spender. Approximately half the pennies each year disappear from circulation, and the US General Accounting estimates that 2/3 of the roughly 170 billion one cent pieces in existence have been effectively removed from circulation by people who believe they are too much of a hassle. We are throwing our money away, literally.

www.straightdope.com...

The penny just doesn’t buy much. Here are some ratios of how much you could buy of a certain item, with a penny, in Texas, including tax. (I came up with these)

Item Cost How much you get for a penny

Loaf of Bread 1.08 1/4 of a slice (assuming twenty five slices)
20oz Soda 1.18 1/6 of an oz (at 6 cents an oz)
Reg. M&M’s .95 none, since they are approx 1.5 cents apiece (assuming 65 per bag)


A penny doesn’t even buy ONE m&m?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

My opponent has also stated:

“The current exchange rate of the New Zealand Dollar to the USD is nearly 4 to 1. Meaning that 1 penny in New Zealand is worth .25 pennies in the US - that's 1/4th of a penny - NO WONDER THEY ELIMINATED IT!

Therefore, once again, my opponent's argument is refuted.”
The value of a New Zealand dollar compared with a United States dollar has absolutely nothing to do with this debate. We are discussing the value of the one cent piece, which is 1/100 of our dollar. Before its removal in 1989 (almost 20 yrs ago), New Zealand’s one cent piece was just that, 1/100 of a dollar. Therefore it is still comparable to our situation.

Back in 1892 the United States decided to do away with the half-penny, which at the time had more purchasing power than our dime currently does. (just a note)

www.newyorker.com...

While my opponent does present a possible outcome of what could happen with his points on Consumer Pricing, and Business and Sales tax, the work has already been done on this subject. This is an old argument that has actually been tested scientifically, and has been proven to be a myth.
www.retirethepenny.org...

Dr. Robert Whaples of Wake Forest University has done a study on local stores, both upscale and lower income areas. In this study the stores rounded the price of the item to the nearest increment of five. Dr. Whaples found that on average, the consumer actually gained a cent every forty transactions, which is effectively the same as breaking even for store and consumer alike.

www.wfu.edu...

Again , There is more than ample reason to do away with the penny.

Truth Within's Second Reply

For my second post, I will once again refute several of my opponent's arguments and then continue with my own argument.

The 'Value' of the Penny

My opponent states:

The problem with this is that regardless of the cost of a nickel, and regardless of changing the composition of the one cent piece, he fails to address the heart of the issue we are debating-the ultimate value of the penny in today’s society.

My opponent presumes that because the penny is an inconvenience to some individuals, then it must follow that the penny is worthless. Sure, you wouldn't cry over it if you lost a penny - but this is very narrow and unreasonable perspective when there is a much bigger picture at play.

Let us assume that everyone in the US lost a single penny. At roughly 300,000,000 people in the US, that would add up to 3 MILLION dollars!

$3,000,000 will buy a lot of M&M's.

This is my point: Sure, you can look at the penny on a personal level and consider a penny to be low in value, but when you start multiplying by the millions or even billions then the problem multiplies - especially when you like at the size of the US economy.

The Incredible Mr. Whaple

My opponent sums up Mr. Whaple's argument as:

Dr. Robert Whaples of Wake Forest University has done a study on local stores, both upscale and lower income areas. In this study the stores rounded the price of the item to the nearest increment of five. Dr. Whaples found that on average, the consumer actually gained a cent every forty transactions, which is effectively the same as breaking even for store and consumer alike.

(Bold is my emphasis)

Note, that Mr. Whaple assumed that businesses all over America would naturally do the right thing by rounding to the nearest 5 cent increment but, as I noted in my last post, I do not share the same optimism that comapanies would ever round down. To the contrary, businesses with a constant focus on the bottom line would ROUND UP!

Something that cost 4.96 cents would surely go to five dollars. Therefore, as smart as I am sure Mr. Whaple is, he made a fatal error in his study.

Lincoln v Jefferson

Speaking to the nickel, my opponent says:

Two things he (Truth Within) stated are true: it costs more than a nickel to make a nickel, approx 7.7 cents, and congress is discussing changing the composition of the one cent piece.

I am glad my opponent brought this up because it leads right into my argument.

So, let us say that hypothetically the penny were to be eliminated. Naturally, that would put extraordinary physical demand for the nickel to make up for the penny's absence.

According to the US Mint, in 2007 the two US facilities produced:

# 2007 P - 571,680,000
# 2007 D - 626,160,000

That means that 1,197,840,000 (that's over one TRILLION) nickels were made.

Now that we live in a world of increments of 5, we would almost need to double that number to account for the absence of the penny.

Only problem is, the cost to produce and ship a nickel is 9.5 cents as opposed to the 1.7 cents is costs to make and ship a penny!

That is an added cost, if we multiply 4.5 cents by 1.2 trillion additional nickels, of $53,900,000.00.

53 Million dollars will buy a lot of M&M's.

Head ready to explode from all of the numbers? Getting hungry for M&M's?

It is simple - there are many additional costs that would be incurred by eliminating the penny - you just have to look at the BIG picture.

My POS is now a POS!

The Point of Sales (POS), or cash registers, across the country are mostly computers now. This would mean untold costs to get every single POS system be given new software or reprogrammed - and last I checked IT services are not cheap!

Again, this is another adverse consequence to the US economy as retail needs all the help it can get right now.


In my next post I will discuss the sappy side of the penny; charity and sentimental value.

I now open the floor to my opponent.

reply to post by TruthWithin


I apologize but I have to take my 24 hour extension.

My opponent stated that if everyone in the US, approximately 3, 000,000,000 people, were to lose a penny that would be 3 million dollars. This is true. But he is ignoring the fact that the 3 million dollars lost is only 1/300 of the 9 hundred-million Dr. Whaples has estimated the US loses on the penny (and he is an expert in US economy, btw) every YEAR.

In my opponent’s section entitled “The Incredible Mr. Whaple”, he again points to the fact that he believes something that costs 4.96 will now cost 5.00. He must not be really reading my references. I’ll post the reference on the MYTH that his argument is, again.
www.retirethepenny.org...

My opponent hasn’t done his homework. He is clearly assuming that each price will be rounded and then sold. On the contrary, the system works on the basis that you round at the end of the ENTIRE purchase. For example. I go to the store to pick up a sick pack and a pack of smokes. The sick pack is 6.99, plus tax of course (8.25%), as well as the smokes. This figure can be somed up as (6.99+3.99)1.0825= 11.89.
The purchase would only cost me, in the new system, eleven dollars and ninety cents.
Let’s do something with more odd ending numbers. Calculating tax separately.
You go to the store for a candy bar and a soda which are respectively, .88 and 1.16.
The candy bare .88(1.0825)=.95
The soda 1.16(1.0825)=1.26
Candy bar + soda= 2.21
Hence the price would be two dollars and twenty cents. You gain a cent

As as far as my opponents argument on the cost of producing and shipping the nickel, I would like to know where he gets his numbers from, but I’ll humor his argument.

If it does cost 53 million dollars to produce the amount of nickels to replace a penny, which I doubt, added with the 3 million dollars in lost pennies, and maybe even 44 million extra thrown in there for whatever the heck you may need it for, that is still only 100 million dollars, 1/9 of the 900 million dollars a year we lose on penny production and handling.

My opponent’s argument on Point of Sales is completely incorrect. Anyone who has ever worked a POS machine knows that the prices are set by either store owner, or the corporate office/store manager, depending on the type of business. There is no law, no procedure, no software of any type that would prevent businesses from rounding to the nearest nickel. Here are some people who have done it. And guess who is involved?
“The Incredible Dr. Whaples”

www.wickedlocal.com...

My opponent and my judges: Thank you very much for being patient with me. I have a lot going on right now. I appreciate it.

[edit on 20-2-2009 by MemoryShock]

Once again, I will address and refute my opponent's argument and continue with my own argument.

As as far as my opponents argument on the cost of producing and shipping the nickel, I would like to know where he gets his numbers from, but I'll humor his argument.

I obtained my information from the US Mint website.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/eadd85b138e5.png[/atsimg]

USMint.gov

As you can see, it costs an additional nickel for every nickel made, therefore the extra strain on the nickel would be incredibly costly.

But he is ignoring the fact that the 3 million dollars lost is only 1/300 of the 9 hundred-million Dr. Whaples has estimated the US loses on the penny (and he is an expert in US economy, btw) every YEAR.

Dr. Whaples came to the $900 million figure based on an abstract calculation based on the time it takes to dig for change. That cost can be applied to any single monetary unit in circulation and , therefore, the argument is irrelevant.

$900 million is very misleading on behalf of my opponent because the ACTUAL cost to produce and ship the penny in 2007 was $118.2 million, a far cry from $900 Million.

My opponent hasn't done his homework. He is clearly assuming that each price will be rounded and then sold. On the contrary, the system works on the basis that you round at the end of the ENTIRE purchase. For example. I go to the store to pick up a sick pack and a pack of smokes. The sick pack is 6.99, plus tax of course (8.25%), as well as the smokes. This figure can be somed up as (6.99+3.99)1.0825= 11.89.

Nowhere, in any of posts, have I suggested that each price will be rounded up and sold. I am basing my model on a transactional basis only. Remember, there are trillions of cash transactions annually, all affected by the penny.

I take issue with Mr. Whaples' argument because he assumes in his study that the total cost will be rounded to the nearest nickel, ie $1.96 = $1.95 or $2.98 = $3.00.

This is where sales tax for businesses becomes an issue.

If I am a merchant in the state of New York and I am selling something for $5.00 and I apply the New York State Sales Tax of % 8.375 to the $5.00 purchase then the sale total equals $5.42 (actually it is $5.41875). Easy right? According to Dr. Whaples, just round down, right?

Wrong.

The business is accountable for the entire sales tax which must be rendered to the state. In this example, the state will demand $0.41875 cents from that one transaction, but the business only charged $0.40 for the transaction. Therefore, the business is actually losing money!

If we take this example and apply it to a Dollar Store, where all items cost $1.00 and the sales tax is %7, then each item would cost $1.07. The business has to come up with $.07 in sales tax per item, but would only charge $1.05. That means that nearly %2 of every transaction would be lost - and I can not think of a single business owner that would be thrilled about having to lose up to %2 or more of their annual revenue just to make up for additional taxes.

Even if adjusted, that costs gets pushed on to either the customer in higher over all prices, or to the business in additional taxes.

My opponent’s argument on Point of Sales is completely incorrect. Anyone who has ever worked a POS machine knows that the prices are set by either store owner, or the corporate office/store manager, depending on the type of business. There is no law, no procedure, no software of any type that would prevent businesses from rounding to the nearest nickel.

Software would be required to handle these new rounding functions and to account for the new variances in sales tax, for without them, the accounting errors could cost businesses millions of added dollars.

Penny for your thoughts?...er...umm...A nickel for your thoughts?

The penny clearly has sentimental value in the US. There are many phrases and euphemisms associated with the penny, but most importantly, there is a great tradition of charity in the US when it comes to the "worthless hunk of zinc".

Non for profit orgs, schools, churches etc. all run penny drives. They rely on the jars of unused pennies in peoples' basements for revenue and for new projects. Will people be as likely to keep the nickel? I doubt it. The nickel is heavier, more cumbersome and will be in higher demand in the absence of the penny. What will all of these organizations do?

Seattle's Penny Harvest campaign is run by Fremont non-profit, Solid Ground. The group is affiliated with Common Cents, a New York organization that started the fundraiser.

Nine hundred schools in Albany, New York, Nashville, Tennessee and the states of Colorado and Florida are also sponsoring Penny Harvest drives. In 2006, $770,000 was raised in those states.

In the Seattle area, 61 schools are collecting pennies. Last year 39 schools raised $41,000.

Source 2

TruthWithin, thank you for supplying the link to the information on the nickel. I had been unable to locate. Maybe wasn’t looking in the right places.
My opponent takes issue with Dr. Whaples’ study on the money lost by handling pennies. He states that Dr. Whaples’ argument is “based on an abstract calculation based on the time it takes to dig for change.” Dr. Whaples does indeed base part of his argument on the time it takes to dig for change, but that is only one small part of his estimate. He figures the mean wage for an American citizen is 17.00 p/h. This means that every two seconds of your life is worth one cent. This adds up to around 300 million dollars a year for the US economy. Notice how 300 million is only 1/3 of his 900 million loss estimate. Where are the other 600 million dollars lost? Besides production and handling by the US mint?
From the article: “Whaples said that official estimates of the cost to the government ignore the substantial cost to the Federal Reserve System of transporting and distributing pennies.”
From Dr. Whaples himself: “There's a whole range of other costs that we as consumers are bearing in dealing with pennies.”
He also makes the point that getting rid of the penny would make room for the dollar coin in our cash register. Replacing the dollar bill with a dollar coin would save an average of 500 million dollars a year, according to the Federal Reserve.
www.wfu.edu...
My opponent does make an interesting argument as far as sales tax goes, but remember, Dr. Whaples included tax in his study, and overall the store and the customer broke even. Neither got over on the other. The simple fact is that no matter which way you look at it, you are going to have to spend money somewhere in this issue. We have got to start looking towards a change for this country. Hanging on to the penny won’t make or break this country, and many countries have already done it with excellent results. Think of what you could do with the pennies laying around everwhere if we could bring all together in one place. Think of what we could do with the money we would have, if we never made them at all.

To my opponent- Thank you so much for waiting. I know you could have posted your reply already, and I would have lost my turn. You truly are a fair sport, and you deserve to win just for that. I apologize for not being able to put more time and thought into this. Some things have come up recently. You’re a gentlemen, and a scholar.

To all who participate in the debate forum, whether it be moderators, judges or participants, THANK YOU! This is such a great time.

To my opponent, thanks for a great debate and I hope everything is OK on your end. Life comes first, debates come second (just barely LOL).

Ladies and gentlemen, the arguments are on the table and for the sake of brevity, I will keep this short.

My opponent's argument boils down to Mr. Whaples' study, which I have proven to be flawed, and the generic dislike of the penny. But, like it or not, the untold costs on consumers, businesses and the economy in general far outweigh the slight nuisance that the penny might generate for some people.

The reality is that the penny gives pricing an extra feature of flexibility, and while a penny lost here or there is nothing to cry over, several TRILLION pennies lost is another story.

Thanks again to all!

TruthWithin has won through majority decision and will advance to the Second Round. The Judges comments:

As much as I myself do not like the hassle of the penny, I am siding in favor of TruthWithin.

In terms of veracity of the argument, I feel TruthWithin provided a sobering need to take seriously the effects that removing the penny can have on our current economic situation. Until regulations and laws governing a "Swedish Rounding" system are in place, and tax structures in place that do not cause businesses more losses, I feel the penny cannot be removed.

Although I enjoyed the sarcasm and humor of his opening statement,
I do not feel that one_man24's general argument that the penny is just a useless piece of metal holds up when looking at the millions of dollars that are involved. It definitely has a value to our society in light of the problems removing it can entail. If it is valued in the economy, then it is valued in the society respectively. He stressed this was his prime argument, and I feel TruthWithin showed it does have value. Not in sentimentality, but in its viability in a weakened economy.

TruthWithin showed that the added stress on the already overpriced nickel is not justified while it is still overpriced. The nickel and the penny BOTH need to be made cheaper to produce in order to justify keeping them. But, the penny must be valued by society in order for them not to throw them away. Something that might well occur in a weakened economy.

Seeing that removing them can cause problems for business owners is an important consideration well expressed by TruthWithin. Taxes and POS software are serious potential loses and annoyances to consider.

Abusing a rounding system or lowering it for competition are canceled points made by each fighter. I felt this aspect of the argument didn't have enough study to support it by either fighter. And many million dollar figures where thrown here by different "interested" parties.

One_man24 showed there are some myths involved with the abuse by businesses of such a system while TruthWithin showed there are some hidden expenses in such transactions. The consumer saves 4 cents on a total purchase while the manufacturers and businesses have a potential gain. Also a somewhat mooted point.

One_man24 stated that credit cards wouldn't be subject to a rounding system, which actually hurt his argument because then businesses would be less likely to take cash.

I believe TruthWithin showed there are some illusions about how removing the penny will alleviate its annoyances simply by removing it, essentially because of the tax complications and potential problems of abuse.

With TruthWithins perspective in mind, I felt, sentimentality was a lessor argument with little to substantiate it besides a few collectors and coin counting business, nor were there any real estimates regarding what rounding up or down would cost the average consumer, but one_man24 didn't give a good enough reason to justify the 170 million dollar attitude of the spender, nor that that attitude would be reduced by going to the nickle.

In terms of the rebuttal, I am uncomfortable because it is clear that one_man24 had some problems to deal with at home which both fighters seem okay with.

Thank you for the opportunity and the learning experience.

I think that both debaters presented excellent arguments for their sides. I honestly think that they did such a good job that it made it very difficult to decide. Ultimately, I have to give the nod to TruthWithin. He/she just had a more polished approach to the debate, The references cited and rebuttals presented were just a little better than the opponent. I would probably chalk it up to experience.

Again, both did a great job but I have to give the win to TruthWithin.