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I've always been a little curious how eliminating the penny might change the way sales tax is handled. Will everything need to be priced in a way that the total
by drewzero1 5y ago
I've always been a little curious how eliminating the penny might change the way sales tax is handled. Will everything need to be priced in a way that the total including tax will come out to an even 5 or 10? Some stores I've been to already price things to come out to an even dollar amount with tax, so I'm sure it's not impossible.
Or could we finally start including sales tax in the listed prices of things? That would be really convenient for most consumers (though it would probably be a headache for non-taxable organizations).
- tomc1985 5y agoIn countries that have gotten rid of pennies, totals are simply rounded (down, I think, but it's been a while) for cash payments. Digital transactions are still at their original amount
- Ardon 5y agoCould always look up how Canada did it, they stopped in 2013
- drewzero1 5y agoI wasn't aware of that, thanks for the tip!
- shaftway 5y agoOr you just move to a model where sales tax is required to be baked into the price that you see. Then make the items all cost multiples of 5 cents. You can still use single cents for checks, credit, or whatever. The only industry I can think of that gets left behind is gas stations, and then only if you post-pay in cash (or overpay with cash I guess). And they already tend to give a discount for cash, so I think rounding off to the nearest nickel would be a pretty acceptable outcome. As a bonus I don't have to constantly explain to the kids why the $10 thing they want actually costs $10.80, or $10.85, or $10.72, or $10.97, or some other amount that differs by state / county / city.
- drewzero1 5y agoThat's kind of where I was going with my second point, just bake it in so you don't have to keep explaining to kids or mentally calculating it in.