No Cents Of Human Decency

Ever since President Trump discontinued the penny, businesses have colluded into cheating us out of our hard-earned cash. 

     It used to be a penny saved was a penny earned, but these days a penny saved is just laughed at by the other change in your pocket. The presidential bullies all face left, leaving poor Abraham Lincoln nervously checking over his shoulder for John Wilkes Booth. 

     While these coins may seem annoying when they're jangling heavily in your pocket like a copper clot, you should consider a penny as the first brick you use in building your fortune, and on my last trip to McDonald's that creepy clown tried to cheat me out of TWO bricks. 

     My order was simple, and the amount came out to $16.53. I handed the cashier a twenty, did the math in my head, and expected back $3.47. 

     "Here's your change, sir," the cashier politely said, handing me back three dollar bills, a quarter, two dimes, but no pennies. 

     "Excuse me, miss," I politely said back, "but you're short two pennies." 

     "What?" 

     "You're short two pennies," I repeated, "I should have gotten back 47 cents." 

     "Oh, we don't do that anymore," she said. 

     "Do what? Give back correct change?" 

     "Give back pennies." 

     "Why?" 

     "Because the government's stopped making them, so we've been told to round down." 

     While that may be true enough, there are pennies still in circulation and I bet her cash register was full of them. 

     "Yes, but rounding down cheats your customers out of their change," I told her. "Why don't you round up instead?" 

      "Round up?" she asked, as if the concept was a math problem on her finals. 

     "Yes," I explained. "Instead of rounding down, you go in the opposite direction. Rounding down cheats me out of money. Rounding up makes me a happy customer." 

     I felt like a jerk. 

     This girl, who looked to still be in high school, didn't deserve to have a cranky old man give her a hard time. It was two pennies, for gosh sakes. If I dropped one I wasn't going to watch my wife's half of my entire net worth roll away. True, it wasn't going to break me, but... it wasn't going to break McDonald's either. I felt there was a point to be made and I was making it. 

     "Is there a problem?" her manager said. 

     He must have seen the line behind me growing, so he decided to step in. 

     "He wants his two pennies," the cashier told him. 

     "We don't do that anymore," he explained. 

     Trying to get the two cents owed me was starting to become a lot like picking up a girl at a nightclub: maximum effort, questionable value, minimal return. I'm far from poor, but my piggy bank does oink in disappointment every time I shake it for change, so... 

     I sighed. 

     "I know you've been told to round down, but what I'm telling you is I'd like my two pennies please, because at the end of the day all those pennies McDonald's steals from their customers add up. They're making an extra profit, while I'm still short two cents. Now what you should do is round up and everybody will be happy." 

     Everybody but him, that is, because he got a pained look on his face. I fully expected him to reach into his pocket and grudgingly hand over two pennies from the secret stash he's been skimming, but instead... 

     "Round up," he told the cashier.