The next time you go to a convenience store or fast food restaurant, you may want to bring an exact change.
The coin shortage across the country has supermarkets and convenience stores as well as fast food restaurants running out of coins.
We all understood the shortage of hand sanitizers and sanitizing wipes during the COVID-19 pandemic as everyone was taking them.
But now there is also a national shortage of coins, in particular dime, dime and coin.
Ken Adkins now makes sure to keep a handful of changes to his car at all times after he was forced to overpay for a small purchase.
He stopped for a snack and a Coke and learned that the cashier had no change.
“I got there and it was $ 4.45. And I gave her a five. And she said, ‘I can’t give you the change,'” Adkins said. “And she pointed to a sign in the registry that said that because of COVID-19 there is a shortage of change.”
Frustrated, he ended up paying $ 5 for his $ 4.45 snack.
Theories behind scarcity.
So why are we dealing with another shortage?
There are many theories as to why the coins have disappeared this year.
One of them is that many people do not like to touch them, for fear of contracting the virus. So people don’t have coins in their pocket or purse.
Brad Karoloff is a veteran coin collector who owns a coin shop. But even he doesn’t carry much change these days.
“I have a habit of going home at night and taking whatever is in my pocket and throwing it in the jar on top of my dresser,” he said.
Karoloff, who deals with the rarest coins, never expected everyday coins to be rare, but says the pandemic has affected production lines as well as toilet paper and beef.
“The United States closed for a time during the COVID crisis,” he said. “So it delayed them in production and they are not generating as much currency at the moment.”
The biggest coin users don’t handle as many coins
The Federal Reserve also blames the closure of 2 months of banks, bus lines and laundries, the largest users of coins.
As a result, many banks are limiting the number of rolls of restaurant and convenience store owners they can get at the same time.
However, Adkins still scratches his head.
“What happened? Did they stop making them? I don’t understand the shortage,” said Adkins.
Bottom line: Be sure to bring the exact change or a credit card the next time you go to a store or restaurant, so you don’t waste your money.
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