My two cents

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

This is "trickle up" economics.

The first person offers one penny for the thoughts, or opinion of the second person. BUT, before the second person can respond, he must first return the penny he received in compensation for his creative or critical input, and then pay an additional penny for the privilege of replying (this is different than speaking out, which carries it's own penalty).

The opinion or advice then tendered is most often ignored; however if multiple pennies (often in the millions) are handed over, the opinion or advise offered is usually accepted and followed.

This form of economics is most often used by governments to stimulate economies which are alleged to be sluggish, when in fact it does two, opposite, things: (1) it deprives individuals of their pennies and (2) slows down economic recovery (which would happen anyway) by removing the number of pennies in circulation.

When this happens the government is forced to seek foreign pennies to stay in the business of relieving the few remaining penny holders of their pennies. The result of this is that those not originally enticed to give up their pennies by the slogan "Penny for your thoughts" soon discover that the few pennies they have aren't worth a plugged nickle.