for a buck

Here in Michigan, we have a chain of stores called The Dollar Tree. They advertise everything for a dollar. False advertising, or misleading at best. You can't walk into the store and get absolutely everything on the shelves, counters, displays, hand them a dollar and expect to leave with all that stuff. For one thing, the staff is not for sale, as far as i can tell.

Obviously, they refer to individual items as costing a dollar. I'll get back to that later. But first, the Dollar Store Quiz.

I bought an umbrella and a bag of pistachios at the dollar store. Which cost more?

The umbrella. It costs $1.06. There is a 6% sales tax in Michigan. However, there is no tax on food.

Just in case you're catching on, the quiz continues.
I bought a 3 liter bottle of pop at the dollar store. How much did it cost?

$1.10. There's no tax on food, but there is a ten cent deposit on soda. As an aside, its called pop in Michigan, soda in Connecticut, and in parts of Boston, its called tonic.

How much is a six pack of pop at the dollar store?

$1.60. That's right. The six pack is treated as a single item. Individual cans work out to only sixteen and two thirds cents each. There's no tax on food, but there is a ten cent deposit per can. So 37.5% of the total cost is deposit.

Over the last year or so, i've gotten alot of mileage from the Dollar Store Quiz. Soon, i hope to be able to use it to go to China.