The beauty of $1 and $2 coins is that if you throw them in a jar like I do, you amass a small fortune in no time! Just the other week I looked in there and found I had an extra $30 in mad money. Just throwing pennies, nickels, dimes and qaurters in a jar doesn't amount to much in a short period of time.
The Canadian gov't got rid of the $1 and $2 bills because they didn't last as long as coins do which saves money. The 1 cent coin actually cost 1.5 cents to make, so it was a worthless coin, and everyone hated getting them. There was a fear that prices would rise once the penny was gone because retailers would be rounding up to the nearest nickel all of the time, but the opposite has happened. With retail being so cut throat competitive in Canada nowadays, a majority of retailers are rounding down to the nearest nickel to keep customers happy. It's not worth losing a customer over a few pennies. The polymer notes are also supposed to last longer than the paper notes. They are a little weird to the touch, and tend to stick together easily, but again are supposed to save money by lasting longer. When I lived in Australia back in 1995, they were doing all of this already. Australia was way ahead of other countries in this regard. For the most part, I also use plastic (debit and credit cards) when shopping.