So.. Why did the US never convert to the metric system?? It's 10 X easier..

Most of us learned the metric system in school.. It's way easier to use than the english system of weights and measures. It would have been very expensive to convert, but once converted, seems the cost savings would be large.. My wife's company still counts stuff by the dozen.. WTF.. 73 dozen?? How many is that??

Working on my 88 cherokee yesterday reminded me of this. Half metric, half english..

 

When all the old farts like me who didn't learn the metric system die off maybe the US will convert.
In the meantime I still use the old system. I break it down to easier terms so I can do it in my head. 73 dozen, multiply 73x10, easy, 730. Then multiply 73 x 2, easy, 146. Add them together, easy, 876. That's my old fart way to get answers.

Mike

 

Mike is substantially correct. The conversion was tried here about 30-40 years ago. Highway signs were posted in Miles and in Kilometers. For a while, the weather forecasters gave the temperature in Celsius. The US automobile industry converted totally (they couldn't sell US cars abroad - Lars, Marcel, Guido, and Soo Chow didn't have or want US-sized wrenches). A couple of years ago the Federal Aviation Administration instituted a rule change that required temperature to be given in Celsius only. We old farts have been very resistant to the change, but the conversion is slowly taking place. My guess is that by 2050 the USA will be metric.

 

I have used both for many years in the manufacturing business so have no problem with either and relative to my exposure I see no difference as far as difficulty of use between the two. Metric has crept in somewhat over the years but the US English system is still dominant.
To answer your question in my opinion it would cost far more to convert than what cost savings would be gained. Any idea what or where any significant cost savings would result from switching? I don't thik there is and here is why. Use of the metric system in the US is voluntary so if there was really a cost savings or competitive advantage for companies to convert to metric, it surely would have happened by now.

 

Here's a positive outcome of 2 types of wrenches (english and metric) existing in my garage : while taking parts off my old parts car, some of the hex bolts for frontend sheetmetal were withered away a little on the hex. So when the correct english hex socket wouls slip/ rouns corners, I was able to use the adjacent slightly smaller metric size and knock it on with the help of a hammer and remove the old bolt.

 

Why did the U.S. never convert to the metric system? There is an old cliche' that answers that question. "If it works don't fix it"
I'm guessing as the U.S. continues to whither away and bow to other countries, it will lose it's power and influence in the world and be forced to convert.

Bob H.

 

i find it a pain that you haven't switched yet.since a lot of our stuff comes from the good old USA,we are stuck with
American litres.....946ml.
if what i'm working on requires 2l to fill,i have to open a third bottle & use only a part of it.

about the only thing here that hasn't switched is lumber.but a 2x4 is only 3 1/2x 1 1/2".

plywood & osb sheets are now in millemeters.

 

You have it bass-ackwardsou:

We refuse to convert, so we lose our influence.

 

We don't like decimals. The liter is too small, the cm is too small, the km is too small, the meter is too big, the kg is too big, and the centigrade is too big. And the biggest reason? Paying for gas by the liter is a rip-off. It goes up one penny per liter and that's an automatic 4 cents per gallon!

 

Metric system isn't 10x easier if you already know our system inside and out...


There's no reason a thread on this topic would be deleted, as long as everyone remains civil. I know some of our members can't help themselves sometimes. :laugh:

 

We would save ourselves from obsolesence.

Im the biggest stick in the mud around, but the old are screwing the young in this country over this silly argument.

Its just a fact.

Why are such a disproportional number of top science/enginering classes and jobs going to foreign kids?

Are Americans a stupid people?

Or do we spend 12 years teaching our children weights and measures that are 100% useless in the science/enginering fields:rant:


Our kids are being trained to sell 1/4 pounders to Habeeb and Raj on their way to MIT.

 

My job & career is involved with many things related to consumer packaging. I've been working with food packaging the past 4 years.
The costs of changes to convert, and government involvement, would probably be pretty large, not to mention consumer "re-education."

Mark

 

I remember them trying to teach it to us around 6th & 7th grade. I say tried because it seemed like the teachers weren't thrilled and begrudgingly taught it. We kids were equally as thrilled.
(You mean we spent years learning the English system, and now you say never mind?) uzzled:

Like David said, when you know one system inside and out and can visualize it in your head, it isn't easy to forget it all and move on.
People by nature hate change.
I don't know, we just never went all the way with it.

I still find a mixture of English and Metric fasteners on late model cars we own as daily drivers.

 

With the comapny I work for everything is in the metric system, and been in Canada working for a while as well. Also we Americans are slowly moving over to the metric system. I mean we buy 2 litres of soda so thats a start I guess

 

More than 4 cents! Go to any country that dispenses in "litres" and the price per equalized unit is at least 25% higher! Bankers started with metric as was pointed out earlier in the thread, and lawyers love money, and big oil/Halliburton have to fit in there somewhere; it's a conspiracy I tell ya... :bla:

Seriously, I think Jimmy Carter or Reagan signed legislation that all government contracts would be done in the metric system after a certain date. I guess those NASA contractors above didn't get the memo.

Here's a nice windows utility I;e used for years: http://joshmadison.com/convert-for-windows/ There is probably some nice apps for most phones these days.

Geez, I'm old enough to remember when you could choose between a 5th of Jim Beam or a liter (or was it 750ml?). Can one still buy a 5th of whiskey?

 

Careful here, you cannot compare "price per equalized unit" unless you are also aware of and take into consideration any additional fees or taxes imposed on the fuel per unit volume, which can differ drastically from one country (or state/province/prefecture within a country) to another.

Devon

 

My teachers did the same thing, ''oh yeah, here how the rest of planet Earth dos it'':boring:

This is exactly why Americans need to go metric, the sooner the better.

Our kids are taught an old archaic system as the one that they ''know inside and out and can visualize in their head''.

So then they have to un-learn everything to go into the scientific/medical/enginering fields.

That puts them half-a-step behind the foreign kids that dont just know metric but think in metric.

Ever had a foreign doctor that sucked at speeking English, but was very smart and flew through Med-School?

Thats because English is his second language, but med-school uses metric, which is what he was taught from 1st grade.

 

As long as their handwriting is illegible, they should do just fine.

 

As a retired public high school vocational teacher, I can tell you from experience that a very high percentage of 9th grade students do not know the US system of measurement, and know even less of the metric system. The elementary schools need to do a much better job of teaching measurement. It's not that hard to teach the US system; it's even easier to teach Metric measurement. If you can't multiply by 10, the outlook for your future is not great.

 

Check out this article from the March 1906 issue of National Geographic:

http://lamar.colostate.edu/~hillger/laws/bell-1906-03.html

Technically, I can deal with either system but I just don't have the "feel" for the metric system. I can estimate things in feet, pounds and gallons but I need to get out the old calculator to tell you how many milimeters, grams or liters something is and I lived in Germany for seven years. Yeah, I know that a meter is roughly 3 feet, a pound is around a half kilo and a liter is about a quart but I still think in english units and do the coversion. For me, I guess it's just what I grew up with. Maybe if the metric system was the only one around, I'd eventually get a better feel for it but until then, my brain is on the old system.