Euro-mixing in Slovenia: ten years later

Abstract

The paper reports the study of coin mixing after the introduction of the Euro to Slovenia in a 10-year retrospective. The national sides of the coins differ and allow recognition of coins with respect to their origin. At the beginning, after the introduction of the Euro to the country, the mixing process quickly became evident with a quick peek into a person’s purse. Even later, this peeking habit does not lose its charm. One finds coins of other countries, meets commemorative coins, and observes the frequency of coins with different origins. This pleasant activity was developed in a classroom study that allows students to become familiar with the process of coin mixing, to construct a physical model of this process, to compare this model to the collected data, and to extract information from these data. In addition, being involved in the study, students also experience characteristic problems for various measurements in social studies, where individuals with independent minds and desires are involved, problems not encountered with measuring equipment in laboratories during research in physics. In this paper we present the two theoretical models of the Euro-mixing process, ‘the initial model’ valid in the period after introduction of the Euro, and ‘the long-term’ model valid several years later, when shares of different nationalities became constant. The models are confined to a two-stage empirical study. The analysis of data has shown that the share of Slovenian Euro coins in the period after the introduction decreased with a characteristic time around 600 days. The quasi-stable share of Slovenian coins today is around 28% and is much higher than predicted by the initial model. Therefore, the long-term model is consistent with the observed behaviour of Slovenian coin shares.