99 Is Not 100

We all notice how stores price a lot of items just below a dollar. A bag of chips is ninety-nine cents. A jar of mayonnaise is $2.99. The head of lettuce? 79¢, not an even 80¢. You even see it on large ticket items, like cars - $19,999 - not $20,000. That extra penny or dollar sure makes a difference!There's a name for this practice. It's called "just under pricing." It's a psychological tactic, or a marketing trick, to make something seem cheaper than it actually is. Gas stations even price gas at a tenth of a cent - $2.199 - as opposed to simply $2.19 or just $2.20 and be done with it.
As silly as the practice seems, it works. Many people believe that the "penny saved" is more than a "penny earned" and they're getting a great deal.
"Just under pricing" might work as a marketing ploy or sales tactic, and we might feel smug about "rounding up," but in some things we need to be very precise, to know the difference between 99 and 100. After all, have you ever heard of an athlete giving a 99% effort?
When it comes to medication, for instance, or the prescription for our glasses - we want the measurement to be exact. 1% may mean our eyes are out of focus, or the dosage is not quite effective.
When it comes to other matters we want "just weights and measures," as well.
And the Torah recognizes the need for precision. Rabbi Gamliel, in Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), expresses it most succinctly: "Do not tithe by guesswork." When it comes to giving tzedaka (charity), don't rely on "just under pricing" and round up. This insight may be even more important now, in these hard economic times, when "just under pricing" and "rounding up" may seem so tempting.
In other things, too, we should avoid the "just under pricing" approach. The start or end of Shabbat - a little "just under pricing" could lead to lighting candles after sunset, thus desecrating the very Sabbath that the candles come to honor. A "just under pricing" on a fast-day, like Yom Kippur or Tisha B'Av, could lead to eating before one is permitted to break the fast. Similarly, this approach could allow one to think that it's permissible to buy a food product if the ingredients seem to check out 100% and "just" the kosher symbol is missing.
Even in Torah study, we have to be careful not to "round up," to shorten our study sessions or think that 99 is a 100. Interestingly, the rabbis stated that a donkey (taxi) driver who charges $1 for 10 miles can charge $2 for 11 miles, because it's beyond the usual. So, too, learning something 101 times - once more than the norm - is categorically different than learning it 100.
The same is true a step down. Learning something 99 times (metaphorically speaking) is not "just under" learning it 100; it's a difference in kind, not degree. We can't "round up" our learning.
So let's leave the "just under pricing" to the ads and marketeers. For us, when it comes to Jewish observance and learning, let's be "precise about the price" - knowing 99 is not 100.