This is a Comedy Trope where a character or characters try to buy some item (which is normally at least somewhat expensive), and tries to do so with nothing more than a few pennies of spare change, or lint, or some sort of ineffectual barter. Usually this trope is invoked just after the seller has told the character all he has to offer, all the options and all the flexibility in deal making. Either out of desperation or out of a literal interpretation of the idea of making a deal, the character then makes his own pitch, almost ALWAYS starting with the phrase, "What can I get for..."

Generally, the seller then either kicks them out of the store, or sells them something that wasn't in his list of options he gave before, and the item in question is either of questionable quality or is a poor facsimile of whatever product he was selling.

Not to be confused with lint as an actual, valuable commodity.

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Examples:

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[[folder:Advertising]]

• In a commercial for the Mc Donalds Dollar Menu, a guy goes to various places to find out what he can get for a dollar.

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[[folder:Film]]

• In the The Little Rascals movie, the gang tries to buy materials from the hardware store for their soapbox derby. They then sheepishly ask the guy working there about how much they can get...for a little over three or four dollars. The man just looks at them before simply replying, "Paper or plastic?"
• In Im Gonna Git You Sucka Chris Rock appears at Hammer & Slammer's BBQ joint. Since an order of ribs costs $2.50 and you get 5 ribs, he orders 1 rib for 50 cents. They reluctantly agree, then Rock asks for change for a $100 bill. Rock later recycled the character when he was on Saturday Night Live.

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[[folder:Music]]

• In the song "One Meatball", a man has fifteen cents, and buys one meatball at a restaurant. He is refused bread to go with it.

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[[folder:Webcomics]]

• Seen in the Brawl In The Family strip where Bowser gets his flying clown car.

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[[folder:Western Animation]]

• In Avatar The Last Airbender, Aang, who only has three copper pieces, tries to haggle with a pirate who is selling a waterbending scroll for 100 gold pieces. He offers one copper piece. Then, okay, how about two copper pieces? (He gets kicked out of the shop.)
• Implied in an episode of Family Guy where the family is stranded in another country without money--they go to the black market to be smuggled back into America, where there's a sign already posted that they do not except lint or bits of string as payment.
• In an episode of Camp Lazlo, Scoutmaster Lumpus attempts to pay a restaurant bill with the contents of the Bean Scouts' pockets: buttons, lint, string, a frog...

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So, Do We Have This One already? Needs More Examples.