Thoughts on rake change at my local poker room

I had heard this change was coming for a while but it did not start till this week. I sat down yesterday at a 1/2 NL table, and saw the dealer give the person who won the hand what looked like a rather dirty $1 chip... Upon further review, it turns out it was the new $.50 chip. Also they have $2.50 chips. All of this is being done to generate more rake apparently because they are just greedy. I was just curious if anyone else has ran across this at their room and for what folks might think about it. In fairness, it does not slow the game down at all because the dealers are for the most part experienced and it is not an issue. I suppose as busy as they are, it would add up, but it is surely odd.

What is the rake structure now and what did it used to be? If the max rake is less than $6 then your room is about average with what I've seen from Vegas to PA & NY.

It's10% or $5 max but these new chips allow them to get an extra 50 cents out of say a $15 pot. Seems odd to me