No more new pennies

[oscar]

They probably won't be, but maybe they'd be worth more than a 1 cent each at some point.  In any case, it probably isn't going to make or break my future financial security.

Go to the bank and ask for a few rolls...

Back when I was buying penny rolls to add to the pennies I got in change, I often got rolls of pennies that had been thoroughly picked through by other bank customers. They removed all the bronze pennies (1981-earlier, and some 1982s), leaving only copper-plated zine pennies with a melt value less than face. I gave up at that point.

[Big John]

They probably won't be, but maybe they'd be worth more than a 1 cent each at some point.  In any case, it probably isn't going to make or break my future financial security.

Go to the bank and ask for a few rolls...

Back when I was buying penny rolls to add to the pennies I got in change, I often got rolls of pennies that had been thoroughly picked through by other bank customers. They removed all the bronze pennies (1981-earlier, and some 1982s), leaving only copper-plated zine pennies with a melt value less than face. I gave up at that point.

The year indication became smaller with the zinc pennies. can see with the different 1982 pennies.

[Scott5114]

Freed from making pennies, they could easily ramp up dollar and two dollar coins, and in say three years, just require banks to return one dollar bills to the Fed as they pass through, and quickly replace the dollar bill, which is what Canada did.

They can't actually do that, though. It's illegal. A company makes the bill paper and you'll make them sad.

[formulanone]

Just like the idea of "more dollar coins", the "melt value" people talk a big game but also never seem to actually show up.

I spend cash so rarely any longer that penny hoarding seems to be a waste of time. The few times I handle actual cash, it's usually in whole dollar amounts (fairs, a handful of restaurants, tips) or vending machines/parking meters, which necessitates almost zero need for one cent pieces, let alone exact change.

I'll probably pick through a few for coin collecting and get the rest to the bank before nobody wants to accept them.

[bwana39]

Americans don't like coins. 

Stop suggesting making $1 coins.

Americans don't like coins.

Looks like people don't like mixing coins and bills. Make coins large enough so that fast food meal is about largest coin, $10 maybe,  and it may work.
Or make more robust plastic bills, 25c or less, so that coins are not really required

For what it's worth, I'm paying with a credit card generally regardless of the amount.  For those times I do use cash - such as for tips - I don't want to carry around coins, and I'm pretty sure the server or bartender also doesn't want a pocketful of coins.

So you going to Magic City? I hear that the current vibe there starts with Mr. Lincoln.

[akotchi]

They probably won't be, but maybe they'd be worth more than a 1 cent each at some point.  In any case, it probably isn't going to make or break my future financial security.

Go to the bank and ask for a few rolls...

Back when I was buying penny rolls to add to the pennies I got in change, I often got rolls of pennies that had been thoroughly picked through by other bank customers. They removed all the bronze pennies (1981-earlier, and some 1982s), leaving only copper-plated zine pennies with a melt value less than face. I gave up at that point.

The year indication became smaller with the zinc pennies. can see with the different 1982 pennies.

There are large date and small date cents of either composition.  Seven different combinations of composition, date size and mint for 1982 circulating cents.

[vdeane]

Freed from making pennies, they could easily ramp up dollar and two dollar coins, and in say three years, just require banks to return one dollar bills to the Fed as they pass through, and quickly replace the dollar bill, which is what Canada did.

They can't actually do that, though. It's illegal. A company makes the bill paper and you'll make them sad.

What about the paper for the other bills?

[kphoger]

The bill (888-page .pdf warning) only prohibits redesigning the dollar bill.  It doesn't say they can't stop printing them or remove them from circulation.

The law in question far predates that—it was passed during the early 2000s in response to the Sacajawea dollar. (I've dug it up once before, but it was long enough ago I can't quote chapter and verse.)

Forgive my skepticism, but I'll believe it when I see evidence.

[Scott5114]

Forgive my skepticism, but I'll believe it when I see evidence.

Apparently the bill that I was thinking of—105th Congress HR 1098—was never actually passed. (Or if it was, it was merged into some other bill.)

That was an hour's worth of research I'll never get back...

[jeffandnicole]

Forgive my skepticism, but I'll believe it when I see evidence.

Apparently the bill that I was thinking of—105th Congress HR 1098—was never actually passed. (Or if it was, it was merged into some other bill.)

That was an hour's worth of research I'll never get back...

But think of all the knowledge you gained to pass down to future generations.

[kalvado]

Forgive my skepticism, but I'll believe it when I see evidence.

Apparently the bill that I was thinking of—105th Congress HR 1098—was never actually passed. (Or if it was, it was merged into some other bill.)

That was an hour's worth of research I'll never get back...

But think of all the knowledge you gained to pass down to future generations.

https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF11414
As official as it gets



Dollar Note Redesign Prohibition

In many appropriations laws, Congress has included a provision that prohibits the Department of the Treasury or the BEP from redesigning the $1 note. For example, the most recent inclusion of this provision was in P.L. 117-328 (Div. E, Title I, §116), the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023. It said "None of the funds appropriated in this Act or otherwise available to the Department of the Treasury or the Bureau of Engraving and Printing may be used to redesign the $1 Federal Reserve note."

[mgk920]

Americans don't like coins. 

Stop suggesting making $1 coins.

Americans don't like coins.

Looks like people don't like mixing coins and bills. Make coins large enough so that fast food meal is about largest coin, $10 maybe,  and it may work.
Or make more robust plastic bills, 25c or less, so that coins are not really required

For what it's worth, I'm paying with a credit card generally regardless of the amount.  For those times I do use cash - such as for tips - I don't want to carry around coins, and I'm pretty sure the server or bartender also doesn't want a pocketful of coins.

I don't like 'swipe' fees, and neither do merchants.

Mike

[mgk920]

Nickels also CANNOT be made at a profit to the federal government.  You figure material cost (5.93¢ each - source: usa coin book.com, plus labor, utilities, transporation, security, depreciation on the equipment, etc.  I would drop them and dimes, making quarters the lowest denomination available.

One also has to remember that a century ago, 1¢ in 1925 is about $1.20 today based on 'real' inflation.  and yet the smallest denomination then was 1¢. (How did we survive that???)

Mike

[SEWIGuy]

Americans don't like coins. 

Stop suggesting making $1 coins.

Americans don't like coins.

Looks like people don't like mixing coins and bills. Make coins large enough so that fast food meal is about largest coin, $10 maybe,  and it may work.
Or make more robust plastic bills, 25c or less, so that coins are not really required

For what it's worth, I'm paying with a credit card generally regardless of the amount.  For those times I do use cash - such as for tips - I don't want to carry around coins, and I'm pretty sure the server or bartender also doesn't want a pocketful of coins.

Yeah I would rather have a dollar bill than a dollar coin.

[SEWIGuy]

Nickels also CANNOT be made at a profit to the federal government.  You figure material cost (5.93¢ each - source: usa coin book.com, plus labor, utilities, transporation, security, depreciation on the equipment, etc.  I would drop them and dimes, making quarters the lowest denomination available.

The idea of profit makes no sense to me. They aren't selling the nickels. They are using them in transactions, which could happen hundreds of times during their lifetime.

[kalvado]

Americans don't like coins. 

Stop suggesting making $1 coins.

Americans don't like coins.

Looks like people don't like mixing coins and bills. Make coins large enough so that fast food meal is about largest coin, $10 maybe,  and it may work.
Or make more robust plastic bills, 25c or less, so that coins are not really required

For what it's worth, I'm paying with a credit card generally regardless of the amount.  For those times I do use cash - such as for tips - I don't want to carry around coins, and I'm pretty sure the server or bartender also doesn't want a pocketful of coins.

I don't like 'swipe' fees, and neither do merchants.

Mike

There are also fees associated with cash.
As for swipe fees .. customers are conditioned to cash back offers. I'm afraid they would have to go, also bringing transaction fees down

[kalvado]

Americans don't like coins. 

Stop suggesting making $1 coins.

Americans don't like coins.

Looks like people don't like mixing coins and bills. Make coins large enough so that fast food meal is about largest coin, $10 maybe,  and it may work.
Or make more robust plastic bills, 25c or less, so that coins are not really required

For what it's worth, I'm paying with a credit card generally regardless of the amount.  For those times I do use cash - such as for tips - I don't want to carry around coins, and I'm pretty sure the server or bartender also doesn't want a pocketful of coins.

Yeah I would rather have a dollar bill than a dollar coin.

How about all coins up to $20 and no bills until you really need serious shopping for cash?

[hotdogPi]

Regarding nickels and their cost: steel or aluminum.

Regarding dollar bills vs. dollar coins:

* I'm not sure servers at restaurants would have a whole bunch of them, as they might give out more than they receive. And if $2, either a bill or a coin, commonly gets used, you're not going to get four at once.

* Wallets might be slightly heavier, but not by much — we got rid of the penny, and I expect fewer $1 coins than pennies in a given wallet.

Regarding the $1 bill law: if $1 coins replace $1 bills but they ramp up production of $2 bills, they'll be fine, especially since they'd be making a whole bunch in the first few years as you need some for everyone rather than just enough to replace the ones going out of circulation. This would require a change in the law, but they wouldn't oppose it.

[bing101]

I don't care if pennies go away but then again we are in a different era when debit and credit cards have been the primary option for retailers for some time.

[oscar]

As for swipe fees .. customers are conditioned to cash back offers. I'm afraid they would have to go, also bringing transaction fees down

Cash back is what encourages me to use cards except for small transactions. All three of my credit cards provide cash back.

I don't like points or air miles, which some cards provide instead of cash back. The value of cash back rewards is definite, and harder for card companies to screw around with.

[elsmere241]

I remember back around 2000 there was a proposal to drop the penny, and add $2 and $5 coins.

In the meantime, most items in vending machines these days are at least a dollar, but most machines don't take $5 bills.  I saw one at a rest area on I think I-90 in Washington - it gave Sacagaweas as change.

Then there was the time in college I put a $20 bill in a stamp machine and got lots of Susan B. Anthonys back.

[Scott5114]

Get rid of all of the coins but half-dollars, and all of the bills, and replace them with $1, $5, $25, $100, and $500 chips.

[formulanone]

Nickels also CANNOT be made at a profit to the federal government.  You figure material cost (5.93¢ each - source: usa coin book.com, plus labor, utilities, transporation, security, depreciation on the equipment, etc.  I would drop them and dimes, making quarters the lowest denomination available.

One also has to remember that a century ago, 1¢ in 1925 is about $1.20 today based on 'real' inflation.  and yet the smallest denomination then was 1¢. (How did we survive that???)

Mike

The utility of coinage means it can be spent multiple times over. Once released into circulation, coinage pays for itself after a handful of transactions.

Nothing large nor small is manufactured without a hint of profit until it is sold and reached a point of utility.

[NWI_Irish96]

Nickels also CANNOT be made at a profit to the federal government.  You figure material cost (5.93¢ each - source: usa coin book.com, plus labor, utilities, transporation, security, depreciation on the equipment, etc.  I would drop them and dimes, making quarters the lowest denomination available.

The idea of profit makes no sense to me. They aren't selling the nickels. They are using them in transactions, which could happen hundreds of times during their lifetime.

Technically they are selling the nickels to banks. Banks exchange other currency for the nickels.

Given the deficit that nickels cause, I amend my previous statement to re-include dimes.

I still think half-dollar coins, $10 and $50 bills are pointless though.

[mgk920]

Nickels also CANNOT be made at a profit to the federal government.  You figure material cost (5.93¢ each - source: usa coin book.com, plus labor, utilities, transporation, security, depreciation on the equipment, etc.  I would drop them and dimes, making quarters the lowest denomination available.

The idea of profit makes no sense to me. They aren't selling the nickels. They are using them in transactions, which could happen hundreds of times during their lifetime.

Technically they are selling the nickels to banks. Banks exchange other currency for the nickels.

Given the deficit that nickels cause, I amend my previous statement to re-include dimes.

I still think half-dollar coins, $10 and $50 bills are pointless though.

The term for the difference between the cost of making a piece of money and its face value is called 'seigniorage' (a GREAT spelling bee word!).  Pennies and nickels both have negative seigniorage and dimes are useless for everyday commerce, only useful, along with pennies and nickels, for the fine parsing of state and local sales taxes.

Mike