Whatever Happened To The Treasury Presenting A Report

They decided the cent is fine the way it is, and they will continue producing it. Via January 8th, 2013 Numismatic News Magazine Cover.....

Here's the Mint press release and it has links to the summary and the full report. Interestingly the full report was made back in August.

http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_min...ennialreport

Basically what the mint said was we need more time to study the problem. Let's see, they have known about the problem for what eight years now? A problem that even the report says can't be cured for the cent because no matter what is used because the cost of manufacturing is greater than the face value. (Something anyone could have told them just looking at the mints own reports for the past few years.) But no they have to have more time (and money) to continue studying the problem.

Well at least theyre keeping the composition the same. The only thing worse than keeping the penny in circulation would be having some cheaply made or plastic penny circulating around

Well considering the report is to be made every two years, we will probably have the cent in the current composition through the time till the next report in Dec 2014. Then they will probably have to debate what to do which will take us into 2015, and since the contracts for the planchets will have already been let by then I think we will definitely be wasting money striking cents until at least 2016 or something like 12 years after they became more expensive to make than the face value. And after three years of funding studies to find a material that will allow them to make a profit striking a coin whose cost in labor and distribution alone is twice the face value of the coin. Really how long do you have to study to know that if it costs 2 cents plus materials to strike a 1 cent piece, it doesn't matter what you make it from you are going to lose money?