Obama Adminstration's Plan To Change Metal In US Coins

The way this administration spends money, maybe they will make them out of silver and gold.

I agree we should mint fewer cents and maybe fewer nickels. I'm not against changing the composition as long as they do it in a way that makes sense.

Jason 11006 wrote:
IMO they can get rid of the cent and Nickel. round everything to 10¢. I hate to say it but they could get rid of the dollar bill too and just use them 1$ coins that everyone hates. I also think that every state should have bottle deposit

Guess what, The Dollar Bill is not far from being deleated
Our Treasury right now has 750 Million ( $1.00) coins they are trying to get into circulation to save the cost of printing the one dollar bill

My opinions...

Stop minting the cent for circulation. I would love to see it continued in the mint and proof sets, but only if they are minted in 95% copper (as they were in 2009). In my opinion, any change to circulating composition would only delay the inevitable.

As always, all electronic transaction would still be to the nearest cent.

Stop minting the five cent (nickel) for circulation. I would also love to see it continue in the annual sets. I would also accept the resurrection of the half-dime to replace the five cent nickel in circulation, but this may cause issues with the vending industry.

I would also accept the return of the Two Cent Piece, if only to silence the people that are convinced that everything will be rounded up. Of course, making a cheap Two Cent coin might prove economically impractical.

Stop printing one dollar Federal Reserve Notes. If ever there was a waste of time, the continued issue of the dollar bill is it.

If they stopped making pennies we'd run out almost immediately and then people would hoard them because they are "rare". The reason they don't circulate is that they have no value.




If they were really serious about saving money then they would eliminate the cent and put the dollar coin in circulation. We'd have usable money again. The costs of making quarters wouldn't matter since they'd flow into storage and we wouldn't need more for years. Very few dimes would be needed.

The mint could avoid needing massive layoffs by slowing down the presses and making attractive coins again. They'd also need to recoin the billions of nickels in circulation in a lighter and/ or less expensive alloy. It would soon become obvious a $2 coin would be beneficial and they could make some nice ones of these too.

Any "savings" which involves the scrapping of the coins in circulation is just another government boondoggle that will cost billions of dollars.

The problem is really very simple. The control of circulating coinage is spread across government agencies and no one has the courage to lead.

I should have mentioned that the reason dropping the penny would create HUGE savings is two-fold; First is the reduced cost of making a worthless coin and trying to provide a fresh new coin for each transaction. The second and larger savings is in the greater fascility with which the dollar coin could enter circulation onbce a slot in the cash registers is freed by the elimination of the cent.

This is where the biggest savings to the government occur because paper currency is extremely expensive and not durable.

Getting rid of the bill and using the Dollar Coin would be a smart move...the Fed would save money by less printing and the Mint would make money by more printing. But as Augsburger pointed out, that would cost a lot of people in high places a whole lot of income. Don't count on that happening until it is absolutely necessary...if then. I still marvel at this profit thing.

Eaglefoot wrote:


You are a very wise man

You can bet your bottom dollar (pun intended) they'll come up with a list of all the options and pick the absolute worst option imaginable.

As for the hoarding problem tackled by SAP and others, I really don't see a problem with modern hoarding. Mainly, who cares if all the pennies go missing? They are worthless and irrelevant (sadly) in today's economy. Quite often cashiers will just hand you a Nickel instead of a couple pennies when the change is $.04 or even $.03. Also, we are talking about trillions upon trillions of pennies. I don't think they could all be hoarded in a years time. If after the first "penny-free" year the supply is seriously damaged then the Mint can make a bunch more. If the supply is sufficient, simply wait to the next year to reevaluate the conditions and decide then, after year2, whether to mint or not to mint.

Just my two (Zinc) Cents,
--Gary

Since this is all about profit, the limited minting of Halves for collectors is crazy money for them. They should never again release these for general circulation and when they are finally all hoarded and lost and destroyed so be it.