Happy Birthday Kennedy Half Dollar 3/24

Hopefully the vending industry will want to help me change that last part in your paragraph about the "49 years later and the coin continues to be produced and rarely seen in circulation" Hopefully the 50th aniversary of the Kennedy half will spark some intest in their use, even without a design change. Maube I should try to call and encourage as many large bank branches as possible to post signs at teller windows next year, that it is the 50th aniversary if the Kennedy half, so get some that day and spend some. Of course, I'd have to tell those banks to just make sure they have ample supplies of Kennedy halves available for the promotion. Maybe I could even get some large and even small retailers to use them. The possibilities are endless. You never know.

LincolnGuy,

Its not just halves and vending machines, but $2 BILLS and vending machines as well. Yeah, I know. Sorry if I sound like some deranged weirdo. I don't mean to offend or freak anyone out. I just want to see something new in circulation. I'm tired of just seeing pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, $1, $5, $10, $20, $50, and $100 bills. How about some halves, $1 coins, $2 bills and eventually $2 coins, and $200, $500, and possibly $1,000 bills, just to be different already.

I have to disagree. People don't demand quarters, they have no use for half dollars because they can't be used in vending machines. It doesn't matter whether people want small dollars or not because the banks aren't going to issue them. Very few people any longer have any use for less than worthless pennies. They are ugly little corroded things that are highly toxic to small mammals (like babies), leave your hands dirty and aren't even worth the metal they are stamped on. Everytime one is used, destroyed, or produced the country is poorer. Pennies displace larger coins in coin drives limiting their effectiveness and causing more work in counting them. Children have less time to collect coins because they are soon laden down with pennies.

The government wants our currency system to be broken because they want a record of what we buy. This means that they simply aren't going to issue currency larger than $100 whether people want it or not. Political considerations and inertia run every aspect of our currency system as we have gone from being able to buy lunch with the largest circulting coin to needing the 4th largest bill. When lunch at McDounalls costs $100 this will still be the largest circulating bill.

I do agree that it makes no sense to mint the 50c which no longer circulates or is used in machines. I'd hate to see it go but coins without corresponding versions in circulation just aren't appropriate.

Why? if collectors buy them who cares? Besides weirdos like me like ordering bags of them at above face value and giving them out in change.

I think it cheapens the importance of all Kennedy half dollars. Making them in such low numbers must be extremely expensive since it's only mass production that reduces unit costs. They also serve to complicate already overflowing mint and proof sets.

I don't consider it important to eliminate them but it is expedient and appropriate. It is especially appropriate to end them at the 50th anniversary.

Here's an idea. I could try to get the U.S. Mint to send out promotional materials for the Kennedy half's 50th aniversary next year, regardless of a design change or not, and ask major bank branches (and possibly some smaller banks and credit unuions) to stock Kennedy halves for the occasion, to broadcast to the general public that halves ARE STILL being produced at the U.S. Mint, and also, maybe try a promotional program with some major store chains, like the year 2000 Walmart Sac Dollar promotion for the Golden Dollar. Yes, I know the GD promotion failed, but with halves, I believe it would be different, regardless of the fact that halves larger than the current dollar coin that does not get used and worth half as much, because I believe people actually favor fractional coins in this country, over $1 and up, coins. And three more things, If vending and self checkout machines were set to accept and dispense the halves, and self checkouts, which do not dispense dollar coins could have room made to dispense halves, then people would receieve, hoard, hate, or spend them again until there were as many halves in general circulation as quarters. Two, of your gonna carry two quarters anyway, why complain about the size and weight of a half Vs. two quarters? And if you're not going to carry dollar coins (at least, until the $1 bill is discontinued), then, why also make an issue about halves being heavier than the "dollar" coins which may be smaller, but most people are not going to carry, vs. their lighter, $1 bills anyway? Sorry, not trying to sound agressive. Just trying to get my point across. This country needs a larger work horse coin than the quarter, and for now, I think the half fits that bill, until Congress grows the guts to "kill the bill" (The dollar bill, that is). And we could also use the $2 bill in circulation, both before and after the $1 bill goes, to help pay for items without dealing with so many $1 bills or dollar coins. The dollar coins I think I can deal with, better than the bills, because I hate digging in my wallet and counting out 2-3-4 $1 bills out of my wallet when I can simply have one $2 bill, a $1 bill and a $2 bill or two $2 bills. Its just annoying, and I believe more denominations are better, easier, and down right more convenient to deal with than less denominations. Maybe a little more expensive for vendors and retailers to adapt to and deal with, but worth it in the long run, in my opinion.

There are far worse things to obsess over.

I have to agree.

I like the idea, but I think 2017 would be more appropriate. That being said, if 2014 is the last year for the Kennedy half dollar, I cannot think of a better finale.

I think the best option for the fourth reverse would be something space related. Kennedy said we would go to the moon, and we did; chronologically it was after his term in the White House.