The US Mint's Biennial Report To The Congress

So, I'm assuming you don't live in a bottle-bill state? Michigan is awesome. 10 cents a carbonated bottle. Write your congressman. We need more bottle bill states.




The reason for that is the reason the US dollar will collapse, just like every other currency. It's only a matter of time. The only option to save it is to redenominate in a fashion that eliminates most of the money supply, which is hard.

However, for the cost of the cent at today's value of the cent, the government needs to set up MORE mints, each to produce cents for specific regions. OR, get people to empty out their coin jars and get the cents back into circulation so the gov only needs to produce maybe a billion new ones or so a year, rather than 5-6 billion.




Nordic gold is used in Polish commemorative 2 zlote coins, as well as in a number of Euro coins. The 10 cent and 50 cent coins come to mind, but I could be wrong on the denominations there. Nordic gold, which is a brass alloy with aluminum, is supposed to be tarnish resistant, and it for the most part is. Does it stay as shiny as it did when first minted? No. But does it tarnish like our manganese brass dollars? No. Standard aluminum bronze would work as well (I've some Israeli New Shekels that are decades old, found them a few years ago in a location I'd forgotten about, and although the conditions of that location weren't the best for coins, they didn't tarnish).




No, no, no. Seigniorage wasn't part of the mint originally. Each coin contained the face value's worth of metal, pretty much exactly.

(from wiki): In 1801, following complaints from the public and members of Congress regarding the lack of small change in circulation, Boudinot began requesting that silver depositors receive smaller denominations rather than the routinely requested silver dollars, in an effort to supply the nation with more small change.[19] Production dropped to 54,454 silver dollars in 1801 and 41,650 in 1802, after Boudinot was able to convince many depositors to accept their silver in the form of small denominations.[17] Although silver bullion deposits at the Mint had increased, Boudinot attempted to end silver dollar production in 1803, favoring half dollars instead.[19] Mintage of the 1803 dollar continued until March 1804, when production of silver dollars ceased entirely.[17] In total, 85,634 dollars dated 1803 were struck.[17] Following a formal request from the Bank of the United States, Secretary of State James Madison officially suspended silver dollar and gold eagle production in 1806, although minting of both had ended two years earlier.[20]

Sure, it also says (per Wiki): The precious metal composition of US coins was calculated such that gold would be fifteen times as valuable per ounce as silver. By the turn of the 19th century, the price of gold in terms of silver had risen to approximately 15.75 to one. This made it profitable for merchants to buy gold coins at face value using silver coins, and export the gold to Europe. Gold vanished from circulation in the United States by 1800.[21] By 1801, almost no bullion was being deposited at the Mint, causing the Jefferson administration to consider its closure. The eagle was especially desired by exporters, as the larger size and value made it more convenient to handle.[22] Although the Mint remained open, on December 31, 1804, President Thomas Jefferson ordered that eagles and silver dollars no longer be struck, ending the Turban Head eagle series.

And that's the reason why the G-S ratio was dropped to 1:16, which lasted until 1933. Of course, although the mint continued to produce smaller denominated coins of the old 1:15 ratio and continued to produce 1:15 ratio half eagles, those weren't exported to the extent the dollar and eagle were, and thus it took until the 1830's for the ratio to be changed properly. But it WASN'T seigniorage. The coins struck in 1795 has a dollar/eagle's worth of silver/gold in them. The coins struck after the redefining of the ratio contained a dollar/eagle's worth of silver/gold. The coins struck nearer 1803/4 had the same issue as coins struck nearer 1964, the falling value of the metal (in the 1800's due to the discovery of more metal; the 1960's due to the declining value of the dollar) meant the mint was loosing money, but had nothing to do with seigniorage.

The mint broke even before, so as far as I'm concerned, the mint can continue to make a (net) profit or break even (net) until the cost to produce ANY coin of existing denominations exceeds to the face value of the coin. That would ensure the mint can produce coins for probably the next 50 years without any issues. And 50 years will probably see the collapse of the dollar.

By the way: Happy 18 Trillion in debt everyone! It took 403 days to get the latest Trillion...hoping for around 365 for the next one! And 200 for the next, and 50 for the next, 10 for the next, and then every few minutes thereafter!

All this debate over saving a few million. Just let the mint continue doing what it's doing. 90% of the gov's ENTIRE tax revenue goes just to pay for mandatory entitlement programs and interest on the debt. We are NOT going to get out of the hole we're in no matter what we do, and while Washington burns, I'd rather play with coins. I have no use of fiddles.

Only took them four years to come up with that when their own annual report for years has shown that the manufacturing cost exceeded the face value.



So recycle them yourself and stop giving them away for free.



So you need to sell advertising space on the back to make up the difference.



But they usually don't keep it up forever.



Banks don't want to have to order coins if they don't have to because it costs them money. They TRY to balance the amount of coins that come in with the amount that are requested by businesses so they don't have to pay to ship coins, and they don't have a lot of non producing assets sitting in the vault.



Well in the early years the mint almost got legislated out of existence because they weren't breaking even. So they had to make changes so they DID make a profit.



And that extra money goes into the general fund reducing the amout of taxes we need to pay. But if you want to pay more taxes....



Except for the copper Half Cents and cents. The seigniorage from those were supposed to pay the expenses of the mint.

Are there no prisons, are there no workhouses?

They already do. Those engravers/artists that sit soaking up tax-dollars yearly for coins that never changed in 30 years. (Yes I know more dies are needed, but not someone drawing coin designs full time.)

Also apparently you don't know where that phrase comes from...and I think it fits nicely in the season and discussion about the Mint and Congress.

It surprises the dickens out of me someone doesn't instantly recognize that phrase.

The engravers do more than just coin design.

I say do away with the one cent denomination altogether.
round off to the nearest nickel for all.
Tony

With the exception of one coin the US mint has not struck coins for other countries since 1984. The exception was the Iceland 1000 Kr coin used in the special 2000 Millennial set with an ASE. Iceland was going to produce the 1000 Kr themselves but the mint insisted that if the ASE was going to be in the set then the US Mint had to strike it. (I wonder why they didn't insist they had to strike the British Britannia piece that was used in the special Freedom set that contained an ASE?)