Failure Or Success? Presidential Dollars Are Not Circulating

No. Dollar coins will not be embraced as long as you are not using them.

I use dollar coins all the time and I am in and out of line faster than others because of it. A quick hand in the pocket, 4 or 5 coins on the counter, change made, and out! Beats pulling out a wallet and unfurling bills, putting wallet back...takes longer. Would be even better having $2 and $5 coins as well.

Australia:

We used to have Dollar notes, but I am glad they are no more.
Dollar Notes used to circulate, but they were replaced by coins.
I am glad that the Dollar Notes were withdrawn, Coins FAR more convenient.

I used to have a few of the old worn Dollar Notes, but the young checkout chicks refused to accept them, despite remaining Legal Tender.
Only old cashiers who remember them, and will accept the Notes, usually with much surprise. Older cashiers immediately withdraw the Notes, for a personal keepsake.

I'm strictly a cash user. I like checking my change for collectibles. However, I dislike carrying coins in pocket.

I never use those dollar coins. However, I seldom use cash of any kind anymore. I really don't know why everyone doesn't use plastic cards. Stores charge the same if cash or plastic. I get money back when using plastic, not cash. Why carry something heavier than one plastic card?

In the UK, back in 1983, the pound coin was introduced. For almost three years you never saw one in circulation, and everyone continued using pound notes even though hundreds of millions of pound coins were minted. Then they stopped making the pound note and the coins took over after a few months.

The situation in pre-Euro France was similar: the base metal 10-franc coin was introduced in 1974 but didn't circulate much until the note of the same value ceased production in 1978. Even then the note remained legal tender for a further 9 years before it was demonetised.

It was the same here when I was a kid in Iowa back in the 50,s. I could get Silver Morgan and Peace dollars anytime at the bank. They had bags of BU dollars. I had an 03-0 Morgan that was rare, then the govt. released lots of bags of them and they became common so I spent it.

Sounds like what is going on now. They were heavy coins and people didn't like the weight then and bills were light to carry.

It is possible to make a case that dollar coins never circulated widely.

During the silver dollar era, long gaps in mint production existed because of lack of business and banking demand for the coins. But for the political push to purchase and coin silver from the Comstock Mine, combined with the comparative efficiency of coining dollar coins over subsidiary coinage, these gaps would have been more pronounced.

Silver dollars circulated widely in very few parts of the country, chiefly on the urbanized east coast. The availability of so many bags of dollars for Pittman Act and Silver Act of 1942 melting attests to their unpopularity. Ditto for the comparatively high grades of so many dollars released in the silver rush of the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Gold dollars circulated more widely, but had the different problem of being small enough to be lost easily.

The issue today is more complex. Eisenhowers were too large and heavy. The SBAs looked too much like quarters. The Sacs and Presidentials have too many different designs and lack familiarity for the general population. Debit cards have replaced carrying cash for many people. And the buying power of a dollar doesn't spur circulation.

This may be numismatic heresy, but I think it would be better to throw in the towel on the idea of a circulating one dollar metallic coin. It's time for a translucent plastic dollar coin, with an embedded readable serial numbered chip. That would be light enough to be useful, long lasting, somewhat difficult to counterfeit, and would circulate if combined with cessation of one dollar currency.

That said, replacement of higher denomination currency with metallic coins would have several benefits. Just two coins could replace the $5, $10, $20, $50, and $100 notes. A five dollar bimetallic coin and an Eisenhower size and weight twenty dollar coin, combined with currency cessation, would provide ample flexibility for cash transactions. There would be an additional benefit: disruption of drug trafficking. (Picture the local drug dealer jogging down the street with a couple thousand dollars in heavy coins in the pocket, or a Cessna or Piper Cub trying to fly out of the country with boxes of coins on board.)

It's time for a broader rethinking of circulating money.

Just my Two Cents worth. Oh wait, they don't circulate either.

Actually, they were from 2007 to 2011. As indicated in the article, they incorrectly believed the rotating designs would get them to circulate like the Statehood Quarters. They were wrong and in 2012 the Presidential dollar ceased being minted for circulation.