The Treasury estimates that it has earned about $5 billion in seignorage profits from the quarters so far.Ergo: the goal will not be to replace the paper dollar with a cheap metal one. The goal is to, practically speaking, move billions into the Treasury without taxation or inflation.
Bad money drives out good. The gov't just realized that by injecting cheaply-made ($0.05 each) yet relatively good fiat money (hereby declared value $1.00), people will spend relatively bad (coin is better) paper money to obtain and hoard it.
Comprehend it - it's freaking brilliant:
Billions of dollars CASH go into the fed's coffers in return for coins which get hoarded.
Because it's a mostly obligatory transfer of cash from citizens to feds, it's basically a tax - but with no tax increase.
Because the billions of minted-for-dirt-cheap coin dollars are exchanged for paper dollars and then hoarded by recipients, the feds effectively print billions of $$$ - without inflation.
No-tax no-inflation hot-off-the-cheap-press dollars printed and spent by the billions by the gov't. Twisted. Friggin' brilliant. And probably a future chapter for Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.
This is in the Constitution:
"The Congress shall have Power [...] To coin Money"
No mention of a private institution like Fed. Sorry.
Beautifully stated.