Speculation plays a part as well.Pre 1992 pennies contain about 2.2cents worth of valuable copper and other base metals; the successor penny contains over a cent; foreget about the nickle--it is worth over five cents.
How did it get that way? Very simple--the fed debased the US dollar until the metal in the coins had a greater value than their face value as a share of the dollar.
Who in the heck would be spending pennies and nickels now? As you mention, the pre-82 pennies have over two cents of copper in them. The post-82 pennies were almost at par with their zinc content a couple months ago. Nickels have more than five cents of metal in them.
And now commodity prices are starting to roll again. When hyper-inflation comes these small coins will retain their intrinsic metal value escalating against the collapsing dollar -- and in a worse case scenario would become "small change" for your Silver Eagles or 90 percent.
The nephew regularly "buys" hundred dollar boxes of nickels and twenty-five dollar boxes of pennies from the bank. His reasoning is that he can never lose money on the deal and in a financial meltdown the coinage will hold value better than paper money.
The government is destroying the middle class with the hidden tax of inflation caused by excessive money supply. For a supposedly conservative forum there is very little discussion of hard money economics here.
When it all comes tumbling down you would much rather hold a hundred pennies or twenty nickels than one paper "dollar" of American debt vouchers. Copper and nickel with a bit more substance than paper.
Oh well, you seen one Great Depression then you've seen them all.
HG
Speculation plays a part as well.