Posted on 02/29/2008 8:55:38 AM PST by Sub-Driver
Treasury secretary wants to dump pennies
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER, AP Economics Writer 4 minutes ago
A penny for your thoughts? Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson thinks the answer to that question should be not much. In fact, if he had his way, he would like to get rid of the penny.
Asked Friday whether he thought the penny should be eliminated, Paulson agreed that it would make sense, saying, "The penny is worth less than any other currency."
However, he quickly added that he didn't think it was "politically doable" to eliminate the one-cent coin and it wasn't something he planned to tackle in the final year of the Bush administration.
"I've got enough challenges to take on," he said in an interview on the "Spike O'Dell Show" on Chicago's WGN radio.
O'Dell also asked Paulson, who made a fortune as the head of investment giant Goldman Sachs before joining the Bush Cabinet, how much money he carried in his pocket.
"I walk around with very little cash in my pocket," he said, depending instead on credit cards "like everyone else."
Paulson said he did carry a few dollar bills with him to sign for people who ask for autographs. The signatures of the Treasury secretary and the U.S. Treasurer are carried on not just the dollar bill but all U.S. currency.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I think the metal in it is worth more than the penny. Which means . . . instant profit! Helter Smelter . . . stick it to the man.
The metal in the penny is worth more than the penny itself. They actually had to warn recyclers not to accept pennies to melt down because people could turn them in for a profit. I say let the market take care of the surplus stock of pennies - just say they aren’t legal tender anymore. People can turn them in to recycle for more than they are worth. At the worst, you’ll be out four cents.
If the penny is deleted, then the nickel (which is 75% copper) will be worth less than any other currency. And all transactions (except some electronic) will have gone up in price significantly.
“The penny is worth less than any other currency”
Gee, what a genius!
If you melt a penny you are going to find you have copper plated alumninum.
You’d need pennies that are over 25 years old.
Exactly, our money would be much stronger if we were still spending silver dimes, quarters, half dollars, and dollar pieces.
It isn’t that the copper in an old penny is worth more than the penny, it is that our paper money isn’t worth the paper its printed on.
zinc
Current-manufacture pennies are zinc with copper coating. I have no idea what the value of the zinc content is.
I don’t recall when they made the switch; probably ten or twenty years ago.
Actually it is zinc. They switched in the early 1980s (maybe 1983). I remember because we could melt the new pennies in a bunsen burner in chemistry class, but not the old copper ones.
I think even the zinc ones are worth more than $0.01 in metal value.
Huh?
It's worth several thousand Zimbabwean dollars.
1982...pennies of both types were produced that year. And there are “large” and “small dates” to further confuse the issue.
Zinc is currently 2776.00 per metric ton.
I hate pennies, to be honest. I wouldn’t mind just rounding up/down to the nearest nickel..
I’ve got an early one that the plating chipped off on. They must have been working the bugs out.
It’s not as if people carry around pockets full of change anymore. Nearly everybody I know uses plastic. Less coinage use = less pennies needed. I think this is a manufactured crisis.
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