Lincoln's 200th birthday will see new 2009 pennies issued. That raises the question as to why we still have pennies. Is it to weigh down a lady's purse or cause a man's pocket to bulge and jingle? Is it to fill all those glass jars in which people collect their unused pennies?
A Cox News Service article by Chris Megerian discussed some of the facts regarding pennies.
In answer to the question posed in the headline, a penny minted in 2007 cost 1.7 cents but the U.S. Mint has gotten that cost down to about 1.4 cents today.
A penny in 1857 had the buying power that a quarter has today. I've not seen anything in recent memory that could be purchased for a penny, and I probably wouldn't want it if it were only a penny. On the other hand, I used to covet pennies because, as a kid, I could buy all kinds of candy at the corner grocery store with a few pennies!
It seems to me that we have outlived the usefulness of the penny. It should be eliminated and we should simply re-price things and round up or down to the nearer nickel. There used to be a half-penny but that was eliminated in 1857. We really ought to 'get with it' and make this happen.
There have been attempts in Congress in both 2002 and in 2006 to eliminate the penny, but both attempts failed. The U.S. Mint produced 7.4 billion pennies last year. At a cost of 1.4 cents each, that comes to over $103 Million if my long-hand math hasn't been lost completely.
I know that doesn't sound like much to our members of Congress, but it sounds like a whole lot to me! Especially for a coin that we simply don't have to have.
