America says goodbye to pennies. The decision is expected to bring millions of dollars in savings
In May, the Ministry of Finance announced that the last batch of one-cent coins will be minted in 2023, and then their production will be completely stopped. As reported by the AP agency, the head of the mint, Brandon Beach, was present during the production of the last tranche and, just before pressing the button on the machine, he stated that thanks to this decision, America would save millions of dollars.
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The twilight of pennies. Used less and less
Although there are still billions of one-cent coins in circulation, they are less and less used in everyday transactions. However, these coins have gained symbolic meaning – many people treat them as good luck charms, and others collect them.
As AP writes, not everyone welcomed this change. Some retailers complain about a lack of guidance from the federal government on how to handle transactions after the penny coins are phased out. Some of them have decided to round prices down, others ask customers to bring the deducted amount, and still others have introduced creative solutions, such as prizes in exchange for small coins. Banks, however, began to ration their stocks of one-cent coins.
The history of one-cent coins dates back to 1793, when they began to be minted. Back then, you could buy a cookie, a candle or other small goods for one cent. Today, many of these coins lie forgotten in drawers, jars or end up in the trash.
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No more pennies. Obama and Trump's idea
The production of one-cent coins has been generating significant losses for years. In the previous fiscal year, the U.S. Mint lost $85.3 million. on the minting of 3.2 billion such coins, each of which cost 3.69 cents. The problem of high costs also concerns five-cent coins, called nickels, the production of which has been generating losses for 19 years – the cost of minting one coin is 13.78 cents. Despite this, there are no plans to withdraw them for now.
It is worth recalling that the initiative to end the production of one-cent coins was taken already in February by Donald Trump, who drew attention to the high costs of their production. However, this idea was not new – in 2015, then Treasury Secretary Jack Lew talked about it during the presidency of Barack Obama.
