Penny and Nickel no more next year

[adagirl]

Have any of you caught wind of this (see below)? This is from Ed Steer's Gold and Silver daily that came out this morning.

"No More Pennies Or Nickels Next Year in the U.S.A.

Mr. Geithner has been busy lately. Amongst his many other pressing tasks, he took the time to announce that the U.S. Mint will be removing the penny and nickel from circulation in the U.S. starting early next year. The reason is clear. It now costs the mint $US 0.048 to make a penny and $US 0.162 to make a nickel. They are still just above the break even point on the dime, which costs them $US 0.092 to produce. That won't last, according to Mr Geithner, so the dime will be the next to go - probably in 2014. - Bill Buckler, Gold This Week...01 December 2012"

[henrysmedford]

Not true-- From http://www.coinworld.com/articles/demise-of-1-5-premature/

'Demise' of 1c, 5c premature

A Nov. 11 online article meant as satire indicating that U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner ordered the removal of Lincoln cents and Jefferson 5-cent coins from circulation beginning in January 2013 was picked up by an unknown number of online blogs and reposted as fact.

Henry Wallen, a staff writer for SkewNews.com, which published his original satirical article, posted a retraction at 7:45 p.m. Eastern Time Nov. 29 on the Sutori.com website.

“Most of our regular readers understood that it was fiction, but some people did not,” Wallen posted on Sutori.com. “The story went viral and has been viewed by several hundred thousand people.

“The piece is not mean spirited, harmful or slanderous in any way, and skewnews.com carries a disclaimer stating that the website is not responsible for the accuracy of any work. However the editors and I agreed to come clean on this one.

“For those people who were upset by the penny and nickel going away in January, you can be assured that this is not happening; the story is fiction and was written for entertainment value only.”

U.S. Mint reaction

Mary Lhotsky, deputy director of the U.S. Mint’s Office of Public Affairs, contacted Coin World on Nov. 29 about Wallen’s article in a damage-control effort to debunk the contents of the article.

“Nothing about the article is credible,” Lhotsky said Nov. 29.

Before Wallen had revealed that his article had been meant as satire, Lhotsky told Coin World that Geithner had not issued any directive seeking removal of Lincoln cents and Jefferson 5-cent coins from circulation.

Lhotsky said Nov. 29 that the Denver Mint and Philadelphia Mint are continuing to produce both denominations and will continue to do so until instructed otherwise.

Members of the U.S. Mint’s public affairs staff were tracking additional online blogs to determine how many other websites had picked up Wallen’s report and reposted the information, she said.

By 1:50 p.m. Eastern Time Nov. 29, the number of coin-related websites and blogs that Mint public affairs staff had been able to identify that had picked up Wallen’s erroneous report had expanded to more than 20, Lhotsky said.

Lhotsky said the Mint had contacted Snopes.com to request the website report the story as false. Snopes is a popular website devoted to pointing out the falsity of urban legends and other untrue stories.

Incorrect costs cited as well

According to the Mint, Wallen’s Nov. 11 satirical blog report also incorrectly stated the cost of producing the two U.S. coins; the article claimed each U.S. cent costs 4.8 cents, and each 5-cent coin costs 16.2 cents to make.

U.S. Mint officials state that the true production costs are 2.41 cents for the Lincoln cent and 11.16 cents for the Jefferson 5-cent coin.

Since 1982, the Lincoln cent has been struck on planchets composed of 97.5 percent zinc and 2.5 percent copper plated with pure copper. The current Jefferson 5-cent coin is composed of the same homogenous copper-nickel composition of 75 percent copper and 25 percent nickel alloy introduced in 1866, the year the base-metal 5-cent denomination was inaugurated.

The U.S. Mint is scheduled to submit Dec. 14 to Congress the findings of a two-year congressionally mandated alternative metals study for all U.S. coin denominations for circulation.

SkewNews’ report suggesting the removal of U.S. cents and 5-cent coins follows on the heels of Canada’s recent announcement that it was phasing out the Canadian cent.

The Canadian cent most recently had been struck in a multi-ply plated steel alloy.

The Royal Canadian Mint’s Winnipeg facility is still striking the current Canadian 5-cent coin in its multi-ply plated steel composition. The composition was introduced on the Canadian 5-cent coin in 2000 for circulation.

The full SkewNews.com article can be viewed at http://skewnews.com/penny-and-nickel-co ... t-in-2013/. ■

[adagirl]

thanks for the intel.

I had heard what you posted in the near past, but when Ed Steer recently published this I thought there were some new developments. Thanks again.

[adagirl]

Miles Franklin published Ed Steer's article today

[avidbrandy]

ha. It's called Skewnews.com.

I just went and looked at the site. some of the stuff's pretty funny. Reminds me of the military one I read, the Duffelblog

[John_doe]

I'll bet they put steel into circulation for a few years first, but im prepared if they don't.

[everything]

I think we can agree that the penny will still go well before the nickel does, they should have let it go back in 2009 just to make it an even 100 years, only thing it's really any good for is making exact change and of course, hobbyists such as ourselves.

[No82s]

They will both be history as the are within 2 years. BWTFDIK

[John_doe]

keep in mind it took several years of steel production for the canadians to pull. i figure the united states will follow what they did. (I am guessing they will pull in accordance to metal value and stretch it out over some time, so they do not cause a shock of inflation.) Yes they penny in nickle would cause a major spike if pulled over night.

[NHsorter]

Everyone uses credit cards for everything now. I don't see the absence of the penny changing the price of goods really.

[adagirl]

I guess I am old school because I would hate to see the penny and/or nickel go. I do see some level of inflation if the penny and nickel were eliminated regardless of what the MSM might try to spin.

[John_doe]

Everyone uses credit cards for everything now. I don't see the absence of the penny changing the price of goods really.

i know wikipedia is not the most reliable source to cite but....

"Debasement lowers the value of the coinage, causing inflation. Over time, it may even lead to a new coin being adopted as a standard currency, as when the Ottoman Akçe was replaced by the Kuruş (1 kurus = 120 akçe), with the para (1/40 kurus) as a subunit. The Kurus in turn later became a subdivision of the Lira."

[John_doe]

http://money.msn.com/business-news/arti ... d=15926937

just stumbled upon this

[JerrySpringer]

On my drive home from work today the DJ on the rock radio station I was listening to made a mention in passing of how a penny costs two cents to make and the waste of money for such. The cat is outta the bag as I kind of saw that as a shoeshine boy moment when even small talk on radio mocks the penny. He prefaced his comments by saying something to the effect that the US mint is in trouble. Time to stash away more copper.