The US penny: Should it be scrapped? BBC Story

[henrysmedford]

See--http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18586854

[John_doe]

I hate to say it, but almost every person on this board could break the world record for largest penny cash in.

[ZenOps]

Nah. If they melted down all the pennies, I don't think it would even be enough copper for the wiring in *one* three gorges dam (14x the output of Hoover)

Its not really fair to compare something that is Iron, to copper or nickel. Iron is about 162x more common than copper, and 1600x more common than nickel.

If I had the choice between one pound of nickel or 1,600 pounds of iron - I'd always take the nickel.

Its the same reason most civilized, advanced societies would never have to stoop so low as to use Iron as money *cough*.

[jacer333]

Cool, those are some new analogies to illustrate just how many Lincolns are floating around!

[OtusLotus]

Funny thing is... The moon is moving FARTHER away from the Earth every yr!

At least the penny is a lot nicer than the Brits penny!

[henrysmedford]

Funny thing is... The moon is moving FARTHER away from the Earth every yr!

At least the penny is a lot nicer than the Brits penny!

[SilverDragon72]

That's ALOT of pennies floating around!

[Sheba]

Well, since there are that many pennies floating around, guess I'll keep 'hand sorting' to find some more copper Thanks for a very interesting post!

[OtusLotus]

Also, I think you have to be a MORON to only be able to count one penny a second!

I mean seriously...

[ZenOps]

So, that means only 1.90 years to count the pennies if they were all in $25 boxes?

Sounds doable to me.

[Sheikh_yer_Bu'Tay]

Great stats! It makes me want to sort more pennies.