Trump wants to eliminate the penny
President Trump has ordered the end of minting the penny. It has long been more expensive to produce than the face value of the coin. We taxpayers lose $85 million a year minting the one cent coin. The copper in the alloy coin can be put to other industrial uses. In that regard Trump’s action makes sense. (And do not worry about better uses for the silver in our other coins. There isn’t any.)
It would not be the first time a coin has ceased to be minted. We once had a half cent coin created in 1793 and eliminated in 1857. We had a two cent coin from 1864 to 1874, It was the first coin to carry “In God We Trust.” Apparently, trusting in God was not enough to save the coin.
Getting rid of the unique (almost) copper one cent coin is not without a measure of public grieving. It is without doubt the most popular and beloved coin. It has a much greater cultural value than its monetary worth.
It is the coin most collected by youngsters. In fact, it is the most collected and least used coin. Virtually every household in America has a jar of pennies. They are often used as “chips” for … not surprisingly … penny-ante poker. “Pitching pennies” was once a childhood pastime. What kid, living near a train, did not place a penny on the track to see it “re-minted” into a flat oval.
We often have our own traditions. My grandmother would tape pennies to my birthday card – one for each year. As I got older, she would use silver coins and pennies. Without the penny, she could only could have done her thing every five years.
We celebrate the penny in lots of songs — Pennies From Heavan (Bing Crosby), Penny Lane (The Beatles), Penny Arcade (Roy Orbison), Throw a Penny (Bee Gees), Penny for Your Thoughts (Willie Nelson), Pretty Penny (Lionel Richie) and others.
Many of our expressions refer to the penny – “a penny for your thoughts (Willie Nelson used the phrase, but did not coin it – no pun intended).” “Penny wise and pound foolish,” “in for a penny, in for a pound.” When we butt in, we “put in our two cents.”
A stingy person is a “penny pincher”. We name our young girls Penny. (Yeah, I know it is short for Penelope, but it does remind us of the coin, so I am including it). When women went to the ladies’ room, they often said they were going to “spend a penny.” (Probably not so much these days.)
The penny is often considered a “good luck” piece. Many women carry a penny in their purse. We even had shoes designed to display a penny – appropriately called “penny loafers.” Pennies are the coins most commonly found in wishing wells and fountains. Golfers often use the penny to make their spot on the green.
Some of the popularity of the penny is the fact that it is the only coin that carries the image of arguably the most beloved President of the United States – Abraham Lincoln. It is the sculpted version by Victor David Brenner from a famous photograph of the 16th President taken by Mathew Brady. The Lincoln cent was introduced in 1909 – the 100th anniversary Lincoln’s birth.
If we are to eliminate the Lincoln penny, surely, we need to put his image on another coin in common circulation. Not one of those coins that we rarely see or hold. That means Lincoln would replace one of the guys on the nickel (Jefferson), dime (Roosevelt), quarter (Washington). The half dollars and dollar coins are rarely found in pockets or purses.
So, which of the three popularly used coins would get a new image? The answer is obvious. It would be historic malfeasance to knock Jefferson or Washington off their coins. It has to be Roosevelt by process of elimination. (The sound you hear is the blowback from those who still believe that Franklin Roosevelt was a great President.)
Mine is not a partisan proposal. When the penny was previously threatened with extinction during the Obama administration, I proposed that it be saved with a double image of Lincoln and Obama – the man who freed the slaves and the first Black President. Even though I was not a fan of Obama’s policies, the coupling on the coin created great symbolism. The idea was not well received by some of my Republican friends and would be a far less popular idea today – even with me. Also, it is our policy not to depict living individuals on coins or currency.
Personally, I am against ending the minting of the penny because of its cultural value as opposed to its intrinsic value or the production costs. It is not just a medium of exchange, it is iconic Americana.
Does Trump have the power to take a coin out of circulation … or is this another issue that will have to be settled by the courts? Time will tell. But I would hope to see those copper coins in circulation for generations to come.
So, there ‘tis.
The penny coin was and still will be used in Taxing what you purchase for cash.
It is the 7.25% or other numbers each crappy state uses for sales tax.
If we are to eliminate the penny, we should eliminate the state sales tax
thrown on top of each purchase.
Even a postage stamp costs 73 cents?
WTF just make it 85 and call it a day!
There are probably enough penny’s floating around to stop minting them
for a couple years anyway.
Then start over.
Give coin collectors something to look forward to!
You make an interesting point. Do we need to keep minting pennies? The US as minted some 500 billion pennies since 1793. There are currently 140 billion in circulation — 28% of all those ever minted. Since the shelf life of a coin is rather long, seems like they can be around for a very long time — unless they are no longer accepted in every day transactions.
Hey, kill it: I’m one of those kids who started the “blue book” collection and would love to see more value than a penny for each. Some I even bought. For pennies no doubt. I got leaf’s, steel, lots of weird ones.
But as long as they keep charging pennies, I will pay with pennies. And let’s face it, when they destroy the penny, the prices will be rounded up. And that’s yet another Trump policy directly causing inflation. Holding the bird flu reports back probably didn’t help either. Like vets were catching it from cows and ssssssssh, if the government does not tell us, then I guess it really didn’t happen. They are masking now, those deniers.
Thanks for your interpretation of the history of the penny, Larry. Trump may want to be rid of it, which politicizes the issue as a republican policy. In this piece, I read into it that you took on this topic with a more tongue in cheek sarcastic point of view. That is until you had to mention Obama and FDR just for kicks. You can’t seem to get through an article that is sufficiently complete in an objective fact relating state.
Revealing to your readers that your opinion is for keeping the penny minting process going and the coin itself in circulation can be a non-political statement.
Introducing some of your less than complimentary comments directed at past presidents of which you take exception with history’s record, as in FDR’s case. That delivers quite a left-hand twist to an otherwise straight information relating article.
You just had to be you, anything less than that would not ever do.
R.I.P You many pennies should President Trump pull your long beloved rug out from under his favored ones and those with more common cents than he can muster.
When Trump gets bee caught in the hive on his head there’s no telling what the EO will target in retribution against the innocent bee. Well, be as it may, Trump searched as far as his sight allowed and his myopathy landed on one red cent crouching low and unassumingly under the Resolute Desk.
The penny had little means of escape and neither had it even one leg to stand upon. As poor and lonely a stamped copper coin as ever there had been since its minting in Y2K.
Never the less, Trump who wouldn’t pick up a cent if he had tripped an fell upon one. This one cent piece had littered his so grand space and annoyed him not a little bit. What was he todo in his present circumstance with one cent in hand and no others like it.
All of a sudden Trump heard such a clatter, he listened intently a wondered what’s the matter. When he opened his eyes he recognized what was the matter. The sound came whenever his thoughts hit on a notion for an EO little considered. On this occasion his little old notion had America’s least portentous coin on trial for its very existence.
Since it had not a legal leg it couldn’t stand in the defendant’s box. Why, of course, the humble penny was put there and had to take the punishment that originated in Trump’s own take no prisoners imagination.
Trump has been the root of many a coin’s demise. It’s no wonder that he took or his revenge on the one cent piece. Its marginal utility which meant something to many in America means nothing to him. As E0’s go, it’s just chicken feed. That this EO might earn him more press and taking more pennies from people’s pockets had its own reward.
Questions abound about the man, Trump. With this particular EO one wonders, how low does he intend to take this country? When we recon we can’t go much lower. Trump, in his Art of the deal planning, has yet another confidence scheme for just a time as this. Then he’ll pull out from under those yet standing. In what’s left you will meet up with the bee and then even the rug is gone.
Trump’s conservative loyalists will sacrifice their all on the alter of Trump’s elusive ideals called policies.
Count the cost demanded by the consequences price paid in full.
RIP democracy and every penny earned in its security.