Pismo500

http://www.coinnews.net/2010/02/04/c...obamas-budget/

Randy_K

You can bet that the change in composition and weight will be protested by the vending machine industry! That's how the machines now detect slugs and foreign coins.

chip

Congress has already ceded too much power to the executive branch, if it is costing too much to mint some coins, mint less of them, from what I have heard they have millions sitting in storage with no demand from the banks,

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Randy_K

Producing less coins means overhead costs go up making each coin more expensive. Just because you make fewer coins doesn't make the cost of the buildings and machines go down or the personnel expenses a lot lower.

Make MORE coins to make each one cheaper to produce.

GDJMSP

Yeah, that's true right now. But they have already cut the mintage numbers by 65%. That means in 2009 they only minted 1/3 of the coins they usually do in a year.

Do you know why that is ? Pretty much everybody says it's because of the economy, and it is. But there is more to it than that. It's because people have been digging into those jars and cans of coins that they have had sitting in their homes for decades - and they are spending the coins because they need the money.

Now what's going to happen now that all that accumulated change is gone ?

Over the next couple of years the demand for coins is going to go right back up and probably exceed previous record mintages because all of stored up coins are gone and being used in the system.

I don't think most people understand just how many coins are used in this country alone - every single second. Do you realize that 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, there are over 3 million coins being pumped into a vending machine every 15 minutes.

That means that every single day 288 million coins are taken out of circulation and stuck inside a vending machine. And that's just vending machines. Now imagine how many coins are used in regular commerce.

Sure, they go back into circulation. But it takes time. They have to be collected, sorted & counted. And taken to a bank where they are collected, sorted and counted again. Then to another bank, and then to another bank, and then to one more bank, and then to the Fed bank.

So how many billions of coins are out of circulation at any given moment because they are stuck in the system ?

That's why we have such huge mintages - because we need them. Drop the mintage numbers for just 2 or 3 years - and then watch people scream bloddy murder because they don't have the coins they need. And of course they'll blame the govt. for not minting more.

You see, most people don't know what's good for them because they have no comprehension of what it actually going on. They make assumptions, completely false assumptions because they don't know the facts, but they make them anyway. And they scream change this, change that, do this do that.

And if somebody listens and they actually do it - then things get all screwed up and those same people scream even louder because the govt screwed up again.

You want to fix things? Then use your head and think for a minute. Realize finally that the 1 cent & 5 cent coins are no longer needed and are a detriment to society. Realize that the $1 dollar bill is a detriment to society - and get rid of all 3 of them.

Those things alone would fix every single problem there is regarding the production of money in this country. We would save millions upon millions every year from the first year and every year after that. And all of it could be used to help lessen the govt. spending. It's your money they're spending ya know.

And as for authority being taken away from Congress, hell, it needs to be taken away from them. They can't make a decision as it is. And when they do make one it's the wrong one most of the time because they make decisions based on politics instead of reality.

End of rant !

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mpcusa

Why mess up a good thing!! Changing the composition, To most likely
A less expensive medal well isnt that typical of this administration
Cut,Cut,Cut

Just Carl

I well know what you mean. A friend of mine has a Vending Machine Buisness. He has enough problems with slugs and those baby sized dollars that don't work in his. Next they'll want to make them all out of Radium so we can find them in the dark.

mpcusa

Next will be talking about bottle top,s and pull tabs!!

Mr. Coin Lover

Changing the composition is not a big item for me. I do hope they don't start another "golden coin" of another denomination due to the rapid tarnishing of these. Also I'm sure changing the composition is not going to get rid of all the dead presidents currently on our coinage.

Joelfke

how is a $1 bill a detriment to society?? I can see how a penny is, and a penny can be rounded. no problem but a dollar? and even the nickel. How is that a detriment to society?

coleguy

Because a bill lasts about 2 weeks in circulation, where as a $1 coin would last 50 years or more.
Guy~

cladking

I love your rant and couldn't have said it better myself but must take great exception to this;

This does apply to pennies and to a small extent to nickles but not to the other denominations. People don't bother cashing in cents and they might sit around literally for decades but there is almost no hoard whatsoever of dimes and quarters out there. These simply get recycled back into the system on a continuing basis and this is proved by the fact that there are almost no (statistically zero) old quarters like the 1969 in XF or AU in circulation. These were all gone by about 1983 and there haven't been any since then.

You are right that the economic conditions result in a net inflow of coins back into the FED but this is the result of people cashing in their coins earlier. That is instead of keeping their quarters for two years on average they keep them for only one year. But there are no old hoards of old quarters anywhere at all. The FED distributes coins on a first in first out basis and people do not keep them for decades.

In 1999 a lot of people started setting aside nice old clad when the states coins were first issued. These were quarters that still existed as late as '99 like nice XF '70-D's and AU '74's. There were probably in excess of 50,000,000 older coins set aside and many of these have come back into circulation now.

I say there are no old hoards but of course for every rule there is an exception. But people shouldn't be left with the impression that there are millions of nice old clad out there always waiting for the economy to turn down or the value of nice old clad to go up. There might be thousands but there most certainly are not millions.

End of Rant !

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cladking

Nickels have to be made because they serve as a bridge to make change. We could round them out of existence too, almost, except there'd be no way to provide 5c 15, change.

It's simply cheaper to mint a nickel out of material that costs less than to scrap out the current dime or quarter.

Making any coin with more value in metal than its face value is pure insanity.

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cladking

I should add that making a coin that is a drain on the economy and on commercial transactions is a far greater insanity. To also make this coin at a loss is worse.

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GDJMSP

The $1 bill is a detriment because it cost us a fortune to make them. They last about 18 months at best while the $1 coin last approx 30 years. So they need to do away with the $1 bill and use the $1 coins.

The nickel is a detriment because of its cost. Until the economy took dump it cost us aprrox 7 cents to make every nickel. When things pick back up, it will again.

Anything can be rounded to the nearest denomination and it doesn't matter what that denomination is. In the end it will cost the consumer no more and no less as it will all average out. So doing away with the cent and the nickel is the wisest choice.

Of course it will not happen any time soon. Nothing that actually makes sense every happens anytime soon because people fail to believe in mathematics and instead trust their emotions. Which is the absolute last thing anyone should ever trust.

And clad, I agree that the niclels, dimes and quarters exist in far smaller numbers than the cents - sitting in people's homes. But there are far more of them out there than you think. I know this from personal experience. But beyond that, recent events back it up. Otherwise mintages across the board would not be down as much as they are.

The coins have to be coming from somewhere buddy - and it's from jars and bowls in people's houses.

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