Most Worthless Coin

The cheapest round trip ticket from EWR to JNU (NJ to AK) is $937 - I'll stay put and pay the $1.39 plus gas expense for a candy bar

 

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My European experience was always having to pay the attendants for TP. No coin, no TP for you.

 

The penny might be "worthless" but if it is done away with there are going to be many Lincoln Penny Collectors VERY HAPPY.

 

As exchange rate value goes down, you eventually reach a point where the metal in the coin is worth more than the exchange rate. Once that happens it doesn't matter if the exchange rate continues to drop, the coins "value" doesn't.

 

Where were those old ladies at? I would like to hire them to run my collections office.

 

lol. They were about to start beating on me if I hadn't scurried away.

 

Pennies from 1982 and earlier that are 95% copper have a melt value of close to .02 cents each. Now if I can only figure out how to get 100 million of them in my garage then I can retire.

 

Hopefully you know 1) that price would be for 100% copper and 2) the cost of refining the 95% copper makes it less than half that.

 

Now he'll need 400 million cents to retire.

 

I did take the 95% copper @ $2.7827 per lb and added the 5% zinc @ $1.0533 per lb for a melt value of $184.86 for every $100.00 of these pennies.

 

I only have $50.00 worth saved so far, ugh

 

Doesn't work that way. 95% copper/5% zinc is not an alloy useful for anything. The copper would have to be refined. Are 40% silver Kennedy halves worth 40/90 of the 90% silver value? I think I will check this, considering I have seen dealers turn down buying 40% coins.

 

I really do not believe it would be worth the effort and time but who knows, someone may figure a way to make it work. Thanks guys

 

Depends on the date/mintmark and how nice they are, but yea a lot don't really want to deal with them or pay a low price for them if they do

 

It's illegal to melt pennies.

 

Yeah...pennies of today now just melt on their own.

 

Some foreigners just don't like Americans, nothing we can do about it but roll with the punches. Same kinda thing happened to me but it was from a little kid selling Chiclets in Mexico!

 

Still beyond me that the U.S. Mint doesn't just produce Lincoln cents (bronze, not zincolns) for collectors only. That way, Lincoln purists would be satisfied and the "penny" would not be in general circulation anymore. The Mint could make money rather than lose money - various gimmicks could be used - reverse unc, reverse proof, enhanced unc, privy marks, etc. could add to the price charged. At least collectors would still be able to get their Lincoln cents and the "penny" would still be the longest running monetary unit in the world. Win-win?

 

It would stay in circulation as it should.

Old type cents would sell well as a collectable item, the question is whether or not they could make money off doing so

 

Thinking about what @Bruce DiLego said, what would keep me from melting the 95% Lincolns into 1 kilo bars? Why IS it illegal?