I've noticed especially with quarters, that the coins from some point in the 90s, I want to say somewhere between 1990-92, onwards are not stuck in as deep a relief as coins from the 1980s. They have a different wearing pattern. Was there some kind of change to the pressing process of coins in the early '90s? And in what year was this change made? I think I remember reading a long time ago that it was in 1990 when they started making the quarters with "spaghetti hair" on George Washington and such. But I could be wrong.
Id like to know when any branch of our goverment was allowed to make a profit . Protect and serve is their only fuction.
Not in the early years, in fact they faced several attempts to abolish the mint because it was too expensive and was losing money. They have made a profit every year since 1964, and probably earlier as well. This past year their seigniorage profit dropped to only about $16M though, and the only reason it didn't go into the red was because they made a $79M profit on the last quarter production of 2011 President dollars. (The Mint 2012 fiscal year started in Sept 2011 so the last circulation strike president dollar was included in 2012.) They won't have that profit to offset losses on the 2013 fiscal year. If it hadn't been there for 2012 the mint would have lost something like $38M last year.
