Interesting story on possible new US coins/currency.

I totally believe this. Still, 6 years is a bit excessive. It seems like the committee could come up with a candidate list of 3-5 metals, do test strikes and other measurements, and have the whole thing wrapped up in a couple years. I'm sure some of the things can run in parallel (e.g. you can be test striking one metal while having moved on to other tests on another).

 

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Generally speaking yes thing do need to be tested. However, the cost analysis which should have been done first would have shown they can't get it below face value so really there was no need to test anything.

 

Not really. Just being able to reduce the cost would help the problem. They did cost analysis first and that's why they started testing.

 

A pretty long post but I'll reply as compact as possible.

I acknowledge that labor cost in Australia is absurdly high compared to the rest of the world. As such, Australia has to make do with higher productivity to offset the overall cost. Because I do not have such data from the Australian and US mint, this is the main reason why I refrain from making comparison.

My argument still remains - even with high labor cost, you have a production line that is setup to strike coins. With the same production line, you can use it to strike quarters, nickel, cents, dollar or any other foreign coins. Granted, the material cost of dollar coins is slightly more expensive compared to quarters. But with the same production line and with similar production rate, is it difficult to accept that it is certainly more profitable to strike higher denomination coins with the same labor cost? I reckon that you can make 2-3 times profit just to strike dollar coins compared to quarters and much more compared to other denomination.

As I have never been to the US, I do not know what a quarter can buy. In Australia, you can get a soft serve at McDonald for 50 cents. McDoanlds does have a menu that you can buy with 'loose change' so there is some practical use for such change. https://mcdonalds.com.au/menu/loose-change-menu (I'm not trying to promote 'unhealthy' lifestyle)

 

Not much as far as I (regular visitor) can tell. And I guess that is a major difference between the US and many other countries: Since the quarter is the highest circulation coin denomination, not too many people actually buy anything with coins. You get them back and (unless you need quarters for, say, bus tickets) then put them in some jar ...

Christian

 

You said that well. Most folks in the US just save the change and cash it in as needed. It won't buy much so most don't carry around much change.

 

A quarter in the USA can buy a big gumball from a vending machine, it can also buy a pack of ramen noodles. But that is practically all it can buy. Coins in the USA don't have any practical spending power.

 

Our dollar coins would have some spending power, if people carried them. The problem is that given the choice of carrying an 8.1g coin around or a 1g note, which do you think most people would choose? It was even worse when we had large size dollars (~25g).

 

In the US, $1 coins are not minted for circulation any more, so the comparison is moot but here in the euro area many people do carry €1 coins (7.5 g) and €2 pieces (8.5 g). Of course a (€5 and above) note is lighter, but will also be larger. I just don't buy those stories where people compare carrying, say, ten of those coins and the equivalent in "paper". Nobody does that ...

Christian