So far nobody has ever forced me to buy or collect any coins, hehe. And no, I do not collect coins by mintmark. Stuttgart (F) has the biggest production share, so I often end up with pieces from there. But when it comes to my collection, I do not care about MMs, and (depending on the country) not about years either. What I find amusing is that, even in cases where there is no visible mark (the mints sometimes do that with sports collector coins), people want to know about the "secret" distinguishing marks so that they can get all five. We coin collectors can be so silly. Christian
Most rich countries have their own mints and contracts with other countries, to produce their coins. Israel is an exception. They can certainly afford their own mint, but, most likely choose not to have one.
There was some law passed prohibiting the mint from manufacturing foreign coins - before that they had minted coins for other countries starting in 1877 for Venezuela. Canadian 10c coins were minted in Philadelphia in 1969, and occasionally I find them in circulation.
No problem, we all learn new stuff almost every day. And somebody from a country that makes all its coin domestically will be more inclined to believe that this is what everybody does ... The question of whether a country has a local mint is partly a question of wealth, as torontokuba wrote, but also of size. Luxembourg and Malta are small euro countries; it just would not make sense for them to have mints. I mentioned Sweden (non-euro) before - before the mint in Eskilstuna closed, they had about a dozen employees. Of the three Baltic countries that have joined or are about to join the euro area, Estonia and Latvia do not have mints, but Lithuania (not exactly a big country) has one. Ireland does have a mint, but usually has its collector coins made in other countries. Christian
For the record, the Polish Mint is now privately owned, another reason why Poland had their coins minted by the Royal Mint. To the gov't of Poland, it is just another bidder for their coin needs.
Yep, the mint is basically part of the empire of Zbigniew Jakubas. At least we know about these deals. Sometimes it is a well kept secret, however, where a country's coins are produced ... Christian
You would also find that during World War II, Denver and San Francisco minted coins for both Australia and the Philippines, with D and S mintmarks. However, I would have guessed that Israel had its own high-security mint, to limit counterfeiting.
Australia had coins minted in London, India, the USA and several mints in Australia. I collect the 1912-1964 Pennies myself, good grief you can even find Bombay and Calcutta minted coins!
Well, it's nice to know that the junk I purchase locally is produced right here in the 'good ol' USA.........
Franklin Mint, maker of crummy "collectibles" and a private company here in the US, also mints coins for some countries! At least commemoratives, but I think circulation, too. Bermuda is one, IIRC. Rob
This is a rather unusual question but a good one to think about. In these days of globalization, many companies would import goods from overseas to lower their prices under a competitive market. However, this may hurt the local market. Good examples are food producers, car manufacturers and such. Please note that every country is different therefore my examples may not illustrate what I am trying to express. There seems to be a huge notion of nationlism and or patriotism to support one's country. Regardless of how hard one attempts to avoid buying goods from overseas, in the overall process, this is a very difficult process to avoid. For instance if you have a mobile phone or a computer, chances are there will be traces of rare earth metals, majority of it coming from China. Now as of why I was going around the bush - my question is, how can we be assured that "manufactured in ABC" is definitely 100% originated from ABC land? What difference would it make if it was manufactured overseas? You can never know every process of manufacturing. Similar to blood diamonds - once you have a final product, you may never know the true origins. I believe what's important is what kind of ethics a company have.
Depends. In some countries, such as the US, that may well be true. In others, the concept of giving and taking is at least as important. I would certainly not want to live in a place where I can only buy products and services from my home city, or state, or the Federal Republic of Germany, or the European Union, without risking of being "accused" by people. As for mints, sure, if you have local companies (private or government operated) that get the job done well, fine. And I agree, here in Germany we do not actually need four mints with five facilities. The question is, should the federal government give the minting job to one or two of them only? That would affect the somewhat delicate states/feds balance. Now what if a mint does not operate profitably? In the case of a government operation, one could argue, so what, a mint does not have be a profit center by itself. Another reaction would be to say, our mint can make enough money by producing medals, and/or coins for customers worldwide. Or you say, minting locally is too expensive, let's get this done by people elsewhere in the world who do a good and yet cost efficient job. Each approach has its pros and cons - my point is simply that none of them should be ruled out. Christian
As for me I am openly campaigning for the re-opening of the Muldenhutten mint so I can see the "E" mintmark again.
Obese chance. The place looks just miserable these days; here is an article (German, with some small images) written by Angela and Reiner Graff aka "numiscontrol" after a trip to Muldenhütten a few weeks ago. There are some vague hopes that - now that Muldenhütten is part of Freiberg - there will be a small museum, or some department of the city museum, where the mint used to be. Don't hold your breath though ... Christian
"Obese chance" - now that is PC to the T From looking at photographs of the mint buildings, it is in pretty rough shape. Was last used by the Ost for coins in 1953, and has been in a steady state of erosion ever since. Kind of a cool mint though, very small and not too far from Berlin which makes me wonder why it was needed in the first place except that it was probably some ca. 1887 Junker pet project to increase employment in some overlooked backwater.
The US attitudes relate to a proud national identity that has continued from generation to generation. A nation formerly embarrassed, ashamed, trying to change its very narrow historical point of view, might adopt a very welcoming and flexible new attitude (brainwashing) to help bury its past transgressions. Part of that can be shame and accusations for what once was considered "patriotic". To this day, there are meetings on past issues, where Germany apologizes for something and dishes out cash. My guess, that's probably where your open and unrestrictive global attitude stems from.
