I was wondering if some government agency routinely removes old or damaged coins from circulation the same way they do with paper currency? It seems like if they make billions of new coins every year, they must be destroying some old ones or else the supply would be too great.
The mint does not remove coins from circulation. However, you can still send them damaged coins for replacements. The mint tour leader put it this way "if your hoard of coins gets destroyed and melted in a house fire, you can send it to us and we'll give you face value for them". Not sure how anyone would make out with shipping costs, but you get the idea of their role these days. They did USED to remove coins from circulation, primarily for the value of metal, to actually reuse - but no more.
Even with silver? I know you can still find it, and still do, but does the mint look for it at all anymore?
The government stopped actively looking for silver in circulation around 1971 or 72. The Fed or the armored car companies do still remove damaged pieces that come through their hands. They used to remove uncurrent coinage but there are really no longer any uncurrent coins in circulation The cent has been current for over a hundred years, the nickel has been "current" for 62 years. Even the dime and quarter have been "current' since 1965 or 45 years. Natural attrition has removed all the uncurrent coins.
Non-current meaning 20 cent, half dime, 3 cent, 2 cent, large cent, half cent etc? Or all of the older types of nickels, dimes, pennies?
Those are uncurrent (obsolete) too but I think what he was referring to was the design of the coins (and composition for dimes and quarters).
I think your teller is fibbing to you...there is no logical reason to take ikes out of circulation by the fed...
I agree, why wound't they melt these too as they are the same composition; maybes it's not cost effective though, but neither is making nickels and pennies today!
I just asked the bank teller in my family. She says the Feds do not remove the coins (Ikes or SBAs) from circulation at least from the bank branch she works at. However, I was watching a tech show on the History Channel earlier this summer and they were going on about the coin sorting machines in this particular episode. Apparently after the armored truck companies pick up the coins from the coin sorter machines - which are found at many supermarkets and megastores - they take the coins to their secure sorting facilities. The coins that are damaged physically or are outside of an error range for their weight are rejected from the sorting process. After the first reject the coins that are not physically damaged are put through a much smaller and slower sorting machine. IF the coins fail the second sorting process they are combined with the physically damaged coins and sent back to the mint for exchange on face value - as robbudo stated above. I freaking love the History Channel for stuff like this! Apart from the coin sorting companies I think that we as collectors are the next largest source of removing coinage/currency from circulation.
It isn't so much that the Fed plls the Ikes, it's just that once they get there they never leave again because the order forms that the banks have for ordering coins from the Fed no longer have a place on them for listing the Ike dollars. The tellers don't know how to order them, so they don't (they don't want to anyway either), so the Fed gets no requests and none get shipped. They don't melt them down though because if they do it results in negative seniorage and a loss to the government.
according to the US Treasury web site - it stats that muliated or non current coins if returned to the US mint only get the value of the metal - not face value ---- if that is true instead of face value - then sending any coin in is a waste of time and money What is the definition of mutilated coins? Is it illegal for people to use coins to make jewelry, souvenirs or other items? "Those coins are classified either as not current or as mutilated. Coins that are chipped, fused, and not machine-countable are considered mutilated. The Mint redeems mutilated coins at the value of their metal content. Mutilated coins are only redeemable through the United States Mint at: Link - http://www.ustreas.gov/education/faq/coins/portraits.shtml#q11
The FED calculates the face value of the coins by weight and this is what they pay. If you bend a quarter in half it'll still weight the same as a quarter so you get 25c. if you drill a big hole in it it will get figured for less. Most bad coin just gets tossed in the garbage because it's too expensive to redeem them. The big counting houses will toss anything that won't go through their machines (including brand new errors) into bins which get sent back to the mint. Most redeemed coins actually come from city incinerators. These get redeemed by the truckload.
Cladking is correct. They say they redeem by the metal content but they do not quote the relevant law which states the rate at which they pay for the metal content (Treasury Regulations Subpart C Sec 100.11 and Sec 100.12) and for the coppernickel clad material that is roughly $20 per pound which is also what $20 worth of dimes, quarters, or halves weighs. ($20 for bent/mutilated $18.14 for fused mixed coin.)
