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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Vess1, post: 504476, member: 13650&quot;]I know this will come across as being controversial but really, I&#039;m just trying to be honest with myself and everybody here.&nbsp; I don&#039;t mean to rain on anyone&#039;s parade but the numbers don&#039;t lie.</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; I post this as an example born from my own curiosity (and maybe even out of frustration. lol)&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Ok.&nbsp; I am guilty.&nbsp; I check my change for key dates and silver every day.&nbsp; But that&#039;s as far as I am willing to waste my time.&nbsp; I don&#039;t think I or many others have quite had a firm grasp on the absolute magnitude of coinage the mint has produced for circulation.&nbsp;&nbsp; Just in the last 70 years.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; What has spawned this outburst on the forum?&nbsp;&nbsp; Well, one day I&#039;d love to find an old quarter in change.&nbsp; Just to say I found one!&nbsp; I don&#039;t need one.&nbsp; I currently own 88 silver quarters plus most of the modern silver state proofs.&nbsp;&nbsp; But still, I kick the idea around of maybe finding an old one some day.&nbsp; So, I glance at my change.</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Lets look at Washington quarters:</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp;In the past week or so, I&#039;ve received no less than 4, 1965 quarters in change (including one today) from 4 completely different places.&nbsp; In the past year, I&#039;ve probably received 30-40, 1965s.&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; I have never received a 1964 or earlier.&nbsp; &nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Why is that?&nbsp; &nbsp; Well, for one, we can look at the mintage figures to try to help understand this anomaly.&nbsp; &nbsp; 1965 saw a mintage of 1.8 Billion Washingtons.&nbsp; &nbsp; 1967, another date commonly received saw 1.5 Billion produced.&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp; But wait!&nbsp;&nbsp; 1964 saw a total of over 1.2 Billion produced for circulation.&nbsp; Where are they?!&nbsp;&nbsp; <u><b>Shouldn&#039;t I be almost just as likely to find a 64 as a 65?</b></u>&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp; This leads me to believe that despite the high mintage for 1964, circulating coinage has been diluted and picked over for so many years that trying to search batches of quarters (or most anything anymore), would be insane.&nbsp;&nbsp; They were probably picked over in the early 80s more than they are now.</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Here&#039;s where things really get interesting.</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; From 1932 to 1964, they produced a little over 3.77 Billion silver quarters TOTAL, for circulation.&nbsp; This number sounds huge.&nbsp; But in reality, this is nothing!</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; 1965 to 1967, they produced over 4.1 Billion in these 3 years alone!&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp;Which means if it was theoretically possible to do, you could throw EVERY 1932-1964 quarter ever made for circulation <b>(32 years worth of quarters)</b> into a pot........&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp; Then throw every 1965 to 1967 quarter <b>(3 years)</b> ever made into the same pot and mix it all up.&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; Now, you get to pick a quarter out, blind folded.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp; <b>The chances of picking out a silver quarter would be LESS THAN 50%!!&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; </b>That&#039;s just having the 65s through 67s mixed in!&nbsp; &nbsp; You would have a 48% chance of picking a silver quarter out of the pile.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Ah.&nbsp; It&#039;s all making sense now. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie8" alt=":D" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp;They put over 1.6 billion bi-centennials into circulation.&nbsp; You can&#039;t even hardly find one of these anymore!</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The state quarters program alone easily saw over 1.5 billion quarters EVERY YEAR being dumped into circulation.&nbsp;&nbsp; This was common.&nbsp; Not to mention all the old quarters, dealers and collectors are sitting on, or that the TPGs have graded.</p><p>&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp;So bottom line, what is your chance of pulling ANY old quarter out of circulation now?&nbsp; &nbsp; I quickly and roughly skimmed through all the mintages since &#039;65 to get a rough number.&nbsp;&nbsp; I came up with around 75 Billion new quarters made, from 65-2008.&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp; If we wanted to pretend in a perfect World that ALL Washington quarters were still in circulation and up for grabs, you would have roughly a 4.7% chance of receiving a 32-64 quarter in circulation.&nbsp; &nbsp; Which of course is a fantasy.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p>&nbsp; We can assume that almost no old quarters are left in circulation, making the very high number of 4.7% much, much less.&nbsp; Most likely less than a 1% chance by now.&nbsp; And getting smaller each year that goes by.</p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Unless of course somebody just spent one out of somebody&#039;s collection (which, I won&#039;t be waiting around for either), this is rare happening!&nbsp; &nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; So, hopefully anybody searching a bank roll these days is looking for DD&#039;s, or errors.&nbsp; I believe searching had it&#039;s day, but that day has come and passed.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&nbsp; Some may not want to hear it but, if not only for myself, we have some perspective on the situation and maybe I saved somebody some time.&nbsp;&nbsp; <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie8" alt=":D" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" />[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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