[F]Abolish the Penny

   Inflation has eaten the value of the penny. The fact that the penny is still in circulation does not mean that it is useful. If the half penny were minted then it too would be in circulation, even though it would be nothing but a nuisance. The penny is now worth so little that nobody even picks it up off the ground.

  Making a single penny costs more than its own value which means that every time a penny is produced, the government loses money! According to the ABC news article, the US Mint makes 8 billion pennies each year and this costs them $130 million. Since they are only worth a total of $80 million the taxpayers are losing $50 million each year on the production of pennies. It gets even worse. The US mint has acknowledge that the metal in both pennies and nickels are worth more than the value of the currency. A few years ago, there was a law enacted that severely limits both the melting and exportation of these coins. Apparently, the mint had been contacted by many people looking to melt down these coins in order to harvest the metals used to make them. They are now worried that people could sell the coins as scrap and remove them from circulation.