December 11, 2012 – Swedish journalist Stefan Karlsson thinks that a one dollar coin instead of the bill could save $147 million to the US Treasury. Keeping the penny, though, is even more expensive since its production costs currently amount to approximately 2.4 pennies. So, why is it not done?
According to Karlsson in 1973 a one dollar bill was worth even more than the five dollar bill today, the same goes for a penny in 1973 compared to the dime today. He thinks that eliminating the lowest denominations or, in case of the one dollar bill, switching from a banknote to a coin would mean to acknowledge the inflation that has hit the US economy in the course of the last decades. That fact, he says, many Americans want to forget.
You can read his article at The Christian Science Monitor.
On the American penny and its elimination focused the British journalist Cordelia Hebblethwaite some months ago as you may read here.
Due to production costs Canada has phased out the penny, too. Read this article on the subject.