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Pennies Research Paper

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Pennies have been part of the US currency for over 200 years. It’s fascinating how long these small coins have been around for. Recently, an argument has been stirred up concerning the penny and if the US should cease its production. Ceasing production would be more beneficial to the economy. It is not cost effective, it wastes taxpayers’ money, and it wastes businesses’ time and money. Therefore, the US should stop minting the penny. Keeping production of the penny is not cost effective and removing it from US currency could help the economy. The price to produce and distribute one penny is equal to 2.41 cents while it is only worth 1 cent, this is 1.41 cents lost for every penny that is made. This may not seem like a lot of money but the prices add up and soon enough that can be millions of dollars down the drain. In 2010, the money wasted on producing and distributing pennies was $27.4 million. As stated by Chris Ward, a …show more content…

With this in mind, they’d probably round up rather than down. In “Is the Penny Worth it?” Mark Weller estimated that the rounding of prices would equal to about $600 million per year for consumers, which is what people are afraid of. In spite of this, Dr.Robert Whaples believes that the rounding of prices would not create a significant change economically because it will save time and money. Businesses pay retail clerks to count their coins, and counting pennies wastes a lot of time and since they pay their employees by the hour then they waste even more money because time adds up. It is estimated that the seconds wasted counting pennies a year is equal to $700 million. Which means that keeping the penny would still equal to a waste of $100 million per year that could be used for other

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