June 02, 2004

A penny for your thoughts .. "There is no escaping economic history: it takes nearly a dime today to buy what a penny bought back in 1950. Despite this, the U.S. Mint keeps churning out a billion pennies a month. Where do they go? Two-thirds of them immediately drop out of circulation, into piggy banks or � as The Times's John Tierney noted five years ago � behind chair cushions or at the back of sock drawers next to your old tin-foil ball. Quarters and dimes circulate; pennies disappear because they are literally more trouble than they are worth. The remaining 300 million or so .. go toward driving retailers crazy. They cost more in employee-hours � to wait for buyers to fish them out, then to count, pack up and take them to the bank � than it would cost to toss them out .. ". MORE "Abolish the Penny". Posted by Greg Ransom | TrackBack