I can’t find how long ago Andy Rooney recorded this.
Like so many things, it’s been a long time for the government to recognize what non-government people can see plainly.
(For the record, I stop to pick up pennies.)
A penny in 1986 is worth about 3 cents in today’s money.
That is also about the melt value of the pre-1982 pennies that were actually all copper instead of copper-plated zinc.
I’m more surprised this didn’t happen two decades ago.
Sales tax has kept the penny around. Some states even issued small “mill” tokens that were worth a tenth of cent back when a penny could actually buy something.
I’m a toll collector and I can tell you we have pennies all over every lane that accepts cash. They’re all over the place, and no one picks them up. That’s because toll collectors usually throw them in the lane after the person that paid with them left. Some exits put them in a jar until it fills up. No one banks them out.
We still price gasoline down to the tenth of a cent. Probably just tradition at this point. The pump rounds to the proper whole penny. I wonder if anyone calculates how many gallons they pumped (registered down to the thousandth of a gallon at most pumps) and multiplies by the price per gallon (including the 9 tenths of a cent) to see if it rounded that last penny correctly.
I collect coins. Often coins of significance are given to people as mementos. Mint employees perhaps. My guess Trump will get one, maybe Bessent, one maybe in a museum…in 1974, the government made some pennies of aluminum as an experiment. Many were given to congressman. Most have been lost track of but would be extremely valuable if one could be found and verified. I get rolls of coins at the bank and so far I’ve only gotten two 2025 pennies, people will hoard them, but they probably will not ever be worth much- more keepsake than anything…
Just like how many people hoarded those bicentennial quarters. LOL.
Those quarters are a dime a dozen. I get them all the time at work.
Like those gold anodized squaw dollars, they will never have any value above face value except to fools.