Stop the Minting of the American Penny

Yea sorry about the mishap. Thanks for being understanding though. That being said, this will be my last round for arguments, so I will respond to the Pro side’s last post and provide more clarity on my position. Section 1: The Penny has an Economic Impact in Industry, and Industry Tries to Help. In my last round, I reported that if the penny suddenly stopped being produced, that there would be a significant impact in the zinc industry that could cause large contracts with the government to be essentially voided. One such contract is with Jarden Zinc Products[1][2], who currently have contracts worth millions with the government to produce such pennies, and such voiding of coins for production would significantly have an impact on this industry. These companies don’t try and stifle the American government either, as such industry uses modern technology to reduce the cost of the manufacturing. Multi-ply plating technology is now used to reduce cost when compared to through alloy coins, and makes these coins possess a unique electro magnetic signature (EMS) which provides for greater coin security.[1] So yes I see the Pro’s side in that robotics can help manufacture durables (or pennies for this debate) cheaper, and that’s great, but against Pro’s argument, you don’t see people abolishing the car…. Or milk. It takes people to come up with such testing and technologies to try and achieve ideas to manufacture better, so yes this is not only jobs being lost, but innovation as well. Section 2: Financial Impact of the Penny’s Absence If the penny were to cease production, there would be many undesired consequences from this action that would be counter-intuitive from the Pro side, but would quickly become devastating realities for the general public. Intrinsically, if the penny were to be removed from production, there could be no way to sustain prices realistically without rounding to the nearest 5 cent piece. Millions of transactions are managed every day in the United States, and with 28% of Americans either not owning a savings/checking account, or trusting on payday lending services[3]. With this data, the amount of cash/coin trades each day is purely not dismissible, not withstanding that cash is used in 46% of all transactions in the U.S[4]. Demographics with comparatively low incomes (predominantly the young, elderly, and minorities) use cash more commonly than people with higher incomes. Because only cash dealings will be subject to rounding, any move to eradicate the penny would be regressive and hurt these demographics of Americans who have no other choice and do not possess the means to make non-cash transactions. According to one report[5], the Treasury would essentially lose money without the penny. First, the Mint's construction and circulation costs include fixed elements that will continue to be incurred whether or not the Mint manufactures the penny. The report approximates this fixed component at $13 million (2011). In addition, there is $17.7 million in operating costs apportioned to the penny that would have to be engrossed by the remaining denominations of circulating coins without the penny. Moreover, under present Mint accounting, the nickel expenses eleven cents to produce (and the nickel isn’t even being targeted in this debate). In a scenario where nickel manufacturing doubled without the penny, the study determines that with current fixed costs, abolishing the penny would prospectively result in increased net costs to the Mint of $10.9 million, compared to the current state of manufacturing. Section 3: Proposed Solutions As I previously stated, there are better ways to resolve this debate, and the best way is to make the penny worth 1 cent again. In 1982, the United States changed the composition of the penny to reduce manufacturing costs, and such similar solutions can be found again in contemporary times, ending an outdated 30-year solution. An option that could sustain such reduction is costs calls for a core of some sort of ceramic material, with similar heft as zinc[6]. Ceramics are metal-based and consequently much denser than plastic, though not as heavy as metal itself. Ceramics could be made from 2 inexpensive compounds: silica (SiO2) and alumina (Al2O3, or possibly with a bit of denser oxide such as titanium oxide added for weight. The ceramic penny core likely could be anodized with a copper skin fairly cheapl, thus no longer requiring the use of zinc to manufacture our pennies. Section 4: Current Trends Over the past couple years, the prices of the metals needed to produce the modern penny have actually decreased. According to a report from the Department of Treasury[a], after attaining a peak cost of 2.41 cents in 2011 due to the substantial growth in global metal prices, the cost of manufacturing has dropped to 1.83 cents for 2013.[4] In the 2014 fiscal year, the cost to yield a penny fell additionally to 1.70 cents.Congressman Steve Stivers (R-OH) has introduced a bi-partisan bill to mandate the use of steel in the manufacturing of pennies, dimes, and nickels. . Research has shown this bill could save the U.S. government up to $2 billion in material costs over a 10 years. References: [1]: http://www.export.gov... [2]: http://legacy.utsandiego.com...; [3]:http://www.forbes.com... [4]: http://www.frbsf.org...; [5]: http://financialservices.house.gov... [6]: http://www.livescience.com... [7]: http://riponadvance.com...;