One penny costs about 2.41 cents to produce. $116M: Those pennies sure add up

It’s not the change he believes in.

When President Barack Obama said Thursday in public remarks that he was open to eliminating the penny, he once again sparked a debate about the smallest denomination of U.S. currency that critics say costs too much to keep making.


One penny costs about 2.41 cents to produce, and the government’s gross cost of making pennies was $116.4 million annually — more than any other coin, according to the U.S. Mint’s 2012 annual report. (The nickel was No. 2, costing $101.5 million, according to the report.)

On the flip side, penny fans argue that while there may be a way to cut costs on how to make a penny, eliminating it (as Canada recently did with its equivalent) would lead to inflation and end up hurting the consumer.

“We certainly need to look at ways to make our coins less expensive,” Mark Weller, executive director of Americans for Common Cents, a pro-penny advocacy group, told POLITICO. “But consumers lose when you don’t have a penny because business owners would round prices up instead of down.”

Obama was asked about why America still has the penny during his Google+ hangout on Thursday.

“I don’t know,” Obama said. “It’s one of those things where I think people get attached emotionally to the way things have been. … We remember our piggy banks and counting up all our pennies and then taking them in and getting a dollar bill or a couple dollars from them — and maybe that’s the reason why people haven’t gotten around to it.”

He added: “The penny is something I need legislation for and frankly, given all the big issues, we’re not able to get to it.”

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