For those of you who are collecting your pennies....

I have a penny bank and I also always stop to pick up a penny.

Plan to keep holding on.

What else am I going to do with them?

I admit it, I don't like pennies. But even more, I despise nickels. Nickels weigh way more than dimes, but are worth half as much.

In Europe, Germany, at least, restaurants don't deal with the copper coins, 1, 2, and 5 euro cents. They make all of their prices to the nearest 10 cent, e.g., 7,90 euro, so they don't have to deal with the small coins. Note: since tax and service are included, there are no small coin amounts added.

I like the way the Europeans do it. When I was growing up (I was six in 1950), what is $1 today was 7.5¢, and we didn't need a 1/10¢ coin.

Yeah, unless it's a 1943 steel penny or a pre-1982 copper penny I don't see the zinc junk being of any collector value for another 100 years if ever. Remember there's 114 billion cent coins in circulation.

Good riddance though.

Edit to add - not that the 1943 steel or pre-1982 copper are particularly valuable. It would be the odd 1943 copper, 1944 steel, or 1983 copper, because somehow planchets from previous mint runs got stuck in a machine, swept up, picked up, etc. and dumped in with current planchets, then struck.

Bostonphil, Go ahead and spend them.

There was a story on the news a few days ago. Some grocery store, maybe in Ohio, was giving gift cards for twice the value in exchange for pennies. One woman walked out with a $76 gift card.

I agree with VAP. I doubt very much whether pennies will be worth anything in the near or far foreseeable future. Good riddance to bad rubbish. I'm not sure why we ever had them in the first place.

Well, there was a time when the cent coin had purchasing power. At about 1950 the cent had the purchasing power that the dime has today. There was a time in 1990 when a Taco Bell taco cost 39 cents, a McDonald's cheeseburger cost 59 cents and a Big Mac cost $1.60. Or when fireballs or bazooka bubble gum was 1 to 5 cents candy . Back then, yeah those pennies made a difference, but around 2010 less so.

My Dad(a dairy farmer) was born in 1923 to a family with 10 siblings. As a child it was drilled into us to always save our penny's and we always thought we were dirt poor. He died in his 90's a multi millionaire.

I’m keeping my pennies—-and having them bronzed!

There was a time in 1990 when a Taco Bell taco cost 39 cents, a
McDonald's cheeseburger cost 59 cents and a Big Mac cost $1.60.

When I was in college in 1963, in Troy, NY, some gas stations in town were having a gas war. I think gas was 17.9¢/gal. (I know, some of you youngsters didn't even know what a ¢ sign meant.)

That .1¢/gal amounted to significant part of the price, but they priced it that way so you wouldn't realize it was really 18¢. Now, with $3, $4 per gallon gas, it's really, really insignificant, but people would probably rebel if they had to pay that extra 0.025%

While we saving money with the elimination of the penny. Should do the same with the paper dollar bill that has a life of about 18 months. With the increase use of credit cards for nearly everything, I think we should stop production of the nickle and the paper dollar. And the only president that could do it would be Trump.

There are still an estimated 250 billion pennies in circulation, the American Bankers Association said in October.
https://www.aba.com/news-research/analysis-guides/faq-phasing-out-the-penny

That works out to about 800 pennies ( $8) per person in the US. That is a bit over 4 lbs.

Time to start checking all the nooks and crannies in your house and car.

Well a little trivia then.
What Is 1/10¢ called? Or 17¢ and 9____

I said it in another thread, but with 114 billion or even 250 billion cent coins in circulation there's no shortage. Though it is entertaining to watch some ridiculous panic set in as though there could really be a shortage. Most people do not pay for products or services in exact change, but the business must make exact change. Once cent coins leave the business they don't stay in circulation. They'll end up in ashtrays, cupsolders, coin jars, or in the couch.

I wouldn't mind ending the dollar bill and going to just dollar coins, heck I wouldn't mind a return of a half dollar.