The Last Penny Has Been Minted

I can remember a time when my pants pockets jingled when I walked. It was all those coins from the last time I made a purchase and was given change.

My father had a nervous habit of holding coins and rolling them around in his hand.

Like many people, I had a coin organizer at home. A video of one of those old things is below. It made it easier to bring coins to the bank for deposit or to have them converted into bills.

Our cars used to come with coin organizers in the center console. This helped people who lived in states that had toll roads.

Today, most people pay with credit or debit cards. Cash is still used, but nowhere near as much. Some kids have actually made it all the way through public school, having no idea what some coins are called or what they are worth.

Because of these changes to our money system, the final penny was minted, and no more will be made.

This does not mean the end of the penny anytime soon. There are an estimated 250 to 300 billion pennies in circulation. But subtract from that number all of those pennies that are lost at the bottom of drawers, under the seats of cars, dropped in the dirt somewhere. In that case, less than half are actually being used as money.

Modern US pennies are made of copper-plated zinc (97.5% zinc and 2.5% copper plating), while pennies minted before 1982 were primarily copper (95% copper, 5% zinc or tin). An exception is the 1943 steel cent, which was made of zinc-coated steel to conserve copper for the war effort.

Besides not being used much anymore, it costs more to make a penny than it is worth; the U.S. Mint's latest figures show a penny costs 3.7 cents to produce. This economic reality led to the recent decision to end the production of new pennies, a move that is expected to save taxpayers millions annually.

This means that retailers will have to round up or down to avoid owing someone a penny. So let's say a product costs 2.99. Let's hope that sales taxes round that price up so that a penny is not left hanging. How is that going to affect gas prices?

So find a few pennies and save them. It might be worth something as a collector's item.