Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, June 18, 1990 TAG: 9006160060
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Cox News Service
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
American as the Revolution, the penny has become humiliated and valueless currency that might even be decommissioned so the nickel can become the lowest medium of exchange.
"When I see pennies on the floor, I scoop them up in a dust pan and throw them in the garbage," said clerk John Paramore at a 7-Eleven store.
There you are. The penny gets trashed. Pennies crowd car ashtrays, muss dresser tops, line fountain floors and are stuffed in red bank rolls and stockpiled in shoe boxes. They're also found on the street, dirtied and homeless.
"If they took the penny away, it would be no loss," said Alan Seabrooke, who sells rare coins at William Youngerman Inc. in Boca Raton, Fla. "People throw pennies away because they're of so little value."
The penny obviously doesn't pack much patriotic punch. We propose constitutional amendments to ban flag burning, but the penny has few defenders. Do you stop to pick one off the street? Do you stop to pick one off the street if someone is looking?
The penny's practical value has been squashed by inflation. You can't buy a gum ball with a penny. If you're short a penny or two on a sale, the store clerk usually lets you go. And piggy banks have become as popular as drive-in theaters.
"It would just make our lives easier not having pennies," Paramore said. Customer service would be faster, and the store's penny jar could be ditched, he said.
Here's the penny pincher: A House banking subcommittee is considering putting the cent out of business. A sales price would be rounded down to the nearest nickel if the price ends in 1, 2, 6 or 7 cents. The price would be rounded up if the sum ends in 3, 4, 8 or 9 cents.
Pennies would still be made, but only for collectors.
But the penny is no prize, Seabrooke said. Coins are collectible mainly because of low mintage. The Treasury made 1.2 billion pennies in March. Pennies are as common as Big Macs.
"A hundred years from now, the pennies of today will be valueless," Seabrooke said. Many countries around the world already have phased out the penny's equivalent in their currency.
He'd sell you a 1943 steel penny for 4 cents or sell you bags of "wheaties" made before 1959, when the Lincoln Memorial design was placed on the coin's reverse, or give you $550 for your classic 1955 "doubled die" penny on which the date is badly misprinted. But dealers don't make a living anymore just collecting and selling rare pennies, he said.
If the penny was retired, "it would be a blessing in the banking industry," said John Glenn, a Sun Bank vice chairman. He stashes his pennies in an old college beer mug.
Banks don't need the hassle of collecting, sorting and storing the nuisance cent, he said. Before the bronze penny was replaced with copper-coated zinc a few years ago, it cost the government more than one cent to mint and distribute the coin.
"When was the last time you saw a kid pick up a penny on the street? If it isn't a dollar, they don't care," Glenn said.
"Pennies do give you something to throw in a fountain," he conceded.
Bingo. We found somebody who would miss pennies - the people who count on charity fountains.
The cent is big business for these groups because people save pennies to throw into fountains and kettles. We spend everything else. Charities don't find many quarters or half-dollars twinkling on the blue bottoms of mall or airport fountains.
"Oh my goodness, I'd hate to see the penny go," said John Jones, an auxiliary captain for the Salvation Army in Lake Worth, Fla. Pulling the penny would mean the loss of an American tradition and - closer to work - the loss of donations, Jones said.
"A lot of people who don't have much money save up their pennies before Christmas. Then they like to come by the kettles," he said. "Take that away from them and you've taken away their sense of pride."
by CNB