The United States has a problem with pennies, which keep getting made and minted — most often in Philadelphia — but are rarely spent, writes Caity Weaver for The New York Times.

According to a conservative estimate, there are roughly 240 billion pennies lying around the country. They are used as change for transactions ending not ending in zero. However, most of these pennies are not used by customers in further purchases and have to be replaced with new batches, which are again not spent, creating the need for yet more pennies.

This makes the American cent the most produced coin in the history of civilization.

For example, the Philadelphia Mint made 85,092,703 pennies in 1903, which is not even two percent of the circulating pennies the U.S. Mint struck in 2023.

The majority of those that have not seemingly disappeared are “sitting in consumers’ coin jars in their homes,” according to a 2022 report, and it is crucial they remain there.

Mint officials conceded that even if a modest portion of those pennies were to return into circulation suddenly, the resulting flow-back would be “logistically unmanageable.”

This means there would not be enough space in government vaults to store them.

Calls to get rid of the penny has gone on for decades and will likely continue.

Read more about the problem with pennies in The New York Times.

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