Jody Serrano
Editor in chiefEditor in Chief at Xataka On. Before joining Webedia, I was a tech reporter at Gizmodo and The Messenger. While I've covered all sorts of things related to technology, I'm specialized in writing about social media, Internet culture, Twitch, and streamers.
These days, it seems like everyone’s a penny-hater—from President Donald Trump to cutter-in-chief Elon Musk. In fact, nearly half of the country believes the penny should be eliminated, according to a new YouGov survey.
But stopping penny production is easier said than done. It might also have unintended consequences on another coin in our currency: the nickel.
Why is everyone hating on pennies? While the penny hate isn’t new, it recently gained steam after being targeted by Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, a commission that aims to cut $500 billion in federal spending. DOGE went after the penny because of the cost involved in making the coin.
According to the U.S. Mint, a single penny costs 3.69 cents to produce because of the price of the raw materials used to make it. This means that the country loses 2.7 cents for every penny it produces. In 2024, the Mint produced roughly 3.2 billion pennies, which led to a loss of $85 million.
Trump orders U.S. Mint to stop making pennies. In February, Trump ordered the U.S. Treasury to stop making pennies, calling the coins “wasteful.” The president wasn’t wrong in his assessment of the penny as a money loser, but experts have doubts over whether taking the penny out of circulation will actually make that much of difference in the federal budget.
“Let’s rip the waste out of our great nations budget, even if it’s a penny at a time,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Putting pressure on the nickel. Experts point out that removing the coin with the lowest value from the currency system could put pressure on the coin with the second-lowest value: the nickel. Strategists from Wolfe Research stated that removing the penny from circulation would increase the demand for nickels, and that’s not necessarily a good thing.
Producing a nickel costs even more money than producing a penny—specifically, 13.8 cents. The nickel also produces higher loses, or 8.8 cents per nickel.
In 2024, the Mint produced 202 million nickels, which generated an $18 million loss. While this might seem less than the losses produced by pennies, there were a lot more pennies produced (3.2 billion) than nickels last year.
What savings? Although Trump framed his decision to stop making pennies as a way to cut spending, it might actually end up costing the government more money. Mark Weller, the executive director Americans for Common Cents, an organization that is a proponent of the penny, told CNN that the Mint would likely have to significantly increase its production of nickels if it stopped making pennies for good. He estimated that the Mint would need to produce 2 million to 2.5 million nickels per year.
“In most countries, the lowest domination coin is the most minted coin,” Weller said.
Furthermore, just producing 850,000 additional nickels in 2025 would completely wipe out the money the government would save by stopping penny production.
Images | Chris Briggs | Adam Nir
Log in to leave a comment