I was intent on writing an argument in favor of dumping America's copper runt, and still find merit in that point of view. However, what makes the penny worth merely...well, merely a penny? Is it the metal used? No - copper is a fine and respectable member of the non-animal, non-vegetable family. Is it the artistry or composition? I'm no critic of the visual arts, but I see nothing diminutive about Mr. Lincoln's rendering, certainly not as compared to those of Washington, F.D.R., or Jefferson on Honest Abe's coin cousins.
What, then, makes America's numismatic kid brother thus? It's not the penny's fault. It's policy. You heard me. With one stroke of the pen (okay, maybe the process is a bit more convoluted than that), "the man" can decide that the penny is now worth - gasp - TWO cents! What's the point? You double a penny and you still have a piddly two hundredths of a dollar. It's still less than half a nickel! Yeah, maybe so b-but... you can't just wave a magic wand and say "voila!", ye who had fifty cents now have the sum of one green-back! Where's the product, the WORK, that makes the money MEAN something? Isn't it all relative? Won't that just ultimately devalue our other money until our current equilibrium is returned? We either increase America's GDP by busting our collective butts the equivalent of the increased value so that the value is REAL, or else the other coin and paper in circulation will naturally have to take the hit?
Then, too, what of the global economy? We neither have virtual OR actual walls separating America and Americans from the rest of the world, or more accurately, the rest of the world from us, as much as some seem to want just that. The fact is that changing the penny's value would indeed have reverberations beyond this country's borders. We consume product and services from all over the world sometimes with just the tiniest twitch of our "mouse finger". Anyone here drive a Hyundia? A Toyota? Wearing anything from Versace? Gucci? And, it is a symbiotic relationship Micky D's has been a global staple of impulse and comfort eating for decades. Similarly, I don't think Americans are the only folks who have "Googled" their navigational queries on anything from Dafur to Unicef to Viagra to Paris Hilton to Tom Brady to tofu burgers to the public records of their new neighbor.
We are now and forever an interactive and irreversibly intertwined economy. When one country sneezes So, as fundamentally meaningless as money actually is, but for the material worth of the "stuff" of which it is made (copper, silver, paper) it is in fact representative of and a means of exchange for real property or wage. That has long been the whole point of our symbolic worth. Ya can't very easily carry that baby grand Steinway or vintage Harley in your back pocket to exchange for the thoroughbred owned by the guy across town. And money is only ONLY! valuable as a convenient, portable, manipulable and MAGNITUDES of value more functional than barter.
Why not roll the dice? Oh that's the argument against it right there, huh? "If it ain't broke" and all that? We shouldn't GAMBLE with our currency policy? I suppose there's a point there. But doesn't our current economy with ever rising costs for fuel, food and shelter just beg for some radical approach? A new idea? A fresh perspective and/or "outside the box" thinking? Alas, also I am again brought to the fact that the level of risk is made minimal by the very puny value OF this coin! Doubling its denominative worth won't bring us back to 1929! In fact, for the first time in MY life, Uncle Sam gave me a virtual "no strings attached" bankroll of $600 this last fiscal year. That sure was radical, huh? Even more radical that it was the brain-child of a republican a *conservative* administration!
That, to me, seems strong persuasion toward a "go for it". Something does seem to need adjusting in our economy, no? Many experts have opined, among other things, that Western societies and its consumers are rather spoiled. We want more and more and want to wait longer and longer to pay for it. America's collective credit card debt is staggering. We seem to have a laissez faire attitude toward the relationship between consuming and working between getting and paying for what we get. There may even be a widening disconnect between the two!
I think the sheer novelty of increasing the penny's monetary value could be very stimulating to the economy especially among those who REALLY have very little. Among the rich, leaving a penny sitting on the ground will continue. But, among those who do literally count every cent, this may be a boon or a boom! Think, too, about the possible behavioral manifestations and/or effects. We may once again become acquainted with the idea of saving! Pinching pennies would become instantly twice as profitable. Maybe, therefore, twice as likely? Would Americans rediscover the idea of putting off spending until we actually have some money to spend? Wouldn't it be fun to see the reemergence of the ever-endearing "wow" face of a 5 year old who finds something shiny and valuable enough to save and eventually spend?
I am not suggesting that this behavior will take on proportions of a grand scale. And, perhaps among middle class adults, very little indeed may change. But what of those others? The truly "have nots"? The ones for whom the relationship between work and pay is ever and constantly tangible. There is no "portfolio" or "financial planning". The money they have is the money they EARN period! Money doesn't actually earn money. Yet, for reasons beyond my understanding, this concept of an "economy" permits an INDIVIDUAL to "acquire" perhaps *billions* of dollars of wealth. Does he have billions of dollars worth of calluses on his hands? Billions of drops of sweat from day after day after day of HIS labor? No. Now, I love that there is the opportunity for the industrious and smart, and yes, the hard-working, to reach a point where he can enjoy the fruits of his efforts, and even a little luck, and not have to stay in survival mode to, well, to survive!
Money does for society now what language did and does for all communicating animals. It allows us to REPRESENT our thoughts and lives. We are indeed richer for having the ability to trade IDEAS as well as "stuff". So too, does money allow us to see beyond the immediate. We don't have to bring our horses and cattle and gold bullion everywhere we go just to get other stuff for it. How unthinkably laborious and unmanageable would that be?!
On the other hand, the penny seems BARELY less cumbersome than trading goods for goods, doesn't it? There again is another argument for giving our most junior mint a promotion, or at least a raise! I keep finding my mind, however, wandering back to the magical quality of just reassigning its value. It seems just too, too, superficial! It seems like a pandora's box. It's the unknown. It's the unfamiliar. Heck, we tried out the 2 dollar bill and decided we just plain didn't like it! Ahh.but it was still competing with its more flexible and functional ancestor! And, thankfully, there are still some things in this world that you can get for a dollar so that paper still makes sense.
Can the same be said for the penny? Maybe it will make more sense, if we make it worth well more cents!