Congressman looking to make all US coinage from steel, may affect silver supply, price and volatility; WealthCycles.com Next logical step in continuing to take the piss I suppose :/
Is there anything left to debase? Now that gold and silver have gone from the coinage does it really matter what metal the coin is made from? They are now just tokens to use in exchange for goods, in themselves they haven't been a store of value since 1964. They should be nice and magnetic as well, I am sure the smaller euro cent coins are copper plated steel and they are magnetic, not that you can get many of them, last time I was in Europe most of the small village shops had run out of small change.
Why not Aluuuminum coins, like many other countries. Alcoa and US currency sounds like a great partnership
Obama and Congress fiddling while America burns. As well as debasing the currency, by removing copper from coinage, the proposal is blatant protectionism of the US steel industry. If the US steel industry becomes a captive industry beholden to government contracts (coinage and GM/Government Motors) then its' no longer a part of the free market and an example of fascism in the economic sense. And yes Willrocks I wonder if they will rust? After 5-10 years of steel coinage of ever increasing cost, will the steel alloy blend be changed become even cheaper, the side effect being prone to rusting.
Bitcoins or similar is testing waters now. What will they come up with. Like you say out of air for them ?
Jane Austen started rolling in her grave long ago; but I think she would add on a couple of thousand rpms if she saw this title. Was already expecting this when I read the title. I suspect certain recycling/scrap metal concerns would benefit from the influx of tin, nickel, copper, bronze etc. Making cash dollars from nickels & dimes (literally). According to the OECD, the largest two consumers of steel remains the construction sector (50%), followed by the transport sector (16%). (Source:http://www.oecd.org/industry/ind/45145459.pdf) Does anybody know the total mintage of all common US coins in circulation, so we can estimate their total weight? I suspect if every US circulating coin in existance was replaced with one of same weight in stainless steel, it'd barely matter to steel demand.
You may have missed my point. The proposed Act mandates the steel must have been produced in the US. Steel for construction can come from anywhere. The amount of Chinese steel used for housing in Australia may surprise you. A friend who retails construction steel to tradies says they have to sell Chinese housing steel as customers want cheap cheap cheap and if they only stock Australian, their tradie customers will go elsewhere. Blame anyone who renovates or is building houses for that - ie the majority of society who buy on price not quality or place of manufacture. What I was getting at is the US steel industry has been in decline for decades, and Congress mandating to itself that government used steel must only come from a domestic source, that domestic source may become reliant on their government contracts at a set price and their other customers who shop on price will use imported steel. Over time the US steel industry will become even more reliant on government and government will control the industry, which is why I said 'fascism in the economic sense'.
Time to invest in vending machine companies. Every vending machine in the USA would have to have it's coin rejector modified.
