John McCain and Mike Enzi Reintroduce The COINS Act To Kill The Penny and Move To $1 Coin

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U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Mike Enzi (R-WY) today reintroduced the Currency Optimization, Innovation, and National Savings Act of 2017 (COINS Act), legislation that would modernize our currency by moving to a $1 dollar coin, reduce the cost of nickel production and suspend the minting of the penny, which currently costs more than one cent to produce. These money-saving reforms, which have been studied and supported by the non-partisan Government Accountability Office, could generate up to $16 billion in taxpayer savings.

“With our country facing $20 trillion in debt, Congress must act to protect the American taxpayer,” said Senator McCain. “By reforming and modernizing America’s outdated currency system, this commonsense bill would bring about billions in savings without raising taxes.”

“Change can be hard sometimes, but switching to a dollar coin could save our country $150 million a year,” said Senator Enzi. “Our country is in a difficult financial position because we didn’t value the cost of the dollars we spent. We can’t afford to keep that up, and these innovative opportunities are a way to save taxpayer money that is really just being wasted with each new dollar we print and penny we mint.”

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I like the idea of eliminating the penny but I'm not too keen about replacing the dollar bill with the dollar coin. I just don't see the value of removing the paper dollar for heavy, bulky coins. It would just give people more incentive to use their debit/credit card for purchases instead of carrying around a bunch of coins.