OPTIONAL:
What do you remember from 2016? If you were not alive in 2016, log a story from your elders for us all to enjoy this wonderful year again. Thank you!
Please keep the 2016 Penny inside this GeoCache for others to observe. There are about 130 billion pennies currently in circulation. The Mint produces 5-16 billion pennies every year.
Can we find a penny from every year of production?
Every penny minted since 2006 was produced at a loss. The penny accounts for the largest amount of loss for the U.S. Mint. From 2009-2019 the U.S. Mint produced pennies at a total loss of $586,000,000. In 2019 the loss was $73,000,000. There is precedent to retire the penny. During the U.S. Mint's 225-year history, several small denomination coins and all coins valued over $1 have been eliminated from production. One of those coins, the Half Cent, was retired in 1857 due to inflation. Our current penny is experiencing a similar effect, where it's production cost exceeds its face value. Coins with a face value above $1 were retired during the Great Depression. These coins lost their status as legal tender with the passing of the Gold Reserve Act of 1934, a law meant to protect federal gold from being hoarded by private citizens. This act made gold coins illegal in the U.S. Before 1857, the U.S. Mint produced a coin called the Large Cent. This was a pure copper coin about the size of a Half Dollar. The melt value of the copper in this coin today is about 7¢. The collector value can range from $70-$900 based on quality and variety.
2016:
• Unemployment hits lowest level since the recession.
• The Chicago Cubs won their first World Series in 108 years. As legend has it, the team was cursed in 1945 when tavern-owner William "Billy Goat" Sianis was kicked out of Game 4 of the Cubs’ World Series game against the Detroit Tigers for bringing his smelly billy goat, Murphy. On his way out, Sianis is reputed to have declared, “Them Cubs, they ain’t gonna win no more,” thus spawning the so-called Curse of the Billy Goat that lasted seven decades.
• Several women of color made political history when they were elected to prominent leadership positions within their respective states. California Attorney General Kamala Harris became the first black woman elected to the U.S. Senate from the Golden State; Ilhan Omar became the first Somali-American lawmaker in the U.S. with her election to the Minnesota legislature; Catherine Cortez Masto became the first Latina senator in history when she won her U.S. Senate bid in Nevada; and Pramila Jayapal became the first Indian-American congresswoman with her victory in Washington state.