Yet Another Dollar Coin Disaster In The Making

The US Treasury and US Mint are going to try, yet again , to make a One Dollar coin popular. This will be the third attempt in three decades to move people away from the dollar bill and towards the dollar coin.

The first attempt in the 1980's was a dismal failure. The Susan B. Anthony dollar looked too much like the quarter and was often mistaken for one.

The second attempt was shortly after the turn of the millennium with the Sacagawea dollar. It, too, was an unmitigated disaster, but for a different reason.

The geniuses in Congress and at the Treasury figure that releasing 4 different dollar coins every year with a different president's portrait on the face would garner interest just as the 50 state quarters have. But they won't. They haven't learned the lesson of Sacagawea dollar: any dollar coin will fail as long as the dollar bill is still in circulation.

It's time for the long lived dollar bill to go the way of the dodo. It is expensive to keep them in circulation due to their short survival time. The average dollar bill lasts less then 18 months in circulation before it's worn out. The average coin lasts 35 years. Even though coins cost twice as much to make as a dollar bill, they last 23 ½ times longer, meaning that after 3 years in circulation they've more than made up for the higher cost of their minting.

When will the government wise up and dump the dollar bill? If they don't, why waste time and taxpayer money to mint coins that people don't want and won't use?

I don't have to answer that question, do I? You already know the answer.