It seems to me that just when the usefulness of the US penny has run its course, the US Mint has decided to flood us with newly minted copper-looking pennies, although a penny contains only 2.75% copper. A quick Wikipedia search shows that the penny was modified in 2009 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s birth. I don’t recognize them as pennies; they look more like the fake money used in a board game. The Wikipedia penny information also points out that it costs 2.41 cents to mint a one cent piece and that the loss in profitability due to producing the one cent coin in the United States for the year of 2011 is $60,200,000.
This shot shows some new and old pennies and nickels as well as a few dimes. The newer nickels (just as unrecognizable to me as the new pennies) are out of focus in this shot due to the shallow depth of field that I used.
