Congress is investigating whether it would be cheaper for them to stop printing dollar bills and start using $1 coins instead.
Dollar bills are cheap to create but do not last very long, especially as the velocity of money increases with dollar devaluation. Coins are more expensive but last longer.
The government can create dollar bills for five cents each and “sell” them at a profit to the public for $1. The coins cost thirty cents each to make but also last thirty years. The GAO estimates that the government could “save” $4.4 billion over thirty years with the coins.
The government calls this profiting “seigniorage.” Normal people call it counterfeiting.
Basically the crooks in the government want to find the cheapest way possible to counterfeit the currency. Surprising, I know.
Here’s Murray Rothbard on legalized counterfeiting:
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