As of February 2011, it costs about 2.4 cents to mint a penny. In 2007, the price of the raw materials it is made of exceeded the face value, so there was a risk that coins were illegally melted down for raw materials.
Pennies are not accepted by all vending machines or many toll booths, and pennies are generally not accepted in bulk.
Many pennies that are thrown away are often incinerated in trash disposal facilities, adversely causing air pollution.
The reduced-cost clad zinc penny, which has been produced since mid-1982, holds additional dangers when swallowed by children and others, unlike all previous U.S. coins.
Research using data on nearly 200,000 transactions from a multi-state convenience store chain shows that rounding would not increase consumer prices.