特朗普命令我們造幣廠停止賺錢，但是可以嗎？

似乎沒有什麼太大或太小，無法吸引唐納德·特朗普的注意力，以重新啟動美國在他的第二任期內的工作方式

Donald Trump is setting his sights on rebooting the United States in his second term as US president. Nothing appears to be too big or too small to escape his attention, including the humble penny. While it is the lowest denomination of US currency, there are an estimated 240 billion of them and billions more being minted every year.

唐納德·特朗普（Donald Trump）將目光投向了美國總統的第二任期重新啟動美國。似乎沒有什麼太大或太小而無法逃脫他的注意力，包括不起眼的一分錢。儘管這是美國貨幣的最低面額，但每年估計有2400億美元的貨幣和數十億美元。

However, that growing tally of “copper” coins may come to an end after Trump says he ordered the US Mint to stop making pennies. So, what is his beef with the 1-cent coin that bears the image of Abraham Lincoln?

但是，在特朗普表示命令美國造幣廠停止賺錢之後，這種“銅”硬幣的成長可能結束。那麼，他用亞伯拉罕·林肯（Abraham Lincoln）形象的1美分硬幣的牛肉是什麼？

Trump says minting pennies “is so wasteful!”

特朗普說，鑄造便士“太浪費了！”

“Let’s rip the waste out of our great nations budget, even if it’s a penny at a time,” Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform. “For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful! I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies.”

特朗普在他的真相社交平台上的一篇文章中說：“讓我們從我們的大國預算中刪除浪費。” “很久以來，美國已經鑄造了幾分錢，這實際上使我們花費了2美分。這太浪費了！我已經指示我的美國財政部長停止生產新的便士。”

Not to be a nitpicker, but it actually cost almost 3.7 cents to produce a penny in 2024 according to an annual report from the US Mint. That was a more than 20% increase over the previous year. Last year was the 19th consecutive year that it has cost more to produce a 1-cent coin than its actually face value.

根據美國造幣廠的年度報告，在2024年生產一分錢實際上要花幾乎3.7美分的價格，但實際上要花近3.7美分。這比上一年增長了20％以上。去年是連續第19年，生產1美分硬幣的成本要高於其實際面值。

What is driving up the price of making pennies? Among the reasons, while only 2.5% of a penny is made of copper these days, the rest is zinc, the price of the former raw material has been increasing. Average copper prices were up 5.4% in the 2024 fiscal year states the US Mint to a little more than $8,889 per tonne.

是什麼推動了賺錢的價格？在原因中，雖然這些天只有2.5％的一分錢是由銅製成的，但其餘的是鋅，前原料的價格一直在上漲。在2024財政年度，美國造幣廠的平均銅價上漲了5.4％，至每噸8,889美元以上。

One of my (many) failures in govt was not getting rid of the penny. I tried—with President Obama publicly supporting the effort—and failed.(Personally would go further & shift to a single decimal currency with new penny’s as 1 cent & new nickels as 5.)https://t.co/tGmv0PfTWs

我的（許多）政府失敗之一併沒有擺脫一分錢。我嘗試 - 奧巴馬總統公開支持這項工作 - 並且失敗了。

Trump isn’t the first to want to get rid of the penny

特朗普不是第一個想擺脫一分錢的人

There have been calls from both Democrats and Republican politicians for decades to retire the US penny. However, inertia has kept the US Mint pumping out billions of the copper-plated coins to keep enough in circulation.

數十年來，民主黨和共和黨政客都打電話來退休美國便士。但是，慣性使美國造幣廠抽出數十億枚銅幣，以保持足夠的循環。

Despite there being nearly a quarter trillion of them floating around, over 720 for every man, woman and child in the US, most are kept in coin jars. Those who pay with cash will rarely use them at the check-out but expect to receive them as change and then just hold onto them. For the US Mint’s sake, they would prefer the vast majority stay in those coin jars as it would be “logistically unmanageable” if a modest portion of them were suddenly back in circulation.

儘管它們有將​​近四分之一萬億美元在美國，每個男人，女人和兒童都超過720，但大多數人都被保存在硬幣罐中。那些用現金付款的人很少在退房時使用它們，但希望將它們作為更改而收到，然後抓住它們。為了美國造幣廠的緣故，他們更喜歡絕大多數在這些硬幣罐中留下來，因為如果其中的一部分突然回到流通，那將是“邏輯上不可管理的”。

While the feasibility of Trump’s proposal is being examined, whether he has the authority or he’ll need Congressional approval, there are other examples of countries close to home that have done away with their pennies. Canada began phasing out 1-cent coins in 2012 and required cash transactions to be rounded to the nearest five-cent increment.

儘管正在審查特朗普提議的可行性，但無論他擁有權威還是需要國會的批准，還有其他一些在家附近的國家的例子消除了他們的便士。加拿大在2012年開始逐步淘汰1美分的硬幣，並要求將現金交易舍入至最近的五美分增量。

The downside to that for the US is that making the nickel the lowest denomination coin for cash transactions would most likely be even more expensive than the penny problem. It would necessitate minting more of them as demand would most likely surge and it costs almost 14 cents to make each nickel according to the US Mint, nearly 9 cents more than their face value.

對於美國來說，不利的一面是，將鎳作為現金交易的最低面額硬幣很可能比一分錢問題更昂貴。根據需求的需求極有可能激增，這將需要更多的造幣，並且按照美國造幣廠的價格將每種鎳製成近14美分，比其面值高出近9美分。