Kill the Penny, Senate Urges

The Senate is expected to recommend Tuesday that the Royal Mint stop production of the penny.

Start scrounging through your couch cushions; it’s time to cash in your copper stash. The penny is set to become coinage non grata in Canada, as sources say the Senate will recommend scrapping the coin in a report slated for release Tuesday. Since it was introduced in 1908, inflation has reduced the penny’s purchasing power by 95 per cent, and it now costs 1.5 cents to produce each one-cent coin. According to the Bank of Canada, customers will pay more as often as merchants will lose out by rounding prices to the nearest nickel, although that assessment is hard to square with the fact that it’s the merchants who will be doing the rounding.