The death of the penny
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 20 November 2025
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The last five pennies were minted in Philadelphia last week. Over the 232 years of its existence, the penny became culturally significant through music, fashion and movies. But recently, many have argued for it to be discontinued because of how much the coin costs to produce.
Host Colby Itkowitz speaks with White House economic policy correspondent Jacob Bogage about how prices could be affected by this change and what this could mean for other forms of U.S. currency.
Today’s show was produced by Sabby Robinson. It was edited by Ariel Plotnick and Peter Bresnan, and mixed by Sam Bair.
Subscribe to The Washington Post here.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | After 232 years, America officially stopped making pennies last week. |
| 0:12.4 | The penny carries an almost mystical quality. |
| 0:15.8 | Find a penny, pick it up, all day long you'll have good luck. |
| 0:19.1 | Toss a penny in a fountain, and your wish will come true for me |
| 0:22.8 | the penny has always held a special meaning in my family our lucky number is 11 and sometimes one of us |
| 0:30.4 | will find a single dime and a single penny together and we'll pick up the 11 cents and it feels like |
| 0:36.7 | it's a message from a beloved family member we've lost. |
| 0:40.2 | It's like my dad saying, hey kid, I'm here. |
| 0:44.4 | So the news of the penny being taken out of production left me with a lot of feelings and questions. |
| 0:52.0 | One of the people who's looked into this recently is White House economic correspondent Jacob Bogage. |
| 0:57.0 | Financially, don't expect this to make a whole lot of difference. |
| 1:02.0 | But it is a moment. |
| 1:04.0 | It is a moment that is worthy of us taking a pause and going, wait a minute, the economy in the world has changed |
| 1:13.1 | around us, and maybe we haven't noticed until right now. |
| 1:21.2 | From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. I'm Colby Echowitz. |
| 1:26.6 | It's Thursday, November 20th. |
| 1:29.4 | Today, why the penny is being discontinued now and what it could mean for how much things cost. |
| 1:44.0 | Jacob, thanks so much for being here to talk about pennies. |
| 1:47.1 | Always fun to be here. |
| 1:48.8 | So what does it mean that the penny is now out of production? |
| 1:53.4 | Like, can I still use my pennies? |
| 1:55.4 | You can still use your pennies. |
... |
Transcript will be available on the free plan in 4 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Washington Post, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Washington Post and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.