Gresham's Law and the Value of a Nickel

[traelin0]

What's commonly known as Gresham's law, the debasement of currency causes the hoarding of good (old) relative to bad (new) money, is not a new human behavior. This tendency had been observed as far back as the 5th century BC. It's becoming clear that the public is beginning to relearn a very old monetary lesson.

edegrootinsights.blogspot.com/2011/02/how-much-is-nickel-worth-more-than-five.html

[Deleted]

Over my head, but I will bump it to see what others say.

[midwesterner (banned)]

Feb 3, 2011 19:34:37 GMT -5 @traelin0 said:

What's commonly known as Gresham's law, the debasement of currency causes the hoarding of good (old) relative to bad (new) money, is not a new human behavior. This tendency had been observed as far back as the 5th century BC. It's becoming clear that the public is beginning to relearn a very old monetary lesson.

edegrootinsights.blogspot.com/2011/02/how-much-is-nickel-worth-more-than-five.html

Trae, I posted something about this in MT, reguarding silver, nickel and copper in our currencies which has been replaced with cheaper material like zinc.

What is your thoughts of collecting pre 1982 pennies for copper, and nickels for the 25% nickel/75% copper value in them? Do you see good money replacing bad in this case of the lower demoninations of coinage?

[midwesterner (banned)]

Here's a good one Trae, bad quality, but good point.

[safeharbor37]

It isn't reasonable to expect the government to mint coins which are worth more as raw material than their face value. I don't keep up with commodities but the value of copper has increased recently faster than nickel ~ I think, so it could come to pass that a nickle be worth more melted down. Of course, if that should happen, the collector value of those coins would go up.
I remember when the government ceased minting silver quarters, the local pharmacist allowed a friend to go through his coins every afternoon to glean the silver quarters. I've frequently wondered how the guy made out. If he's like most he sold out too early. If he still has them in a box, he's probably wealthy just from the coins.