We're interested in finding out the ratio of four major types of
United States coins in circulation-- that requires knowing how many
coins of each type are currently in circulation.  We'd be extra
grateful for reference links you could add.

Approximations are okay-- we don't need an exact answer, but we'd like
it to be reasonably accurate.

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Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 25 Jan 2006 18:52 PST

It's easy to find out the numbers of newly-minted coins each year for
the past few years, and the ratios of pennies to nickels to dimes,
etc.

But there don't seem to be any reliable figures for the actual number
of coins in circulation.  One source says 300 billion, but there's no
breakdown between types of coins.

Would the newly-minted numbers meet your needs?


pafalafa-ga

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Clarification of Question by jakedobkin-ga on 25 Jan 2006 19:32 PST

We'd accept a ratio for recent years, provided that it was fairly
stable over time.  So maybe a ratio for each year for the last 5-10
years.  But if anyone has any ideas on how to assess the total
circulation ratio, we'd love to know.

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Clarification of Question by jakedobkin-ga on 26 Jan 2006 19:08 PST

I think we'd accept a three year average, if that's all the info that
available-- anyone care to do the math?

US Mint figures for coin production 2003-2005 can be found here
http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/coin_production/index.cfm?action=production_figures
assuming a similar turnover for each denomination this will give a
good idea of the ratio of circulating coins

A few thoughts:

"Two Hundred Billion Pennies

Current estimates by the U.S. Mint place the number of pennies in
circulation at around
140 billion. Others have estimated as many as 200 billion currently
circulating. Since the
first penny was minted in 1787, until present-day, over 300 billion
pennies have been minted
in the United States. So that leaves about 100 billion pennies that
have been retired by the
Mint, lost down sewer drains, stored in jars, smashed by trains, or
collected by numismatists
in the past 200 years."

"The
rest will become part of the roughly 18.9 billion nickels in circulation. ..."

I hope this helps - if you need the references please let me know.

Have a good day.

Coin shipments 1990-2000 can be found here
http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/annual_report/index.cfm?action=operations_00_ann_rpt
Sshipments are slightly different from production figures and can be
either higher or lower, but they are a more accurate estimate of
actual changes to circulating numbers.
It can be seen there has been somewhat of a shift to higher
denomination coins since 1990.

for coins shipped by the US Mint 1990-2000, the averages to the
nearest 0.25% 1c - 66.5%, 5c - 8.25%, 10c - 13.25%, 25c - 12%