( CNN ) -- If you 've ever looked closely at a newly minted penny , you 've probably been struck by its sheer beauty . Abraham Lincoln 's bearded , chiseled , copper face shines forth beneath the proclamation of `` In God We Trust '' and beside the quintessential American motto , `` Liberty . '' Americans revere the penny , as it encapsulates a history lesson -- Lincoln brought freedom to so many -- and a civics lesson all in one . But increasingly , Americans have stopped using the penny , as we turn toward electronic payments and away from cash . Sadly , inevitably , like so many other beautiful , venerated historical objects , it appears that the penny now belongs in a museum . Earlier this week , President Barack Obama asked Congress for permission to change the mix of metal that goes into making pennies and nickels . He based this recommendation because it costs taxpayers about 2.4 cents to make each penny and 11.2 cents to make each nickel . In fact , the costs of using such coins are even higher . Poor Richard , aka Benjamin Franklin , recognized that `` time is money . '' How much is our time worth ? The average American earns a little more than one penny for every two seconds of work . Unfortunately , when there 's a penny involved in the transaction , it takes a couple extra seconds to fumble around for the coin and complete the purchase . Thus , for many people , time is more valuable than this money , and increasingly we throw away pennies , lose them , do n't bother to collect them to return to the store or let them pile up in jars . Stores pay out more pennies than they receive , so the order goes down the line to make more pennies , which are often lost and ignored -- repeating this vicious cycle . Unfortunately , the U.S. Mint wo n't find a miracle metal that will make pennies worthwhile . The bottom line is that even if pennies could be created out of thin air , the cost of our time would outweigh the gains from using the penny . For nickels , the math works out better , so I 'll second the president 's call to begin making nickels out of less costly metal , rather than consigning them to the history books . People from across the political spectrum should unite to retire the penny . Conservatives care about the color red -- they hate the red ink that losses by the U.S. Mint impose on taxpayers . Conservatives also loathe inflation , but unfortunately , the penny 's value has been slowly eroded by inflation over the years , so the penny is n't worth a red cent any more . Liberals love the color green . A penny will turn a sour shade of green if you leave it out in the elements long enough , but it 's environmentally un-green . Using pennies means an increase in zinc and copper mining , an increase in energy use and pollution at these mines and an increase in energy use and pollution as the government , banks and businesses put rolls of pennies into sacks and lug them from place to place . Penny advocates worry that customers will be ripped off if Congress kills the penny . In a penny-free world , sellers would round your bill to the nearest nickel for cash purchases . Purchases totaling $ 4.98 or $ 4.99 , for example , would be rounded up to an even $ 5 , while those equaling $ 5.01 or $ 5.02 would be rounded down to $ 5 . Since so many retail prices end in a 9 , the fear has been that this rounding will gouge consumers . This worry is unfounded . I calculated the magnitude of this `` rounding tax '' after obtaining data on nearly 200,000 transactions from a multistate convenience store chain . The data reveal that the `` rounding tax '' is a myth . In reality , the number of times consumers ' bills would be rounded upward is almost exactly equal to the number of times that they would be rounded downward . It turns out rounding would have given customers in my study a tiny gain of about 1 cent per every 40 purchases . `` Why , oh why , has it taken so long to recognize reality ? ? Get it done [ eliminate the penny ] , and you will deserve the Nobel Prize ! '' That 's the encouragement I received after former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker read about my findings . Nobel Prize , hmmm ... that 's worth almost 150 million pennies . You could start a museum with that ... Follow CNN Opinion on Twitter . Join the conversation on Facebook . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Robert Whaples .
It costs taxpayers about 10 cents to make each penny . Ted Kennedy : Americans use the penny less as they turn toward electronic payments . He says the U.S. government wo n't find a miracle metal that will make pennies worthwhile . Whaples : People from across the political spectrum should unite to save the penny .