Dollar (United States coin)

Dollar coins have been minted in the United States in gold, silver, and base metal versions. Silver dollars, the first dollar coin issue, were minted beginning in 1794.

The term silver dollar is often used for any large white metal coin issued by the United States with a face value of one dollar; although purists insist that a dollar is not silver unless it contains some of that metal. Gold and gold-colored dollars have also been produced by the United States. The Sacagawea and Presidential dollars are usually referred to as "golden", despite not containing any gold.

Dollar coins have found little popular acceptance in modern circulation in the United States, despite several attempts since 1971 to phase in a coin in place of the one dollar bill. This contrasts with currencies of many other developed countries, where denomination of similar value is only in coin, such as the Canadian loonie and toonie, British 50 pence coin (as well as the 1 pound and 2 pound British coins), the 50 New Taiwan dollar coin, 100 Japanese yen coin, 1 euro coin and 2 euro coin. The failure to produce a dollar coin which differs significantly in size and shape from the quarter, weak publicity efforts, and the refusal to withdraw the dollar bill from circulation have been cited by coin proponents as primary reasons for the dollar coin's failure to gain popular support.

Current Coinage

Today four mints operate in the United States producing billions of coins each year. The main mint is the Philadelphia Mint which produces circulating coinage, mint sets and some commemorative coins. The Denver Mint also produces circulating coinage, mint sets and commemoratives. The San Francisco Mint produces regular and silver proof coinage. The West Point Mint produces bullion coinage (including proofs). Philadelphia and Denver produce the dies used at all of the mints. The proof and mint sets are manufactured each year and contain examples of all of the year's circulating coins. These and the other non-circulating coins can be purchased directly from the US Mint.

U.S. Coins

United States coinage was first minted by the new republic in 1792. New coins have been produced every year since then and they make up a valuable aspect of the United States currency system. Today circulating coins exist in denominations: $0.01, $0.05, $0.10, $0.25, $0.50, and $1.00. Also minted are bullion and commemorative coins. All of these are produced by the United States Mint. The coins are then sold to Federal Reserve Banks which in turn are responsible for putting coins into circulation and withdrawing them as demanded by the country's economy.