After over 200 years, the United States government plans to stop making new pennies, the Treasury Department told the Wall Street Journal.

The United States wouldn't be the first country to eliminate the coin, Turco said. Canada, for example, decided to phase out its penny in 2012. In the U.S., the Department of Defense stopped using pennies at its overseas bases in 1980 because it became too expensive to ship them.

Online chatter has lots of folks looking at their caches of coins hoping to find Lincoln wheat pennies that they unrealistically hope are priceless.

That can lead to coins like the 1943 Lincoln bronze cent, which was made out of bronze in error. It should have been made out of zinc-coated steel, with the Mint having stopped using bronze which was needed for the war effort. Around 20 bronze Lincoln cents have been discovered, with the most expensive being sold for $1.7 million.

A penny saved was a penny earned. A penny bought your thoughts. A penny was pretty. A penny was pinched. A penny might even be hiding in your loafer. There won’t be as much of that anymore. The Treasury Department said on Thursday that it was phasing out the penny.

The U.S. Mint has made its final order of penny blanks and plans to stop producing the coin when those run out