According to the Inflation Calculator, 1 cent in 1970 compares to 4 cents in 1994. Well, there really isn’t much collector value for the average 1970 U.S. cent. This leads me to think that a penny saved, without collecting usury, could become worth less than if it was spent immediately.
a penny saved is a penny lost for a miser knows no joy
I’d rather sit with a glass in my hand 
Note that the word “saved” has two meanings in the context of money. I’m not sure which “Poor Richard” meant…
Also, it would only require about 6% interest to turn 1 penny into 4 in 24 years. Considering that was apparently (?) the rate of inflation over that period (that sounds a bit high to me for the entire period?), I don’t think any reasonable person would consider that usury, though medieval scholars might disagree.
And you’d saved that penny in a Dow Jones stock mutual fund in 1970, it would have been worth a bit more than 4 cents in 1994…
Interesting that Franklin should take the pseudonym of someone poor to give out this bit of financial advice. 
There’s also the spectre of currency change to consider whilst saving pennies. A girt big jar full of pennies with Britannia sitting on 'em are worth diddly today, just as a jar of post-decimalisation ha’pennies are nowt but shrapnel today. You used to be able to buy ha’penny chews with them. No longer legal tender.
They also have a habit on this side of the pond of changing coins willy-nilly, just when you think your jam-jar of assorted 1s, 2s, and 5s are gaining in value. Not to mention the ones ‘saved’ down the back of the sofa or in the car.
I think ‘they’ have it in for the penny-savers.
My favourite adage: “There are no pockets in a shroud.”
I don’t know about a penny saved, but a penny dropped on the ground is a penny Beth is going to find.
The U.S. Mint claims to have a policy of former U.S. currencies always retaining at least face value.
Find a penny, pick it up, all day long you’ll have good luck. 
It is amazing how loose change will add up though, even pennies. Some people see any change below a quarter as a bit of a bother (nickels, dimes and especially pennies).
Apparently they are a) so wealthy they don’t need to care or b) have never tried the experiment of sticking all their extra change in a container until it’s full and then dumping it in one of those little sorting machines to add up. (Money! Yahhooooo! 
)
Sara (who thinks everyone who can’t stand pennies should send all their unloved pennies to her and Beth)
I’ve got a jar of pennies I’ll send… if you’ll pay the shipping. 
See, there’s the problem. Shipping! I’ll just have to wait for them to invent a transporter, like on Star Trek. One that actually works… wouldn’t want those pennies transformed into a melted pile of goop.
Sara
Do people that play high end whistles still call them pennywhistles?
For the purist, cents is the proper term for American money. Pennies refer to English and colonial money. I tell people that the Clarke original sold for an English penny in 1843. Other people claim that this is not true that the name pennywhistle came from the buskers who were given pennies.
According to one inflation calculator, that penny (about 5 American cents back in 1843) translates into $9.50 USD today. Clarke’s and whistles of similar quality, can be had for that amount so the penny price sounds correct to me. I’ve seen Megs for as low as $3, and plastic recorders for 99 cents new.
I don’ t stop to pick up cents, but do stop for nickels and above. A friend picks up all the cents she can find and uses numerology to divine the meaning of each prize. Sort of like getting fortune cookie messages with each find.
- Bill
Didn’t Peter Ustinov used to tell a joke about “A Benny shaved is a Benny ‘urned’”?