Federal Reserve throws cold water on the idea of dollar coins

The Federal Reserve struck a blow Thursday in favor of the dollar bill, saying that replacing it with a coin would lose the government money and raise costs for businesses.

In past years, some lawmakers, such as Sens. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and John McCain, R-Ariz., have introduced bills to phase out the $1 bill in favor of $1 coins. The move is favored by some vendors and other businesses that involve a high volume of coin transactions. Other countries have already taken that step. For instance, the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada switched out their lowest-denominated bill for coins in the 1980s.