Bill Maurer, dean of the School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine, says removing the penny will harm those who don’t use bank cards or digital money options. … “The politics of this are messy. It’s not a terrible idea, but I wish they had thought it through more,” said Maurer, who also is director of UCI’s Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion. “People see this as a quick win — the penny costs about 4 cents to make — but they overlook the consequences. They forget a large share of our population is still underbanked, and lacks easy access to digital payments.” … One of his colleagues, Jenny Fan, who manages UCI’s money institute, said the relevance of cash is rising again, especially for poor nations.

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