Why do Americans call a cent a penny?

Answer 1

It's a holdover from colonial times. When Britain established colonies in North America they brought many of their own coins with them. The British money system included a large copper coin called a penny. The first US 1-cent coins were about the same size as British pennies, so the old name stayed in use after independence.

The US downsized its 1-cent coins in 1857 but the nickname "penny" was so well-established that it's stayed with us till the present time. It's a bit like using the term "dial a telephone" even though telephones have had pushbuttons instead of dials for almost half a century.

MoreUnlike modern currency systems the British one was based on multiples of 12 and 20. One pound sterling was equal to 240 pennies. When the US money system was established during the years 1787-1792, Jefferson and others argued for a more rational system based on multiples of 10, with the dollar divided into 100 parts instead of 240. The Latin and French words for 100 include the syllable "cent". That was adopted as the new coin's official name even though hardly anyone uses it even today.

Other countries' coins also circulated in North America at the same time. The Spanish peseta was a large silver coin about the same size as the US silver dollar that replaced it. The peseta was divided into 8 reales which were commonly called "bits", so for compatibility the US system included a quarter-dollar coin instead of a 20¢ coin. One-quarter of 8 bits is of course 2 bits which is why quarters are sometimes still called "two bit" coins.