As an American, I think pennies should only be used when appropriate.

Such as when traveling by air or making expensive purchases. There's nothing so satisfying as plunking down a sack of pennies when purchasing stuff and saying "just let me know if it's not enough."

The above is sarcasm. I hate pennies. They are pretty much useless these days. The only joy I get from them is when someone annoys me, I can throw them at the person.

They are so useless, in fact, that it actually costs nearly twice the value of a penny ($0.0183)[0] to mint one.

That said, I'd really like it if larger denomination coins ($1/5/10) were common in the US as they are in the EU. Generally coins with value more than $0.25 aren't used (yes, $0.50 and $1 coins exist, but are rarely used/distributed).

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penny_(United_States_coin)

Edit: Added forgotten link.

Of course it's easy to see why Pennies are still made in the US (at a loss, as you said), and it's the same reason so many things are the way they are (Healthcare, education, roads, etc.)

Someone is making a lot of money from the status quo, and they will fight very hard to keep it.