Given: There are more solar systems than pennies
Given: Our solar system is probably pretty typical
Then: Our solar system is worth less than a penny
I know I am making an assumption in declaring our solar system “pretty typical”…but what are your thoughts on this chain of thought?
Regards
FML
The problem with your reasoning is that, from the perspective of our ability to spend money, there is only one solar system.
Economically speaking, they don’t count if you can’t reach them.
Something is worth what people are willing to pay for it. However, asserting real ownership of a solar system is going to take quite a lot of effort.
The law of supply and demand only works when the commodity can be exchanged fairly easily.
The valuable lesson here is to never underestimate the importance of shipping costs.
If the time ever comes when we casually drop solar systems in a “take a solar system, leave a solar system” tray at the convenience store, you may be might.
I have a penny. I’ll take two solar systems, thanks. Don’t bother wrapping them, because you’d need a lot of tape.
Well, of course you would say that, but when I ship with HeisenEx they guarantee instantaneous delivery anywhere in the Local Group for only 10% more per pound. Well, not guarantee, exactly, but they say it’s “statisticlaly likely” that it’s somewhere around the locus you’ve sent it to. Doing the package tracking is a royal bitch, though, what with all the hidden variables and everything. And heed their warnings not to ship live animals; my buddy Erwin had his cat sent to him this way once and it was half-dead when he got it.
Stranger
Never, never ship with HeisenEx – you get far better delivery with Brown-ian Motion!
(By the way, also never patronize their fast-food subsidiary, HeisenBurgers – they always leave you with that queasy, uncertain feeling!
Just make sure the shipping crate isn’t too heavy - you don’t want to exceed the Chandrasekhar Limit.
I can either know what my HeisenBurger looks like, or how it tastes. But I can’t know both!
As for the Solar System being sold… I think eBay has a rule against that.
Why? They’ll sell a galaxy for a money order to creatures of indescribable horror.
And don’t use Schrodinger Shipping - if you don’t check on them, they leave the job half done.
A penny is 2.5 grams of copper-plated zinc. Any given solar system contains billions and billions of tons of both copper and zinc. I’d say that a solar system is worth considerably more than a penny.
Jeez, my evil sister is worth 2 cents and she’s still worth more than the solar system?
Which contains me
and her
and all the pennies.
Ooh… somebody should offer a prize to solve this puzzle.
Ok, this has got to have something to do with the wave/particle debate…
Given: There are lots of pennies in our solar system
Given: Our solar system is probably pretty typical
Then: Other solar systems might contain lots of pennies too.
Oh no, not eBay … they never lost control.
(from my own personal experience selling planets).
In the immortal words of Willy Wonka, “They’re not for sale. She can’t have one.”
If something is not for sale, any estimation of a probable price is unsound.
I’ll buy that. 
“Professer Heisenberg, eh? Do you have any idea how fast you were going?”
“No, but I know exactly vhere I am!”
To treat the OP seriously, there are two false assumptions contained in it.
The first is the implied but unproven assumption that the value of an object is determined solely by the supply and not the demand.
The second is the assumption that there are in fact more solar systems than pennies. The logic of the two givens in the OP would suggest otherwise. If there are numerous pennies in this solar system and this solar system is typical, than logically there are numerous pennies in every solar system and pennies are more common than solar systems.
Realistically, we realize that conclusion is ridiculous - there are no pennies in any solar system except our own. But that realization forces us to re-examine our “givens” and realize that our solar system is not typical - it is the only solar system that is inhabited by humans and to the best of our current knowledge the only one likely to be inhabited by humans at any point in the foreseeable future. Therefore, as a unique item, it is far more rare than a penny.