Gold Standard Movement Growing

[grumbler]

I'm not sure you understood the point I was trying to make--your argument doesn't relate to what I was saying.

It relates to what you wrote, though not, perhaps, to what you thought you wrote.

The demand for gold has not been "largely driven by the convention that gold is a store of value."  Gold was a store of value for many reasons, convention being only fairly recent.  So Ide's point is not correct:  gold is not really just as much fiat currency as paper.

[The Minsky Moment]

Unless of course you happen to be unlucky enough that a Jew has created a pig and wheat brokerage and backed by armed thugs takes half the value of every transaction, leaving you with only a quarter-pig's worth of wheat once you've finished trading.

I am not familiar with this caste of Jewish pig merchants you refer to.  I sense a problem with the concept.

[Slargos]

Unless of course you happen to be unlucky enough that a Jew has created a pig and wheat brokerage and backed by armed thugs takes half the value of every transaction, leaving you with only a quarter-pig's worth of wheat once you've finished trading.

I am not familiar with this caste of Jewish pig merchants you refer to.  I sense a problem with the concept.

As if Jews would ever have a problem making a profit off pigs [or indeed anything, such as baby blood or souls]  Surely you jest. 

[alfred russel]

The demand for gold has not been "largely driven by the convention that gold is a store of value."  Gold was a store of value for many reasons, convention being only fairly recent. 

I don't understand. Would you say this statement is accurate (your quote, with my changes noted):

The demand for gold has is not been "largely driven by the convention that gold is a store of value."  Gold was a store of value for many reasons, convention being only fairly recent.

[Admiral Yi]

As if Jews would ever have a problem making a profit off pigs [or indeed anything, such as baby blood or souls]  Surely you jest. 

The profit and brokerage parts of your story are plausible, the armed thugs and the coerced transaction are not.

[Slargos]

As if Jews would ever have a problem making a profit off pigs [or indeed anything, such as baby blood or souls]  Surely you jest. 

The profit and brokerage parts of your story are plausible, the armed thugs and the coerced transaction are not.

Well. Perhaps I exaggerate. It's people's own damn fault of they allow themselves to be extorted by the Jews. They don't need thugs since they are protected by equally usurious laws.

My mistake. 

[Martim Silva]

The value of gold has always struck me as absolutely bizarre.  I sort of understand its value as a currency in ancient economies, but other than its lack of reactivity it's not really good for that much (except wiring and some other industrial applications).  Isn't gold really just as much fiat currency as paper?

What made Gold interesting is the fact that is one of the easiest metals to mold, while at the same time is capable of resisting the effects of time.

In any Human society, there is always a group of people who rise to the top, and those eventually want some luxuries, like a statue (of themselves, if the are leaders), or something artful that shows their power, or things made in something rare. Gold is by far the best metal for that.

This means that, if you have Gold, artisans of a Human society will be interested in acquiring what you have, to use in their works to please the powerful. So you'd have something that would *always* have demand, as long as you were in a Human society. And since artisans are the guys that make everything (either they themselves do it, or they know and do things for the guy who does what you want), you could rely on it to get you what you wanted from someone.

This was for ancient times. It is no longer practical nor possible to do this in a modern society, which is why we don't use Gold anymore.

In a crisis, currency is always something that can get people who do things to do them for you. Smokes are an excellent example of that.

[grumbler]

I don't understand. Would you say this statement is accurate (your quote, with my changes noted):

The demand for gold has is not been "largely driven by the convention that gold is a store of value."  Gold was a store of value for many reasons, convention being only fairly recent.

I don't understand what the point here is.  The demand for gold is not driven largely by a "convention" that gold is a store of value.  Look up convention in this context.  It relates to Ide's argument that gold is a fiat currency.   The reason gold is seen as a store of value is not due to some "convention" on the topic.  Both the Aztecs and Spanish considered it a store of value long before they met each other.

[alfred russel]

I just want clarification before I respond. I'd rather not assume and then after a bunch of posts have some semantic difference come up.

[grumbler]

I just want clarification before I respond. I'd rather not assume and then after a bunch of posts have some semantic difference come up.

You have your clarification... unless you are going to try to play some kind of semantic games with "convention" or "fiat currency."

Do you believe that gold is as much a fiat currency as paper, as Ide claims (and you say you support)?

[alfred russel]

Gold has not always been a good way to store value in the past. The real purchasing power of gold had eroded consistently since Bretton Woods broke down (the current wave of gold buggerism may have reversed this, I'm not sure).

In a modern society, all the reasons that have been brought up concerning gold as a store of value break down. 200 years ago, a pigs worth of gold would be better than a pigs worth of most other things because gold does not degrade, rot, or depreciate through overprinting. But today there are many more options. I could buy rights regarding barrels of oil or another productive asset. I could buy ownership shares in a company. Both of these, along with many more options, are both more easily stored and more liquid than a bar of gold. In fact, most gold that is traded does not have someone taking possession.

Gold is just one of many commodities that you can trade, and is perhaps special in the sense that among commodities it has very limited industrial at current prices. I don't consider that a stable store of value.

[HVC]

What i don't get is that good prices keep going up but stock gold mining companies aren't matching the rise in prices of the product they produce.

[grumbler]

Gold has not always been a good way to store value in the past. The real purchasing power of gold had eroded consistently since Bretton Woods broke down (the current wave of gold buggerism may have reversed this, I'm not sure).

In a modern society, all the reasons that have been brought up concerning gold as a store of value break down. 200 years ago, a pigs worth of gold would be better than a pigs worth of most other things because gold does not degrade, rot, or depreciate through overprinting. But today there are many more options. I could buy rights regarding barrels of oil or another productive asset. I could buy ownership shares in a company. Both of these, along with many more options, are both more easily stored and more liquid than a bar of gold. In fact, most gold that is traded does not have someone taking possession.

Gold is just one of many commodities that you can trade, and is perhaps special in the sense that among commodities it has very limited industrial at current prices. I don't consider that a stable store of value.

Stricken as not relevant.

Do you believe that gold is as much a fiat currency as paper, as Ide claims (and you say you support)?

[alfred russel]

Gold has not always been a good way to store value in the past. The real purchasing power of gold had eroded consistently since Bretton Woods broke down (the current wave of gold buggerism may have reversed this, I'm not sure).

In a modern society, all the reasons that have been brought up concerning gold as a store of value break down. 200 years ago, a pigs worth of gold would be better than a pigs worth of most other things because gold does not degrade, rot, or depreciate through overprinting. But today there are many more options. I could buy rights regarding barrels of oil or another productive asset. I could buy ownership shares in a company. Both of these, along with many more options, are both more easily stored and more liquid than a bar of gold. In fact, most gold that is traded does not have someone taking possession.

Gold is just one of many commodities that you can trade, and is perhaps special in the sense that among commodities it has very limited industrial at current prices. I don't consider that a stable store of value.

Stricken as not relevant.

Do you believe that gold is as much a fiat currency as paper, as Ide claims (and you say you support)?

By definition gold isn't fiat currency (obviously). What Ide was driving at was that neither gold nor USD have an intrinsic value that guarantees the item is going to hold its purchasing power.

[Admiral Yi]

What i don't get is that good prices keep going up but stock gold mining companies aren't matching the rise in prices of the product they produce.

I suspect this has to do with the fact that as the price rises mining companies pursue digs that are ever more expensive to extract.