Central Banks are apparently buying alot of gold, led by China...
It seems that countries are in the process of de-dollarization...
Steve
Excellent post Steve,steveg wrote: ↑Sat Apr 13, 2024 5:41 am To elaborate a bit further...
Let's go back in time, about 100 years. Let's say, 1928. Before the Great Depression (after which, everything, price-wise, went haywire for awhile).
While numbers vary, depending uon the source, the average price of a car in 1928 was about $400. So, if you wished to pay for the car in cash, you could have pulled out twenty nice, new, 1928 St. Gaudens $20 U.S. gold coins, and the car would have been yours.
What was the average price of a new home in 1928? Again, prices vary by source, but it seems that around $3500 is an average number. So, an average new car was about 1/10 the cost of an average new home -- very similar to what you find today. Now, if you were paying cash for this home, you'd have had to have pulled out 175 of those shiny $20 gold pieces...
Now, fast forward to 2024. The average price of a new car in the U.S. is listed at roughly $44000 today. So, what if you pulled out those same $20 gold coins, and headed to a gold dealer. The current value of a circulated St. Gaudens $20 "double eagle" is at $2268 right now...meaning you should leave the coin shop with $45,360. So guess what...your twenty double eagles would STILL buy you an average new car TODAY, just like in 1928...
What about the house? Well, today, the average U.S. home price is $395,100, according to the National Association of Realtors. Using that same $2268 price for the double eagles, our 175 coins would allow us to pocket $396,900. Hmm. So, your 175 St. Gaudens $20 gold coins would buy you an average new house TODAY, just like in 1928.
One more random idea. In 1964, the average price for a gallon of gas in the U.S. was between 25 cents and 30 cents, depending upon the data source you check. Let's call it 25 cents. SO, in 1964, you pull up to the pump for ten gallons of gas, and pull out ten nice, shiny (still-silver) 1964 Washington quarters, and pay the attendant for your gas.
Today, what happens if you go find ten 1964 Washington quarters, from your detecting finds stash? Heading over to the local coin shop, at today's sliver prices, those ten 1964 quarters would net you $50.50. What is the average cost of gas in the U.S. today? $3.63 per gallon -- so that 10-gallon fill-up would run $36.30, MORE than paid for with your ten silver quarters!
What this basically says, to me, is that ROUGHLY speaking, the price of precious metals, relative to the things we need to buy, has remained generally fairly stable, over time. What has NOT remained stable, is the value of the fiat currency that we call "money." Our PAPER DOLLARS, depreciating over time, are what cause "prices to go up." That's because, we measure the "value" of everything we buy, relative to a depreciating currency. It's like using a yardstick that shrinks by an inch every month, and at the end of the year, measuring yourself and then proclaiming that you've grown a foot taller! It's a bias that we have in today's western world, because we've been conditioned from the time we were born, to call those paper dollars in our wallets "money." However, if we'd reorient our brains, to start thinking of value in terms of that which has been used as money for thousands of years worldwide -- i.e. gold and silver -- it would be much more obvious to us how the cost of "things," relative to that gold and silver, remains relatively stable. The thing that is in fact changing in "value" in a significant way, is our depreciating, created-out-of-thin-air dollar bill.
People say "I don't buy gold and silver because I can get better returns elsewhere," or, they follow the spot price, and get "happy" when the price goes up and they "make money" on their investment...or conversely, are disappointed when the price "goes down" and their investment "loses money." It is SO much more correct to see the changes in the "dollar price" of gold as simply being a reflection of the change in the value of the dollar, and NOT a change in the value of the gold itself.
THAT is why I said, in my prior post, that the "value of the U.S. dollar" has been falling sharply in value, and used the "rising price" of gold as my evidence of that. It should NOT make anyone happy that suddenly it's taking many more dollars to buy an asset with a relatively stable value...as that means the value of our dollars is decreasing -- i.e. the definition of "inflation."
Steve
Terrific new forum Tom, this new site is very user friendly. I like it!NASA-Tom wrote: ↑Mon Apr 15, 2024 10:57 pm Steve........ those are my exact preachings........at my financial training seminars. THANKS for taking the time .... to type this: all out!
What hurts is: (Over the past 21 Months) I have had 11 middle-class friends (11 families) tell me: "I can no longer make ends meet." Regular.....hard-working middle class families (whereby: both husband & wife = work)....... 'going under'.
Another thing that hurts is: There is no inflation index that includes: Food prices, gas prices, insurance prices. ((( I wonder why that is??? )))