Gold Has No Intrinsic Value? Nonsense! — Eric Dubin

How many times have we heard the argument that gold has no intrinsic value?  Here’s an interesting comment and my response on Facebook:

Comment:  …gold has no intrinsic value. It’s only value is what people will pay for it, IF they buy it as Jewelry or are persuaded to invest Fiat Cash in it. It has some technological uses, but generally, it has no intrinsic value. Grocers don’t take Gold in return for food!

My response:  That’s a common misunderstanding. Gold has intrinsic value on account of a compound process: 1) All value is subjective when “value” initiates – always; 2) Humans assign subjective value to gold; 3) In order to get gold, it takes commodity consumption (energy), physical capital (machines) and considerable human labor before the age of modern mining, all of which has intrinsic value; 4) As a scarce commodity first, which has the assignment of subjective value by human culture, the very process of obtaining the stuff “imports” and places into the physical good intrinsic value via #3 and #4.  Tammy, conventional wisdom about gold not having intrinsic value is wrong because the idea is built upon a bogus logic train.

Someday I’ll write a full article and dive into a more though explanation.  But the above “snapshot” is sufficient for now.

You can access the original post if you have a Facebook account by clicking here.  If you are on Facebook, I highly recommend checking out the official Silver Doctors page (click here) and the official The News Doctors Page (click here).  “Like” the pages too (not just the posts, but the page itself).  That helps us expand our media reach and that’s important because we’re on a mission to educate in these highly turbulent times.

If you follow the precious metals markets, I posted another article today that might be of interest:  Silver And Gold Update; It’s “Managed Retreat” Time