The intrinsic value of gold.
Many say that gold has no intrinsic value. It’s only worth what people are willing to pay for it, when they bought it as a jewel. It has some technological uses, but generally does not have intrinsic value. A grocery store will not give you your groceries in exchange for gold !
My answer is this : This is a common misunderstanding !
Gold has an intrinsic value because of a compound process :
- Any value is subjective when the « value » is initiated and remains committed.
- Man assigns a subjective value to gold.
- Find gold requires consumption of raw materials (energy), physical capital (machines) and labor, considerable before the age of modern mining … so anything that has an intrinsic value !
- As a rare commodity in the first place, that mission of subjective value in human culture, the same process for the « important » criteria and a place in the category of physical properties intrinsic value via points 3 and 4, conventional wisdom claiming that gold has no intrinsic value is wrong because the idea is built on a false logic !