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Re:Please remove mitsuhiko/* by Vendan on Saturday November 01, 2014 @11:54PM (#8545577)
Congrats, you just decided that gold miners are the most altruistic people in the world, charging people only what it costs to mine the gold, not what the market would bear. I wish other companies could be so generous!

Also, I would recommend "Making Money" by Terry Prachet. Good book that actually explores a lot of the same ideas behind gold as the basis of a currency. In essence, the main character eventually realizes that the gold doesn't actually mean much, the true value of currency is that the society says x money gives you y goods.

Re:Please remove mitsuhiko/* by tim333 on Sunday November 02, 2014 @08:04AM (#8546486)
Ah - that was a simplification. If it costs $1000 to mine and sells for $2000 then short term the miners will make a profit but long term people will build more mines. This is a slow process - 10 or 20 years but eventually supply exceeds demand, the price drops to $700 or some such, the miners go bust and the cycle repeats. But generally the price stays within a factor of two or so of the production cost.
Re:Please remove mitsuhiko/* by Vendan on Sunday November 02, 2014 @09:31AM (#8546639)
so you talk about supply and demand, yet think cost is set purely by suppliers? What do you think would happen to the cost of potatoes if only 10% of last years harvest was harvested this year. It would go up, but only to the point where the supply vs. demand equalized, i.e. 90% of people wouldn't be buying potatoes cause they cost way too much, but there would be 10% of the people(like my wife) who would still be willing to buy them at $50 for 5 pounds, cause she values potatoes that much(she's got a serious fixation on potato soup). I.e. the value of a good depends on the person doing the valuing, i.e. subjective value.