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by canhascodez 2795 days ago
Would you say gold priced at, or above its level of utility to industry?
1 comments

If gold was no longer wanted for investment, its value would go very close to 0, despite utility to industry. Why? Because there's 190,000 tons of it, most of which is being held as an investment. If it wasn't needed for investment any more, then all that becomes available for industry, and now supply absolutely swamps demand.

Jewelry demand wouldn't help, either. If the price of gold went to 0, how much would be used in jewelry? Sure, it's pretty, but being expensive is part of the point.

As price drops it would be useful for a wider range of things. Gold high voltage power lines for example are physically better, but cost prohibitive.

Gold is directly useful for a huge range of things and the use in industry provides a very real price floor.

I think the tensile strength/density might make gold transmission lines a bit crap. Maybe steel core with a gold outer where the AC current flows, but not sure if it would actually be any better than aluminum.
Plenty of applications like transformers where mechanical stress is a non issue. Corrosion resistance is another useful feature that can be applied to a wide range of use cases.