[typest]

I just got engaged. When we looked at rings, the jeweler asked my fiancé if she wanted natural or synthetic, and she responded “I don’t want a blood diamond!!” Of course, mined diamonds aren’t blood diamonds, but her impression was still they were a little ickier.

The jeweler told me that one reason to get a natural diamond was that the prices of lab grown diamonds had been falling, whereas natural hasn’t as much, so the ring would hold more value. I told her that was exactly why we wanted to go with a lab grown diamond! This isn’t an investment — we aren’t planning to sell the ring.

Ultimately, for a price that didn’t break the bank, we got an absolutely gorgeous ring with diamonds larger and higher quality than we would have been able to afford with natural. Diamond rings may have started as something to resell in divorce, but for us (for my fiancé really), it was more about getting something that was beautiful, and if it didn’t cost as much, great! I suspect most Americans will feel similarly.

[meinmissoula]

> Of course, mined diamonds aren’t blood diamonds, but her impression was still they were a little ickier

For all intents and purposes, they are. The voluntary processes the diamond cartels adopted to supposedly reduce diamonds coming out of "conflict areas" are a joke. Most diamonds are mined under exploitive conditions, often with severe ecological impact, and the owners are almost without exception "blood on their hands" people even if one particular mine operates more ethically.

[Buttons840]

Plus, that one ethical mine plays the market game, limits supply, and thus helps keep the unethical mines running.

[defrost]

Here you go, a 100% guaranteed conflict free blood red diamond

https://www.australiandiamondvalley.com.au/products/10ct-aut...

https://www.solidgold.com.au/argyle-red-diamonds.html

If you object to the mine owners (rio tinto) "blood on their hands" (from > 2,000 years of mining since Roman occupied Spain) then get rid of all your steel products as they're a major supplier of raw high grade iron ore (and copper, and ...)

https://www.riotinto.com/en/operations/australia/argyle

(NB: If you're going to downvote at least provide a comment as to why)

[boesboes]

I dont have any choice in where my steel comes from, but i can still choose not to buy diamonds from those cunts

[bluedevil2k]

Sources to any of these wild (and grossly outdated) claims?

> Most diamonds are mined under exploitative conditions

You’ve clearly never been to a diamond mine. More than 70% of diamonds come out of “modern” countries like Australia, Canada, Russia, and South Africa. Botswana used their diamond bounty to teach hundreds of their citizens to grade/cut/polish the very stones mined in the country, ensuring tons of high skill jobs.

> the owners are almost without exception "blood on their hands" people

Well you’re only right on a loophole on this one - the Russian government owns the company that produces 40% of the world’s diamonds and it would be tough to argue Putin is blood-free.

[ryanwaggoner]

And yet you just respond with your own unsourced claims?

[theonlybutlet]

That's just ridiculous. May as well ask you why you never cited his comment when you commented?

You can Google this. Russia, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Botswana.(the contentious one would be DRC). These are regulated countries with labour rights and human rights. If they operate in these countries they are subject to those laws. May as well say you won't buy anything imported if you still feel there's ambiguity.

These are industries in these countries. Without these exports these people don't have jobs which feed them.

[downWidOutaFite]

Interesting that your salesperson used the same line as DeBeers does at the end of the article about lab diamonds being too cheap. It must be a sales talking point that comes from on top.

It's seems crazy that Debeers is actually trying to drive lab prices down to make them seem too cheap for bridal use. Their strategy is to try to retain the higher-end luxury market while giving up the more mainstream market where they can't compete.

[wrsh07]

Strategy letter five says to commodify your complements, not substitutable goods

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/

[jiggawatts]

This was written in 2002 and includes a warning to Sun about Java commoditising hardware: “When the music stops, where are you going to sit down?”

That was… prescient.

Oracle acquired Sun in 2009-2010 and notably Oracle is a software company that benefits from the commoditisation of hardware, unlike Sun.

Java byte code portability is great for Oracle, but was a strategic mistake for Sun.

[wrsh07]

It's one of my all time favorites

Grove talks about six forces:

• Power vigor competence of competitors

• Power vigor competence of suppliers

• power vigor competence of customers

• Power vigor competence of potential competitors

• Force of complementors

(Lol why didn't I write down the sixth in my notes?)

And these are all super important for business analysis, but complements is somehow overlooked in casual study

[willis936]

I mean, the whole thing is a soulless marketing trick.

https://youtu.be/N5kWu1ifBGU?si=icEExKO1WRazcybP

[gloryjulio]

> whereas natural hasn’t as much, so the ring would hold more value.

This is purely the diamond scam. There is no market for selling ur used diamond. The diamond merchant sell u the high price, but u will not be able to do same to get the money back from the next sucker

[Nursie]

> so the ring would hold more value

A nice little white lie by omission anyway, as the resale value of a diamond drops up to 50% when it leaves the store! If you were planning for an investment, you'd be better off looking elsewhere.

[MerelyMortal]

If you want to make the retailer uncomfortable, ask how much they would buy it back for.

Retailers don't even own their inventory, it's on loan and they only pay the diamond cartel when they sell a diamond.

[BluePen8]

That’s how I got a lavish engagement ring for my wife, I simply bought it used from a guy who’d bought it a year ago for a relationship that fell apart.

Met him at a jewelry store and had it verified and appraised, he had the receipt for the 12k or so he paid, it appraised for 16k (not sure why they appraise for more than the retail price), and I paid him 5k (CAD).

This was years ago, and I think it was a 1.4ct VVS2.

That same budget in store had me looking at sub 1 carat SI2 crap that was cloudy as all hell.

Diamonds have 0 resale value, not sure why people think otherwise when it’s so easy to see simply browsing used ads.

[rasz]

>it appraised for 16k

wasnt that a fraud by a jewelry store, claiming its worth 16K while not willing to pay that much for it?

[BluePen8]

I agree, and don’t really get it either. Some stores it’s even advertised that their goods are appraised at more than their price.

Maybe it’s a marketing thing, but to me it just feels like fraud against whoever has to insure it (if I list it on my home insurance for example).

[martin8412]

Unless you're buying a named diamond, it's close to worthless. Diamonds of the size used for marriages are not rare. They're super abundant, with the supply artificially limited by the diamond cartel.

[OkayPhysicist]

Actually, right now there's a significant chance that mined diamonds are blood diamonds. Russia took over the international diamond industry after the collapse of DeBeer's monopoly, and naturally they claim any conflict they're involved in doesn't make their diamonds conflict diamonds, but on the other hand Wagner is being paid in mineral extraction rights for their actions in some very bloody African conflicts.

[jncfhnb]

Go with moissanite. Vastly cheaper. Looks better.

[_huayra_]

But how on planet Earth will my wife carry around a moissanite ring that's worth the 3 months of salary I'm supposed to spend on this thing? That's a heck of a big chunk of mineral! A diamond is just more practical /s

[mdip]

Frankly, if you're marrying a person who requires you to spend 3 months on a diamond ring, it may be time to remember an important bit of wisdom:

Never enter into a contract where one party benefits by breaking it.

I'm not knocking marriage or (outright) stating that financial motives may be at play, here, but it's a big indicator if "who your with" is more concerned about what's "on their finger" than about what's "around their arm".

[theonlybutlet]

Depends on the law of your country, but the ring forms part of a contract, breach it and they have to give it back. May be the least of your concerns at that point.

[thehappypm]

Less durable tho

[extraduder_ire]

Isn't it still the second hardest thing that exists?

[andromeduck]

nvm, misread

[RandallBrown]

When I bought my wife's engagement ring the jeweler showed me 3 different diamonds in my price range and then had me pick the one that I thought looked the best.

I ended up picking a lab grown diamond and was able to get a larger and (in my opinion) prettier diamond. My wife didn't seem to mind that it was lab grown when I eventually told her.

[rcme]

Yea lab grown diamonds are insanely cheap. You can buy them on Alibaba. A 3 carat, D VVS1 with an excellent cut is $3K.

[londgine]

$3k is a bit much for me to feel comfortable spending at a store well known for selling Chinese knockoffs. Is there a way for a layman to test that the stone is indeed a diamond, and not something like lab made cubic zirconia?

[rcme]

Use a credit card, take it to be tested, and do a charge back for fraud if it doesn’t meet specifications.

[Reubend]

I do see some entries like you're describing on Alibaba for bulk orders, but is there anything for consumers buying a single gem in this price range? I couldn't find anything on other websites that's as cheap.

[rcme]

https://m.alibaba.com/product/1600612782670/Diamond-Lab-Crea...

Min order is 1 carat.

[solardev]

Why does it still cost so much?

[kemayo]

A 3 karat diamond is still a crystal (approximately) the size of your pinkie nail that takes a fairly large energy input to create... and only the ones that've grown clear and without flaws are viable for jewelry purposes. The bigger it gets, the lower the yields are at the appropriate quality level, and so the more effort / waste is involved in getting one. (As opposed to industrial diamond uses, which mostly don't have those requirements and so have their price even more heavily impacted by synthetics.)

[jdietrich]

Silicon is a cheap, abundant material. Making very large, very pure silicon crystals for the semiconductor industry is complex and expensive.

The small, ugly diamonds we use for industrial abrasives cost pennies per carat.

[dboreham]

Bond energy.

[fallingknife]

Diamond is not the energetically favorable form of carbon at room temperature and pressure, so to manufacturer there will always need to be expensive tricks. Not as expensive as digging out tons of kimberlite, but still not cheap.

[glimshe]

Diamonds are a TERRIBLE investment and usually lose around 50% (natural) to 90% (synthetic) on sale. But think like this: if a ring costs 10K natural and 2K synthetic, a 50% loss on natural would correspond to losing 5K. A 90% loss on synthetic would correspond to losing 1.8K. You're still on top big time.

I gave my wife a large synthetic diamond ring for our 15th anniversary and she absolutely loved it.

[theonlybutlet]

It's my opinion they're not an asset, unless you own the cullinan diamond or something very pricey, they're going to depreciate, just at a slower rate perhaps. Older diamond cuts go for less as we get better at cutting techniques, the rest of the ring also loses value as the setting goes out of fashion.

The icky diamond thing is arguable, these are generally mined in countries with decent labour laws. On the contrary, lab diamonds require few workers and takes food out the mouth of poorer mine workers who become jobless.

[rkuska]

When I proposed I got a ring with natural diamond. But being aware of all the shenanigans around diamonds I decided to get imperfect diamond. Especially because of the artificial diamonds - I assumed they would strive for perfect diamonds and therefore would make my imperfect one more unique later. Salt & pepper one. It looks like somebody has trapped a galaxy inside it. It's beautiful and it didn't cost much (compared to pure diamonds).

[javajosh]

Sorry to be negative, but I think the conventions around marriage needs to be redone alongside all the other changes around marriage. To wit, the ability of a woman to divorce you and receive alimony and child support for basically the rest of her life. It's not clear to me what reason a rational person has for NOT getting divorced after enough time has elapsed that alimony is possible. Roughly 50% of marriages end in divorce; 50% of those are high conflict. When you buy a ring and give it to her, this will not factor into that judgement. You can pay for everything and the only thing the judge will look at is your incomes. Be smart and split everything down the middle, including the ring.

[kemayo]

> It's not clear to me what reason a rational person has for NOT getting divorced after enough time has elapsed that alimony is possible.

I mean, assuming that you like your spouse, it's a perfectly rational decision to stay with them despite it being possible to make money by leaving them. It's economics-paper level sociopathy to suggest that "I could maximize my personal income by divorcing the person I love" is an action to be taken.

[intrasight]

>It's economics-paper level sociopathy

Indeed. Ask my ex-wife (an economist) how that worked out for her.

[Tostino]

Thanks for the laugh. I really wish this type of thinking weren't so common in the population, but the fact is, it is pretty common. You need to account for it.

[javajosh]

Believe it or not, love is not a constant, it's a time-dependent function.

[imtringued]

You have ruined your own argument though. Divorce because you no longer love your husband is a completely different thing than divorcing because of monetary incentives.

[ryanwaggoner]

In which direction?

And is that universally true? Does it apply to all relationships, like parents for their children?

[newaccount74]

> Be smart and split everything down the middle

That only works if both partners have similar income, similar working times, and also split household work equally.

Most relationships are not like that, especially when kids are involved, but often even before that. So you often have one partner work more while the other takes care of most of the household. This leads to a situation where one partner is financially dependent on the other.

Marriage laws are supposed to protect the dependent partner in that case.

[gnicholas]

> To wit, the ability of a woman to divorce you and receive alimony and child support for basically the rest of her life.

Child support doesn't last that long — just until the child reaches 18. And alimony stops if the spouse ever gets remarried (though of course some people dodge that by not technically getting married to a new partner).

[intrasight]

In many places (and all the ones where I've lived) it is the state that determines that you are married and not the couple. You may try to improve your odds with a prenup, but according to my friends that have tried, it doesn't offer much protection.

[MathMonkeyMan]

A divorce lawyer in New Jersey told me that 1/3 of the prenups she sees end up making any difference.

[fatuna]

"Be smart and" don't get an expensive ring! Spend that money on your honeymoon, wedding, just save it, or donate it to a charity. Doing anything else makes more sense really.

[joshbaptiste]

Get a pre-nup and most of that is handled.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ia-9wWl2PoY

[extraduder_ire]

This gets me wondering if anyone's made lab grown diamonds with real, ideally their own, blood. Maybe stuart semple.