The primary uses of gold in computers are contact plating, because of its lack of oxidation, and those really realy tiny wires that connect microchip electrical contacts to the chip carrier.
So there is far less gold than people might imagine.
NASA uses gold as a radiation shielding, such as on the glass faceplates of space-suits, and in foil form on the outside of spacecraft. Gold is, after all, twice as dense as lead.
Let’s not forget another wonderful use of gold, as a sparkly highlight in liquer.
Yeah…ounces was a typo. My mistake. It should have been grams. Either way, I get the impression that its use in miscellaneous applications does not necessarily bar its use as specie. Kind of like how jewelry and other usages didn’t necessarily affect the value under the gold standard?
It would seem from my reading that commodity money works well when the commodity itself has intrinsic value.
That’s not to say that a simple fiat currency doesn’t work too, but as with greenbacks and colonial scrip their intrinsic value was set by being able to pay your taxes in them.
Watching “The Money Masters” right now, very interesting.
Well, even grams is incorrect according to my sources. And even if there were 2-3 grams of gold in a PC, that’s not a lot. It would be around $50-75 of gold, less than 1/10 of of one ounce. But in reality, the amount is less than one gram, less than $25 worth of gold, and less than 1/31 of one ounce.
The answer to your question is this: It is irrelevant how much gold a computer contains.
Why? Simple. Gold price is not going to change if we should suddenly start using a gold currency instead of government mandated fiat.
If you think it might change, then you are not really understanding what gold is all about. Gold worth the same throughout human history, which is why we are talking about it in the first place. This means that if we can afford to put certain amount of gold into computer today and afford to buy that computer with fiat, we will certainly be able to do the same with gold currency.
This is actually the fundamental issue. I am not going to explain why, so that I do not destroy your interest for learning about gold, just the fallacious argument against it. Understanding this matter will help you to escape a finacial ruin in more than one way. But, rest assured you’re not alone in this assumption. Mny if not most so called gold-experts are either lying about what is known to them to not be true, or do not understand gold at all.
Now, some may say what about government suppression of gold price? This would be valid, however the suppression argument is marginal to the matter at hand here.
Keep it up with your dad. Find out why the amount of gold is irrelevant and why the price of gold doesn’t change and give it back to your dad, so that he too, can have a joy of an intelligent conversation. Hint: find out what is the price of gold?