Gold - value or drain?

Warren Buffet said it best. You spend large amounts of money, digging a hole in the ground to take out the gold. Then you spend large amounts of money, digging another hole in the ground (large vaults under Manhattan) to keep it safe.  Indians have an attraction to gold that rivals the rest of the world.   It is the singularly worst 'investment' you can make.  There is nothing productive coming from gold. It cannot be used for any purpose. Its value is purely in the eyes of the seller and purchaser. In many ways, Bitcoins are very similar.  The sooner Indians understand and realise this, the better use their money can be put to. The Indian government is trying its best to drill common sense into the public. But alas, 000's of years of foolhardy 'investments' into Gold cannot be forgotten in a few years. ----- Watch as the Federal Reserve starts to taper, raise interest rates in fairly rapid order as soon as the first whiff of inflation is sighted. The price of Gold is headed downward. ----- Buyer beware.  The BEST way to stop this gold attraction is as follows: Gold's main attraction is that it is perceived as a store of value. How do we remove this per reduce the value of gold. 1) International prices of gold when they fall will reduce this attraction. ii) Another thing that people hate is the loss of purchasing power of Rupee due to inflation. The way around this is to make the RBI's goal inflation reduction to < 2%. Over many years of controlling inflation, people will realise that Rupee is a strong currency. They will stop worrying about loss of value. An indirect result will be reduction in attractiveness of gold. iii) Increase the attractiveness of other investments by a) ensuring that scams are caught and prosecuted immediately b) promoting equity ownership c) promoting fixed-income (bonds) with safety in value of principal. A combination of the above steps will reduce the attraction of gold and promote use of people's savings in more productive investments.

After over a decade of silence ...

I had never thought that I would be so silent for so long. Yet here we are. Regardless, I'll try to catch us up on what has been transpiring in my life. 

 

First off, I am still alive - thank God - when I should have, by rights, been gone 7 years ago. Both my father and my grandfather passed on at that age. I am living my bonus years, thanks to medicine and a newfound awareness that fitness is not just a nice-to-be-seen activity, but actually something that gives tangible returns. It helps this body, mind complex to continue existing in 'living' form more effectively and efficiently. 

 

We owe it to our co-live'rs (to coin a word for those who are living with us - whether other halves, children or other forms of caretakers) to keep the mechanical parts working as efficiently as possible. 

 

We also owe it to them that we make wills - living wills as they are known - to clarify HOW we want to keep the mechanics functioning, as they (inevitably) deteriorate over time. 

 

Make sure that we gather them all into a single room and convey what it is that we need done, in case the functioning of the brain behind all the mechanics, decides to stop functioning. Debilitating diseases like Parkinson's (as afflicted my mother), Dementia, Alzheimer's or a stroke that causes the brain to stop functioning can make it well nigh impossible to convey what one wants done AFTER the debilitating event. 

I cannot stress the above paragraph enough, because these events can (and do) happen without warning, or with a deliberate slowness that makes it impossible to determine a good time to convey your wishes.