Merchants accepting silver/gold for payment?

lol @ this derailing eh? ANyway Kat yes I definitely will. I had found a website that was supposedly a list of merchants that accepted silver coin as payment but the list wouldn't load. I will update this thread when I find out more.

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We get it perfectly.

Gold/silver has only percieved value, same a currency, or any othe investment.

In 1980 Gold peaked at $850/oz.

In 1981 Gold hovered around $450/oz and headed downward for 20 years.

No significant changes occured in the U.S./world economy, during that period (1980-1981).

Wow.

Bankers (and anybody else with money) are getting into gold, because the price is going UP.

They are not stupid and not concerned with TSHTF. They will dump their gold, when the time is right, make a ton of money and then watch the gold market crash.

This is how they do it nearly every time. The ones' who hold gold for "the end of times" will be the one's eating it.

I don't know if it is overvalued....if currency inflation (quantative easing and deficit spending) continues and/or interests rate remain low, then commodities will probably stay at a much higher level.

Also, depends on where you buy; my acreage, bought last year, farmed via 1/3rds 2/3rds, brought me a 5% return before any asset appreciation last year (got a 5% return off of my 1/3 share of the beans). I don't know/think that you could do this well on $5000-$6000 acre Iowa corn ground. I think I averaged 38 bushel/acre on the beans--he's gonna fertilize the crap out of it and try for both a wheat and bean crop next year. I suspect the ground is capable of 45 bu/acre beans.

Anyway I'm rambling.

Somewhat back on topic...

I don't like debt either...that is why I posted in my previous post that I would NOT recommend it. However, if one had some big kahoonies and accepted the risk, one could do well with a mortage, locked in low rates, and have a rise in gold/silver to pay for it. It could turn ugly--I see a 70% chance for success and 30% of loosing your shirt. For me, 30% chance of loosing my shirt is too risky.

I somewhat agree with you and somewhat don't as I don't know/trust that the dollar (or Euro for that matter) will survive.

I'm all about exit points to shift money into other hard asset classes (preferably undervalued) when the time is right but I doubt I'll go to 0% on precious metals in the foreseeable furture as I don't know their (TPTB) intentions as to the federal reserve note (aka dollar).

Personally, I don't trust paper anymore (and I got out before the crash)...if I were to go back into stocks it would probably be commodity related dividend paying stocks in transparent economies with stong currencies (Candada, Australia).

OK again, on-topic... someone just pointed me to this site:

http://www.opencurrency.com/#

Essentially, it's a collection of people who had the same thing in mind - let's get away from the fiat currency. Many different places have their own currencies and this is basically a network of merchants that accept those silver-based currencies as "barter." You can also get the silver coins through them. It's legal in the same way that a Chuck-E-Cheese token is legal. I need to look at their site a bit more but this looks quite interesting.

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Blogging from working city mom to homesteading housewife.
Rural Living Today
Encouragement for the Urban-to-Rural Transition
My review of the Piteba oil expeller

IMO, if it ever gets to the point that dollars/euros, have no value and will no longer be accepted at the grocery store, owing gold be be nearly meaningless and not owning gold, will be the least of our worries.

I wish I had money to invest in the stock market, I surely would. It has come back nicely, since the 08' crash.

http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/index/INDU

IMO, there is great money to be made in the stock markets - but only for those who trade short term. Get in low, get out higher.

How many purchased BP stock when it tanked during the Gulf spill? Did anybody think BP would go out of business? Their stock has came back $20 since then.

Buy and hold stocks for 20-30 years, does not cut it any more, as we have all found out.

I agree with you about trading...unfortunately it needs to be a full time occupation.

I disagree that the market has risen in REAL TERMs since 08. They doubled the money supply in the last couple of years and the real rate of inflation (NOT CPI) has to be somewhere around 20% at a minimum.

In fact the markets could go alot higher as they attempt to inflate our way to prosperity; unfortunately the buying power of those profits could dimish at an equal or (more likely) greater rate.

If the the dollar/Euro completely collapses, I don't foresee it being TEOTWAWKI. Rough times? Definitely...in one to three years there would be new Fiat waiting to replace them--or we would be using $1000 notes in place of $1 notes.

If you bought it for an investment good - if you sell it at the right time. If you bought it because you think someone is going to sell you their food/water/bullets& guns/ medical supplies for gold when the bottom falls out - I think you are dreaming.

Quite right IMHO...gold (and Silver) have to specific time frames...1) leading up to an inflationary event and 2) rebuilding after TSHF or a hyperflationary even. Its place is not during the event itself.

Baring a mass extinction event, civilization will rebuild even after a EOTWAWKI.

It a way to preserve (some) wealth in an uncertain future.

Our money supply used to be based upon PM's... paper money was backed up by gold/silver in reserve. The paper was easier to transport... but you could walk into a bank and trade your paper for metal. When FDR got into office (believe it was FDR) he wanted to spend more money than there was metal to back up, so he confiscated gold, leaving silver in commerce. In 64, silver was pulled (except for 40% silver halves, for a few years).

You can't print gold or silver out of thin air. You can print Federal Reserve Notes, backed by the full authority and backed by the trust in the Fed. Govt. Gold and silver still buy close to their original purchasing power, whereas dollar bills depreciate... the more funny money you print, the less value it has.

Google Zimbabwe and hyperinflation. Gold dust is traded openly there... it takes billion dollar notes to buy anything.

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Correct it was FDR--he seized all the gold in the US except for some jewellery and nusimatics, revalued it upwards to $35.00 an ounce and was able to print more paper money based on the on the revaluation.

For international settlements the gold window remained open until Nixon closed it. After this, foreign countries could not turn their paper money in to the US in exchange for gold. Thus our currency became completely fiat at this time and the 72-80 gold/silver bull market began.

Gold ownership again became legal under Ford.

I think Zimbabwe is back to using US dollars as a primary currency along with gold dust, chickens, and goats--believe that they finally retired their currency--Hp, Canon, and Lexmark must have been charging too much for the ink.

Also google Argentina, Mexico, and Weimar Germany for more hyperinflationary events and/or currency revaluation.

So true MP,lets be realistic and plan for what is likely,not an extremism,ie economic collapse vrs Waterworld.

Yup.And I'll pay my taxes with tomatoes,that'll work,history proves it.Oh wait,it doesnt.

Its FAR more likely we will have a currency crisis before we have TEOTWAWKI,yet thats what people are planning for?When the economic crisis is slapping you across the face?

AMAZING!

As for Bankers (and the wealthy),they have been holding Gold forever,better check your facts on that Plowjockey,it isnt a new phenom 'because prices are high right now'.

LOL,ignore that every fiat currency in the history of the world has failed,and then if you believe a 2-3 cent value on todays dollar vrs 1900 isnt a collapse,I dont know what to tell you,you really need to crack open some books.

Yet metal still buys essentially what it did over the years,the fiats sure have not by any reach.

Oh well,your money,or lack thereof.

Want some historical FACT? During the potato famine,those without currency starved,those with currency,ie,Gold and Silver,ate very well,thank you very much.And in todays intertwined world thats even truer,food will go,on a worldwide basis,to those with the money.Just as it does right now.

So dont say you cant eat gold,in the worlds closest thing recently to a TEOTWAWKI,Nazi Germany,even Jews running from a populace hell bent on running them thru ovens both ate,and escaped,with concentrated wealth,Gold and Diamonds,not loaves of bread,bushels of wheat,or tomatoes.Or even a few cartons of cigs,though that was a good trade item,along with booze.....its pretty hard to go on the run,and hide out,with booze and smokes....very realistic to do with diamonds and Gold.

Something amazing here,greed is eternal.Another truism you can take to the Bank.

Funny,you say Gold was up,then down....so are stocks,and real estate,and interest rates,stocks fail completely,currency's devalue endlessly thru printing (inflation) but metal remains,always,never loses its value in total.

But,Im stupid and bought during a very short term bubble when prices went parabolic (like thats the norm,not the VERY short term exception)....better educate yourself again,buying anything going parabolic (meaning almost straight up in an extremely short period) is when YOU DONT BUY.If it rockets up,it plunges down just as quickly.Like in a few weeks.Like this bubble the anti hard currency folks constantly harp on (like somehow unbacked paper is better,LOL). If you did buy then,in that anomaly,you are stupid,eco 101 on that one YET you still had your Gold,and silver even so,and it doesnt disappear over that time either like fiat has thru inflation over that time period and stocks can do,and are doing.

Again,EDUCATE YOURSELF on money,saving and investing.And LEARN SOME HISTORY.

Yup,metal is for stupid people,LOL!Like all AMERICANS right up until 1965,before the big downward slide of America.No correlation there,nope,nothing there.

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thank you for the information tex. I did not know what was going on in Africa.

The gold and silver backed dollar IMO is still a silly and outdated logic system to base currancy on. This economy base of metals is an ancient hold over from the Metal ages when people took the currancy for its literal worth because it was used to make swords, tools, pots, and other actual things. Now, it seems to me that the present day idea of the value of currancy is like a ghost or a dream in peoples minds.

I see land, freedom, friendship, health, and love as wealth. I think it is safer for the greed-balls of the world to see more value in paper money and coins then in other forms of wealth because these kind of people just pervert whatever they touch in life for their own vanity, greed, and power hunger and it might be safer for these kinds of people to be preoccupied with these things so that they dont cause real trouble.

I agree with plow. Buying gold will not bring security. Speculators are just trying to create a spike in gold and silver prices so that they can profit from the wave before it crashes. That is what these people do, that is how they make a living. They did it with the housing market, they do it with stock market , they will do it with anything they can.

They will sell their gold when the peak occurs and then reinvest their capital in another investment while all the suckers who they dooped into buying gold suffer the crash. Once gold crashes speculators will start buying up gold again at low prices and start the whole game again.

Believe what you want. It is still (for the time behing) a free country. To me, the idea of a silly currency system are pieces of paper and electrons that can be created at whim by banksters.

I could be happy with a fiat money supply if you could stop the banksters and Treasury from inflating...all I want is a stable currency and 1% or so real inflation. That would satisfy me...unfortunately this is not the world we live in.

No, you probably won't be able to pay your taxes with tomatoes, that's true.
Before we get to the scenario of having to pay our taxes in gold, I'm thinking taxes will be the least of our worries.

But you won't be able to buy my tomatoes with gold, unless there are plenty of tomatoes around and unless it looks like we can expect there to be more in the near future.

Again, gold is good because someone perceives it to have value. Certainly the Jews carried gold, etc. - that's because people along the way perceived it to have value. I'm thinking those short on food, didn't/wouldn't accept gold for food.

I don't know much about investments, but do know gold has seen a rise. I think a lot of that is due to the uncertainty of the economy but it has been hyped big time by a lot of people. Those people have a vested interest in seeing the price of gold go up. They bought it low and are on TV, etc., hawking gold as the perfect hedge against uncertain times - and chuckling while their investments grow.

You do realize the the U.S. has been using the dreaded "fiat" currency, for 40 years? How have we managed to survive and in some years, fourish very nicely, using this folly method of payment?

Even when economies were on the gold standard (as during the great depression), that system was not perfect, either.

Electronic fund transfers are part of the technology world, we are immersed in, not yet another conspiricy, by evil bankers.

I guarantee you in a world awash in fiat currency, silver, gold, diamonds, what have you, and you or the tax collector hasn't eaten in two weeks, there'd be zero problem trading a meal for a sackful of silver, gold, diamonds... and giving the tax collector his due. In my minds eye, I can see the tax collector preferring a bushel of corn instead of a handful of toilet paper (FRN's or handful of gold).

True, TEOTWAWKI may never arrive.

But, I can also guarantee you this.... as long as you live, you're going to eat something... it'll either be food you've stored or long pork. I prefer food. Food insurance is cheap, with zero downside... and all upside, if inflation persists.

I like PM's, but they won't get you anything at Texican's Country Store... at least NOT till after I get resupplied several times (post shtf or post TEOTW).

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Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity. Seneca
Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival. W. Edwards Deming

Certainly not, but what was certainly better about it was that the amount of money you had had a much, much better chance at staying the same value, and the government did not have such an enormous amount of control over the american economy.

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I'm an environmentalist, left wing, Ron Paul loving Prius driver with a farm. If you have a problem with that, kindly go take a leap.

I'm trying to understand the difference here.

Some are talking about investing in gold and making a profit when it increases in value, some are talking of having gold to pay taxes, etc.

If you are investing in gold - for investment - do you actually have the gold in your possession - or do you have a certificate and who is holding your gold?

If you don't have your gold in your possession, that would pose the problem of not really having it - or having to rely on someone else, wouldn't it?

As for having it in your control, how much would you actually keep around your home? In what form would you keep it?

As far as the powers that be no longer having control of precious metals, I'm thinking that's wishful thinking.

May this next year find us all in better health, and finances - and may our country begin to work it's way up again - and all those who invested in gold will make real profits but we will never find out who is right in this argument.