Posted on 02/21/2009 2:47:20 AM PST by blueplum
Juggling glasses of white wine and baggies filled with baubles, dozens of women descended on a well-appointed Orange County home this week to trade in their old golden treasures for hefty checks.
There were earrings from ex-boyfriends, ring settings with missing stones and chain bracelets from sorority sisters. One woman brought in her husband's wedding ring -- from a previous marriage.
Julia Geivet, 39, had hopes of selling an "embarrassing" Italian horn bauble she had owned since eighth grade and a few other small trinkets, which she thought might get her $30.
"I figured I'd come get a little money and socialize and chat," said Geivet, who was recently laid off as a manager at Verizon Communications Inc. "It might not come out to a lot, but right now, every little bit helps."
She left with a check for $302.92.
Gold is hot. The precious metal soared $25.70 an ounce Friday to $1,001.80, topping the $1,000 mark for the first time in nearly a year.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
BUMP!
I heard a news story on the radio (I don't know if it was the local or national segment) that these gold house parties are a huge rip off even compared to pawn shops. They give much less than the $1000/ounce current price. The only places worse were the mail in places like Ed McMahon was advertising recently.
Also, is a good source of obtaining food.
Lol!
You can eat Federal Reserve Notes but as a store of value and nutrition I believe you'll be very disappointed in their performance.
If you read history you can see that many things are used as barter in hard times.
In Mary Chesnut’s Civil War diary, even though the well to do were buying gold, yarn was being used for barter in NC. (She had fled Columbia, SC ahead of Sherman’s burning raids.)
After WWII, in Germany as displaced persons were trying to get by and avoid being turned over to the Russians, cigarettes became the currency amongst many of them.
I’ve learned it is all about what you have and what you need, or what is needed locally and what you can trade.
We just don’t know what it will be. Is it cold where you live, will folks be unable to heat their homes, maybe blankets and warm clothes will be bartered? Do you live in the city where there is trouble with gangs, maybe ammo will be bartered?
Be prepared to take care of yourself and have something extra.
Put your money in Blue-Steel and ammunition.
Gold was not “confiscated” during the depression. It was turned in by people who were obeying the new law.
No police went door to door conducting gold searches. They did not even go to the homes of “suspected gold hoarders” to check.
(The govt paid out at $20/oz, then turned around and revalued gold at $35/oz, which was the real theft.)
This is not mere semantics. If gold were ordered turned in today, most people would simply refuse to comply. The level of trust in our fedgov today, compared to 1933, is simply nonexistent. So any gold banning law would have to have real teeth to have any effect at all. It would have to be made a felony to own gold over some token amount (”economic sabotage” like in the old USSR, perhaps?).
They would have to do sting operations, and put people in prison to get any level of compliance, but this could blow back in their faces with greater resistance to obeying govt. orders in general.
“I think we are looking at a gold bubble that will burst...”
I worry about that, too.
See 29. Gold was turned in, not confiscated. There is a distinction that will make a great difference today.
After giving hundreds of billions to the suits on Wall Street and their bonuses and Lexuses, I can imagine that seizing the $20 gold piece J6P got from his granddad is gonna go over good.
Real good.
Not.
In 1933, most folks probably thought that “the federal reserve” was a govt. bank.
Can you imagine ordering people today to turn their gold over to the Federal Reserve, a private cartel of banks?????
That would be a hoot. They would get more lead by airmail than gold by FedEx ground.
No doubt at all.
Sage advice.
LLS
LLS
Correct. In really rough times, gold is worthless.
I think the same. There are too many ads on radio and tv hawking gold to make me feel comfortable. My internal warning system is going off.If it gold was as great an investment as they claim, no advertising would be needed.
No one is buying jewelry these days.
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