The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today • Hacker News Board

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#191

Post by SahAssar » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:41 PM UTC

xiphias2 wrote: post #70

shadowgovt wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope this works out for you in the long term; BTC isn't the most stable platform, but it could certainly be more stable than some national currencies.

If you don't look at the price, it's the most stable and predictable service and protocol in the existence of the internet (maybe after the internet / IPv4). It's uptime is 99.987%, last time it was down in 2013, and the cool thing is that even if it gets down, it has self healing property in the case of network separation / sybil attack. https://www.buybitcoinworldwide.com/bitcoin-uptime/ I dare you to find another…

> If you don't look at the price, it's the most stable and predictable service and protocol in the existence of the internet

Well, when you put it like that you just convinced me to put my savings into SMTP. Obviously you've identified the key features of a store of value.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#192

Post by ClumsyPilot » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:41 PM UTC

skinnymuch wrote: post #182

mc4ndr3 wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Banks can fail. Stocks can fail. Currencies can fail. I'm not saying it makes sense on the whole to bury your worth in cash. But there is an amount of paranoia that confuses things. The interest in my savings account is laughable. It's marginally better than keeping in a mattress. The mattress doesn't charge bullshit fees. The mattress doesn't arrest you for being the wrong color.

If you’re in the west. A major bank failing and Govt + insurance not covering the losses for customers means something we have not encountered as a modern society. That’s as close to a break down of modern society as you can get. Sure it’s possible. Cash will def be great then. However this is such an extreme situation that there’s no way to know what will be good in that situation. I would think in a situation like…

'you’re in the west. A major bank failing and Govt + insurance not covering the losses for customers means something we have not encountered as a modern society.'

It's a common occurence u developing countries, people hedge against it by holding foreign currencies and tangiable assets like land. Its not that rare for people to live through multiple devaluations and currency collapses. Ofcourse you don't go around telling people about tour wealth

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#193

Post by magicalhippo » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:42 PM UTC

t43562 wrote: post #3

I remember my dad encouraging me to save my dollars and not spend them on choc-99 double ice-creams ($2.13). These were soft whip ice-creams with 2 cadbury's flake chocolates stuck in the side and they seemed like the closest thing to heaven on earth to me. What my dad said seemed logical though and I saved. When I was 16 I had a holiday job that earned me many ice-cream-worths but I kept it - didn't buy a bicycle or…

My parents encouraged me to save money, but for my birthdays so I could buy a new cool Lego kit. My parents and relatives would chip in on the day, but I would keep count during the year to make sure I was close enough.

Looking back I think that was a good middle ground. At least as a 5-10 year old it was a quite concrete target yet also showed me the benefits of saving money.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#194

Post by 01100011 » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:44 PM UTC

We're seeing more and more economic focused posts making it to the front page lately. We're all thinking about it due to high inflation and few options to protect our cash savings. That said, the quality of HN comments regarding economics tend to be, in my experience, quite low. I'd suggest anyone interested go seek out more qualified analysis beyond a weekend HN thread full of people like me regurgitating half understood economics theories we've absorbed over the last two years.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#195

Post by dools » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:45 PM UTC

This has nothing to do with gold. He is comparing the exchange rate of the Argentine peso and the USD.

That exchange rate is appalling over time because Argentina relies heavily on USD denominated imports and issues debt denominated in USD to obtain them.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#196

Post by H8crilA » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:45 PM UTC

slg wrote: post #9

Argentina has experienced multiple rounds of hyperinflation due to failed monetary policy. Saying this story is a "lesson about the power of inflation" is like saying "the sun is hot". Yes, it certainly is, but it is so far beyond normal definitions of "hot" that people will have a hard time understanding it. This is more a story about the failures of Argentina's governments over the last 50 years than a story about…

A lot of countries have experienced serious inflation at one point or usually multiple points in history - all countries that are not young (>300 years). It is not perfectly reasonable to expect that yours will not experience it during your lifetime, particularly if you're young. Volatility has this nasty property that it's only bounded from below, but not from above.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#197

Post by seoaeu » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:46 PM UTC

anonporridge wrote: post #108

shadowgovt wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope this works out for you in the long term; BTC isn't the most stable platform, but it could certainly be more stable than some national currencies.

Bitcoin is an unbelievably stable platform with an uptime of 99.98% with only 13 years to draw from. It's been sticking with it's algorithmically defined inflation rate with perfect predictability, unlike any other currency or scarce asset like gold, which depends heavily on incentives to mine and accessible reserves. Don't mistake the volatility of the USD price of bitcoin (which is based on the erratic, unpredictab…

Saying that bitcoin has a stable algorithmically defined inflation rate is a hilarious redefinition of terms. Over the last year, one Bitcoin lost approximately 40% of its purchasing power relative to a basket of consumer goods and services. The year before, the opposite happened with bitcoin increasing in purchasing power by a factor of 5-10x.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#198

Post by ClumsyPilot » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:46 PM UTC

Consultant32452 wrote: post #178

Certhas wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a childhood lesson you don't need crazy inflation for this to hold true though. Anything that takes more than a few of months to save up to just doesn't make sense as a kid. Your disposable income goes up by factors of ten every few years. You have 2$ to spend at 5, 20$ at 10, 200$ at 15. Then it slows down but you might still get to 2000$ at 25. Saving as a kid really never seemed worth it to me.

Time preference is a big component in life success. There's not a lot of practical ways to discuss this with a small child, so "save up for the bigger/better toy" is what you get. If you have better ways to teach this lesson to your kids, I highly recommend doing it.

As an adult, 'wait a year' is quite reasonable, but kids live in dog years, when i was a kid 'wait a month' felt like i have to wait untill i grow old and get reincarnated

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#199

Post by throwawaybsd » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:47 PM UTC

xiphias2 wrote: post #6

t43562 wrote: post #3

I remember my dad encouraging me to save my dollars and not spend them on choc-99 double ice-creams ($2.13). These were soft whip ice-creams with 2 cadbury's flake chocolates stuck in the side and they seemed like the closest thing to heaven on earth to me. What my dad said seemed logical though and I saved. When I was 16 I had a holiday job that earned me many ice-cream-worths but I kept it - didn't buy a bicycle or…

I did the same thing for many years, until in 2013 the Cyprus bailouts woke me up...at that point I went all in on Bitcoin out of anger of the banking system, and haven't changed anything since.

Pff tell me about it. I made the choice of buying real estate instead. My tenant has everything serviced for them. They lost half on the stock market, but fortunately own crypto. Also lost a bit on crypto but they earn plenty. My estate doubled in 10 years and the rent they pay paid for two more properties, but i have to deal with the hassle of fixing pipes and such - all in all i pay in maintenance a month worth of rent, but the stress of calling contractors is too much - sometimes i need to get my arse out of the pool to dial people. Also have to spent few hours total a year. I just cant. Should sell everything and invest in crypto. My Porsche is too boring - need a lambo so it loses value sooner. After all what else can you do other than keep money in the bank. Buy estates and turn highly paid tech serfs into tenants? Hah. Best chase nfts.

Re: The money I saved as a child would buy one picogram of gold today

#200

Post by lr4444lr » Sun, Apr 17, 2022, 9:50 PM UTC

Certhas wrote: post #8

t43562 wrote: post #3

I remember my dad encouraging me to save my dollars and not spend them on choc-99 double ice-creams ($2.13). These were soft whip ice-creams with 2 cadbury's flake chocolates stuck in the side and they seemed like the closest thing to heaven on earth to me. What my dad said seemed logical though and I saved. When I was 16 I had a holiday job that earned me many ice-cream-worths but I kept it - didn't buy a bicycle or…

As a childhood lesson you don't need crazy inflation for this to hold true though. Anything that takes more than a few of months to save up to just doesn't make sense as a kid. Your disposable income goes up by factors of ten every few years. You have 2$ to spend at 5, 20$ at 10, 200$ at 15. Then it slows down but you might still get to 2000$ at 25. Saving as a kid really never seemed worth it to me.

It's not about maximizing utility or ROI: it's about learning delayed gratification.