Eli5 Why does gold have high return value and not diamond? Even though culturally we value diamond more
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Gold can be molten down and re-shaped into whatever you want – be it jewelry or electrical connectors.
While diamonds *can* be re-cut into different forms, this is a much more complicated process and invariably causes the diamond to lose mass in the process.
Gold has high value because it’s rare and can’t be created only found and mined up. This is why until recently a US dollar was backed by it’s value in gold and old cultures used gold directly as currency.
Diamonds can be created in a lab out of anything that has carbon in it which is most things, it ONLY has value because of its cultural significance and the artificial scarcity created by diamond companies
Diamonds aren’t rare, but because of the diamond cartel that regulates the output, they keep the price artificially raised. There is no secondary market for diamonds, though. A used diamond is basically trash.
Gold is legitimately rare, is useful for electrical conductivity, and can be melted and reformed over and over. It doesn’t corrode, so it’s useful for plating other metals.
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