Gold: The World’s Oldest Addiction Nobody Wants to Quit

 

For 6,700 years, empires, kings, and central banks have chased gold. Ask yourself: what do they know about the future that ordinary people don't? In plain terms, humanity has been obsessed with gold for 6,700 years because when power, money, and trust collapse, gold is usually the last thing still standing. So, as long as fear and greed remain roommates in the human heart, gold will never go out of style. 

I have seen people laugh at gold investors. I have seen economists roll their eyes when someone starts talking about gold bars, gold coins, and the collapse of paper money. Then a financial crisis hits. A war breaks out. Inflation starts chewing through savings like termites through dry wood. Suddenly, the same people who mocked gold start asking where they can buy some.

That tells me something important.

Gold is not just a metal. It is humanity’s oldest obsession. It is a shiny yellow mirror reflecting our fears, greed, vanity, power, and survival instincts. For at least 6,700 years, human beings have chased it, worshipped it, stolen it, killed for it, and died for it. We pretend we are more sophisticated today, but we are not fooling anybody.

The archaeological record is brutally honest.

Some of the earliest known gold artifacts date back about 6,700 years. They included crowns, brooches, and, believe it or not, a gold phallus cover. Let that sink in. Long before stock markets, central banks, and cryptocurrency, people were already using gold to signal status and power. The message was simple: “I have gold. Therefore, I matter.”

Human nature has not changed much since then. Gold seeped into mythology because it had already seeped into the human mind. Ancient Greek stories were dripping with the stuff. There was the Golden Fleece sought by Jason and the Argonauts. There was the golden apple connected to Aphrodite. Then there was King Midas, whose touch turned everything into gold.

That story is often treated like a fairy tale. I think it is a warning label.

Midas got exactly what he wanted and discovered it was a curse. He could not eat. He could not drink. His greed became a prison. Thousands of years later, Wall Street keeps relearning the same lesson.

Ancient rulers understood gold’s psychological power. They did not need marketing consultants to tell them that shiny objects attract attention. When the Lydian Empire created some of the first coins during the 7th century BC, gold played a central role. Money was no longer just a medium of exchange. It became a symbol of authority.

Then came Alexander the Great. Simply put, Alexander was not merely conquering armies. He was conquering gold supplies. After defeating the Persian Empire, he secured major gold-producing regions and established 26 mints across Europe, Asia, and Africa. Some of his gold coins reached purity levels of about 98%. Alexander understood a truth that many politicians still understand today: control the money, and you control much of the world.

For more than 2,000 years, gold remained tied to money. Kingdoms rose with it. Empires expanded with it. Governments measured wealth through it.

Yet this is where the story becomes controversial. Many gold enthusiasts speak about the gold standard as if it were some lost paradise. It was not. Economist John Maynard Keynes called gold a “barbarous relic” in 1924. He was not completely wrong. The gold standard often restricted governments and central banks during economic emergencies. Historians and economists have linked it to deflationary pressures and to the severity of the Great Depression. When economies needed flexibility, gold often acted like a straitjacket.

The United States abandoned the international gold standard in 1971 under President Richard Nixon. Gold bugs predicted disaster. Some still do.

But here is the uncomfortable fact: the decades following that decision saw extraordinary economic growth, technological innovation, and rising global prosperity. The world did not end.

Yet the gold bugs were not entirely wrong either. Paper money works beautifully until people stop trusting it. That is why gold refuses to die.

History is filled with rulers willing to do almost anything to obtain it. Spanish King Ferdinand II gave conquistadors a mission that was refreshingly honest. “Get gold, humanely, if possible, but at all hazards, get gold.”

There it is. No public relations spin. No corporate jargon. No pretending. Just naked ambition. The result was conquest, exploitation, and bloodshed across the Americas. Gold built fortunes while destroying civilizations.

Then came the great gold rushes of the 19th century. California exploded after gold was discovered in 1848. Within a few years, hundreds of thousands of fortune seekers flooded the region. Australia experienced similar chaos. Entire cities appeared almost overnight. Some prospectors became rich. Most did not.

That pattern never changes. When people hear stories about gold fortunes, they imagine themselves as the winner. Few imagine themselves as the thousands who ended up broke, disappointed, or dead.

Gold has another remarkable quality. It remains valuable even when governments collapse. During World War II, the Bank of Norway conducted a daring operation to prevent Nazi Germany from seizing the nation's gold reserves. Against incredible odds, the mission succeeded. Gold preserved national wealth when military power alone could not. That episode revealed something many investors understand instinctively. Governments can fail. Currencies can fail. Political systems can fail. Gold tends to survive them all.

Today, despite endless talk about digital currencies and financial innovation, central banks are still buying gold. The United States keeps more than 77% of its reserves in gold according to World Gold Council data. Gold accounts for more than 80% of America's official reserve assets when measured against reserve holdings. China continues adding to its reserves. Saudi Arabia continues holding significant amounts. Thailand continues buying. Central banks worldwide remain major purchasers. In 2025, surveys showed that 76% of central banks expected gold to represent a larger share of reserves within 5 years.

That should make people pause.

These institutions employ armies of economists, analysts, mathematicians, and financial experts. Yet they still want gold.

Why?

Because trust is fragile.

America’s use of financial sanctions against countries such as Russia and Iran has encouraged governments to seek alternatives to dollar dependence. Gold offers something paper promises cannot: it has no issuing government, no central banker, no politician behind it. It simply exists.

Even as Bitcoin enthusiasts promise a digital future, governments continue stacking physical gold. The irony is almost funny. Countries discussing alternatives to traditional finance are still buying a metal that fascinated people before the invention of writing. Investors are doing the same thing.

Inflation has surged periodically in recent years. Geopolitical tensions have increased. Wars have erupted. Markets have become more volatile. Gold prices have climbed dramatically. A kilogram of gold that cost Lloyd Blankfein roughly $15,000 in the 1980s would be worth around $150,000 today.

That is not a fairy tale. That is arithmetic.

Gold is not perfect. It generates no earnings. It pays no dividends. It costs money to store. It can be volatile. Anyone claiming gold is a magic solution is selling snake oil. But anyone claiming gold is irrelevant is ignoring 6,700 years of evidence.

The greatest lesson of gold is not economic. It is psychological. Gold survives because human nature survives. People still crave status. People still fear uncertainty. People still seek safety when the world becomes dangerous. Gold sits at the intersection of all three. That is why kings wanted it. That is why conquerors hunted it. That is why central banks stockpile it. That is why investors buy it when panic spreads.

Civilizations have changed. Technology has changed. Money has changed.

Human beings have not.

And as long as fear and greed remain roommates in the human heart, gold will never go out of style.

 

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