answer; you’re not really “buying” gold. You’re just trading your fiat paper dollars for gold. If you ahve extra wealth, you have to do something with it. you can leave it in your paper dollars, or buy whiskey, or dope, or gol, or other stuff of course, even real estate. if you beleive gold is money-like, and it comes to pass that dollars start becoming very very common, you may want to make some of those dollars gold, since gold might be less common. the economy can suck adn there can be lots of excess money floating around. the good news, in other words, is that your gold could be worth 5k an ounce. the bad news is that a loaf of bread costs $20.