Going Rate for an Ounce of Gold

As of last August 2008, gold was up over $900 an ounce. Right now it's way over a thousand dollars an ounce, and people are being asked to sell their broken or unused jewelry. Gold is becoming so hard to come by that they are calling silver the new gold.

The government may be worried that we the citizens may have too much gold on hand, other than jewelery and antiques. They may even start to confiscate the gold from us. One of the reasons the gold market is going up is due to the oil prices. It is interesting that as the oil prices go up, the gold market does too.

Gold is a precious metal that ten years ago was relatively cheap to buy. Back then, the going rate for about a $100 a ounce. Even then, some thought that was kind of pricey. Now the thought of paying what they want for a ounce of gold is just plain outrageous.

With gold becoming so hard to purchase, it's also becoming harder for the millions of jewelry stores who have to pay the high price of crafting a gold ring. If an ounce of gold costs $900, and it takes three ounces to make a ring, that's $2,700 for just the gold. Now you take the time it takes to make it, the cost of whatever gem you add to it and the store's labor and profit mark up, and you have a ring that now costs anywhere from 8 to 9 thousand dollars. Obviously, this is beyond most people's budgets. Stores are losing business because of this. Because of the loss of business, many are having to lay off their employees.