posted 12-04-2010 01:35 PM            

Disappearing Silver notices

Everyone knows my opinion about scrapping....
Also the Guidelines.....

The collecting marketplace has always been cyclical.
When we started the Silver Salon Forums, the silver collecting cycle was peaking. 11 years later it is ebbing
Scrap metal prices rising has also happened before. Scrapping historic or collectible silver is not new.

What may be a new paradigm is how much the world has changed. For example, once it was a chicken in every pot and now it’s a cell phone in near every pocket along with the Internet and the overall global economic down turn & the very rapid increase in spot metal, etc.

I can reflect on a time when a person bought with an eye/hope that their purchase would last. I don’t think this is the way of the world anymore. For today’s consumer it seems obsolescence is an accepted expectation. And for today’s consumer a short few weeks is all it takes for today’s NEW to become disposable.

For example, in the past when buying a home most often for the buyer it was a real 20-30 year purchase. They would expect to raise the kids and retire in the purchase and with any nominal luck the investment would increase in value. The American Dream was to raise a family, live a comfortable life and to making things a little better for the next generation.

Somewhere along the way America lost this vision.

Lately, from time to time I get e-mails from sellers who let me know what they intend to send to scrap; good historic silver because they can not afford not to.