# Inflation index relative to silver and gold?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inflation-index-relative-to-silver-and-gold/1022605>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [August 30, 2025, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inflation-index-relative-to-silver-and-gold/1022605 "2025-08-30T17:02:06Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\
**Post date:** [August 30, 2025, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inflation-index-relative-to-silver-and-gold/1022605/1 "2025-08-30T17:02:06Z")

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In the [A time travelers dilemma: where to store vintage documents for hundreds of years](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-time-travelers-dilemma-where-to-store-vintage-documents-for-hundreds-of-years/1022575) thread, the question was raised of having to pay e.g. a law firm for document storage and thus eating into potential profits. I was going to point out that inflation over the centuries means that fees were much cheaper back then; but then I realized that that’s only measured in the intangible medium of dollars or British pounds. If you had to come up with the actual specie to pay a fee in pounds Sterling in the Eighteenth century, maybe the inflation since then has been less dramatic? In other words, what does the inflation index look like when keyed to the price and buying power of silver or gold?

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**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\
**Post date:** [September 2, 2025, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inflation-index-relative-to-silver-and-gold/1022605/2 "2025-09-02T20:37:25Z")

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In this instance, wouldn’t gold just be another tradable commodity or currency, subject to the same purchasing power parity concerns as any other?

e.g. random sources:  
[https://www.goldpriceforecast.com/explanations/gold-purchasing-power/](https://www.goldpriceforecast.com/explanations/gold-purchasing-power/) and [Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) and Gold Explained](https://www.goldpriceforecast.com/explanations/gold-ppp/)

Or some examples: [Gold Price Tracking 100 Years: Comparing Gold and the Dollar](https://www.usgoldbureau.com/content/gold-vs-inflation)

If the question were “If you were traveling back in time, would it be better to bring X$, or X$ worth of gold nuggets”… it would just depend on the market conditions of your departure vs your arrival timeline, comparing the purchase power of gold between those times.

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**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\
**Post date:** [September 2, 2025, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inflation-index-relative-to-silver-and-gold/1022605/3 "2025-09-02T20:44:25Z")

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There is the Big Mac Index formulated by The Economist magazine.

- [Big Mac Index](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index)

> The **Big Mac Index** is a [price index](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_index) published since 1986 by _[The Economist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist)_ as an informal way of measuring the [purchasing power parity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchasing_power_parity) (PPP) between two [currencies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Currency) and providing a test of the extent to which market [exchange rates](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exchange_rate) result in goods costing the same in different countries. It “seeks to make exchange-rate theory a bit more digestible.”[[1]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index#cite_note-1) The [index](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_(economics)) compares the relative price worldwide to purchase the [Big Mac](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac), the flagship [hamburger](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburger) sold at [McDonald’s](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald%27s) restaurants.