For 5,000 years, one productive beef cow has been worth about one ounce of gold.
Mesopotamia. Rome. The Viking Age. The ratio held.
In 1926, a good cow cost $22. A $20 gold coin held 0.9675 ounces of gold. Almost exactly one ounce per cow.
Today, a young productive beef cow sells for $4,000 to $5,000 at auction. Gold sits around $4,500 an ounce.
The ratio has held for five millennia, and still holds today.
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