Embedded Files
Key Takeaways
Gold is priced globally — but jewelry isn’t.
An ounce of gold costs roughly the same worldwide. The massive premiums on U.S. jewelry come from retail markups and pricing opacity, not the value of the gold itself.American gold jewelery starts you at a 40% loss.
When you buy gold jewelry at a 40%+ premium, gold must rise more than 40% just for you to break even. That’s not investing — it’s paying upfront friction.Transparency exists outside the U.S.
In markets like Dubai, India, and Thailand, gold jewelry is priced by weight + making fee, often at higher purity (22K–24K). Most U.S. retailers won’t even tell you the weight.
Why Does Gold Have Value?
Let's first address a fundamental question: why does gold have value in the first place?
The answer isn’t mystical. Gold has value because we give it value. This is a different question than asking why wheat has value—wheat is required for survival, so it has innate utility. And the reason wheat doesn’t cost as much as caviar is simply that it's easier and cheaper to grow and harvest on a large scale.
But gold? Gold isn’t keeping anyone alive—at least not in the same way wheat does. So the real question isn't "Why does gold have value?" but rather "Why do humans ascribe value to gold?" When you frame it that way, the answer becomes less abstract and easier to tackle: we’ve collectively decided, across cultures and millennia, that gold is valuable. It's rare, it doesn't corrode, it's beautiful, and it’s been a store of wealth for thousands of years. That shared belief is what gives it value.
The Global Gold Market
It’s fundamental to note that the price of gold is a worldwide metric. There might be small amounts of arbitrage between markets, but these differences are typically minuscule thanks to the ability to trade gold futures and certificates on the electronic market. An ounce of gold in America costs essentially the same as an ounce of gold in India, Dubai, or anywhere else.
This is important to understand before we get into how American retailers change the pricing dynamics of jewelry in the United States.
The American Markup Game
America has consistently perfected the art of extracting as much value from the unknowing consumer—and let's be honest, that’s a very real "feature" of capitalism. The great part about capitalism is that, as a consumer, you have just as much right to understand where not to allocate your dollars if you educate yourself and understand the alternatives. Nowhere is this more evident than in the gold and jewelry market, where retailers sell pieces at massively elevated prices while obscuring the actual value of what you’re buying.
Go online to any American jewelry retailer or walk into a store. You’ll quickly find two things (or lack thereof):
You will not be able to find the weight of the gold indicated anywhere.
You will not be able to find many options above 14k (58.3%) gold.
Why? Because they don’t want to make it easy for you to realize that you're paying a 40% or higher markup on the price of gold.
Now, I understand there are legitimate costs associated with creating jewelry—design work, tools, software, logistics, and overhead for running retail operations.
However, it’s worth noting that much of the jewelry sold by major U.S. retailers isn’t actually manufactured in America with expensive American labor. Major chains like Kay, Zales, and Jared source nearly half their merchandise from India, where labor costs are significantly lower.
So, while there are real costs involved in bringing jewelry to market—shipping, customs, quality control, retail operations, marketing—the actual production costs are often much lower than you might assume. Yet the final retail price still includes that 40%+ markup over the spot price of gold, even when the piece was manufactured in a country with a fraction of U.S. labor costs.
This isn’t necessarily nefarious—it’s just how retail margins work across many industries. But it does mean that the high prices you’re paying aren’t primarily driven by expensive American craftsmanship. You’re paying for the entire retail ecosystem: the storefront, the advertising, the sales staff, the financing options, and yes, the profit margins that make the business viable.
The "Investment" Lie
You’ll often hear salespeople describe jewelry as an “investment” that holds its value over time. And technically, they’re not wrong—gold generally does maintain its value, and over long periods, it can even appreciate.
But here’s the critical math that rarely gets discussed: if you’re buying gold at 40% above its spot price, you're starting with an immediate 40% gap between what you paid and what the gold is actually worth. For this to become a profitable investment, gold prices would need to rise by more than 40% just for you to break even on the metal value alone.
Think about it in stock market terms. If the fair market price of Apple stock is $100 per share, and you decided to pay $140 per share because you really like the company, you've paid 40% over fair value. The stock would need to appreciate 40%—from $100 to $140—just for you to break even on what you paid. Most investors wouldn’t consider that a sound strategy.
The same principle applies to jewelry purchased at these markups. Gold can be a store of value or an investment—but the price you pay matters enormously. At a 40% premium, you're banking on significant gold price appreciation just to recover your initial cost, let alone see any actual return.
This doesn’t mean jewelry has no value—it absolutely does, whether that's aesthetic, sentimental, or cultural. But if you're thinking of it primarily as a financial investment, the numbers are worth running carefully before you buy.
Alternative Options Outside the US
The pricing structure for gold jewelry varies significantly by country, and understanding these differences can be illuminating.
In places like Dubai, making charges are often a low, flat fee rather than a high percentage, which can lead to meaningful savings, particularly on heavier pieces. The UAE has zero import duties on raw gold and no VAT on pure gold, which helps keep prices closer to spot rates. The base gold price is displayed prominently in most shops throughout the UAE for 22K and 24K gold, with only making charges varying between retailers—creating a more transparent pricing environment.
This is notably different from the 40%+ markups often seen in U.S. retail jewelry stores. India also commonly offers higher purity options like 22K and 24K gold, whereas U.S. retailers tend to stock primarily 14K or 18K pieces.
Thailand is known for offering high-purity gold, often in 23K or 24K, with affordable pricing compared to Western markets.
It’s worth noting that tourist areas in any country can have inflated prices, and bringing gold back to the U.S. may involve customs considerations. But the fundamental difference is in how gold jewelry is priced: many international markets use transparent weight-based pricing with clear making fees, while U.S. retailers often obscure the weight entirely and build in substantial markups that aren’t clearly itemized.
The point is that if you’re buying a substantial amount of jewelry in the U.S. ($5,000+), it’s likely you can fly to Dubai, purchase the same piece, have a nice vacation, and fly back for the same price as what you would have spent in the U.S. on it.
I Ran the Numbers
I decided to do some recon work. I compared the spot price of gold against standard jewelry vendors in the United States to see just how bad the markup really is.
After searching across six different retailer websites, I found that five out of six did not contain any information about what their basic gold chains weighed. The only one that did? Costco.
After calculating based on the current gold price, the Costco chain proved to be about a 35% premium over the spot price of gold when I checked in 2025. And Costco was the best option I found—they were at least transparent enough to list the weight.
Continuing to attempt to get information, I sent messages, emails, and made phone calls to the six retailers asking for weight information. Not a single one other than Costco was able to provide weight information on their jewelry. They’re selling you gold, but they can’t tell you how much gold you're actually buying.
The Bottom Line
If you're buying jewelry in America and thinking of it as an investment, you need to wake up to the reality of what you're actually paying. You're not buying gold at gold prices—you’re buying gold at a 40%+ markup, and the retailers are doing everything they can to make sure you don’t realize it.
Gold has value because we collectively agree it does. But that doesn’t mean you should pay whatever someone tells you to pay for it. Do your homework. Ask for weights. Calculate the actual value. And if you're serious about gold as an investment, consider buying it in forms where the markup is transparent and reasonable—not from retailers who won’t even tell you how much gold you’re getting.
I have personally purchased gold jewelry in Qatar, Dubai, and Thailand and have firsthand experience in what that process looks like and how it works, so please feel free to reach out if you're considering purchasing any gold jewelry—I’d be happy to share my experiences with you.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse