Now contrast that to gold and if no new money was entering the gold ecosystem, does the value of gold go lower? No, it stays the same without some kind of daily cash inflow just to keep it at the same value.
So it seems bitcoin has an upkeep cost and gold does not, when it comes to maintaining the value the same. And if that upkeep cost isn't paid (in bitcoin's case) then you get a gradually eroding price.
I think you are mistaken.
Mining gold also has costs. The gold mining corporation must pay for these costs (equipment suppliers, employees, electricity, fuel, etc) with fiat currency. This means that the gold mining corporation must dump their mined gold onto the market to cover their costs. If this gold mining "upkeep cost" isn't paid with an equivalent amount of gold demand at the current gold exchange rate then gold gets a gradually eroding price.
This is simple economics. It's true of gold, corn, pork, bitcoins, or any other valued commodity. There is always a cost associated with producing the commodity. If demand is higher than the supply, then the exchange rate increases. If demand is lower than the supply, then the exchange rate decreases.
Yes I totally agree, but I am asking something a little different. I am not referring to the
producing of the commodity (such as mining of gold out of the ground, or mining new bitcoins as in the reward for each new block).
I am referring to the simple act of allowing the existing mined coins to continue to exist. Gold can just exist, as it is. It's a physical object. Bitcoins cannot. Without continued use of (ever increasing quantities of) electricity, bitcoins do not exist (due to being digital in nature). Transactions must be continually be able to be put in blocks every 10 minutes or the bitcoins are worthless and for all intents and purposes don't "exist". Thus, there is a neverending "
existence payment" (to coin a new term) in the form of electricity payments, just to have existing bitcoins continue to exist.
I find it a little challenging to put this concept into words, so I hope I am explaining it in an okay manner.
So the difference is you don't
have to mine more gold to allow existing gold to continue to exist. If you stopped mining gold, the existing gold would
still exist. But with bitcoin, you
have to continually spend energy to mine, even if just to confirm transactions (not even talking about making new coins). There is a
forced flow of money out of the bitcoin ecosystem to pay for energy, which puts
constant downward pressure on the price. This is what has me concerned for a higher and higher hashrate network.
That all being said, bitcoin can of course do things no other money can. But I just wanted to focus on the costs of running the bitcoin network and the long-term effects that constant selling pressure has on the price of bitcoin.