Thursday, April 24, 2008

Not Such an Anti-Dentite Nation After All

Sometimes there are things going on all around me that I’m completely unaware of.
NEW YORK -- Dazzled by the bull market in gold, people are digging through drawers for old dental caps, fillings and bridgework they saved years ago and selling them at prices that would make the tooth fairy blush.

Instead of hanging on to the pieces as souvenirs, many are turning them over to pawnbrokers, coin shops and specialized firms that buy “dental gold,” hoping to take a bite out of the metal’s historic run to $1,000 an ounce.

“People are really cashing in. If a dentist passes away, their kids come in with a big pile of gold teeth,” said Scott Taber, owner of Taber Coins, a Shrewsbury, Mass., coin dealer that buys dental gold and then resells it to a gold smelter.

He said he used to see only a few customers a month selling gold teeth but now gets that many each week. “People are digging up the gold and starting to sell it,” he said.
Ruhhhhh? Maybe because I don’t have any “old” dental work I just don’t understand why anyone would keep it lying around. I guess good for them that they did. I’ll keep this in mind should I ever come into possession of old dental work.

1 comment:

Mitzie Colon said...

That may sounds eerie or unfamiliar for some, but they actually do that for extra cash. I'd be fine with that if people do it for emergency reasons, as long as they don't steal it from other people or dig them from someone's resting place.