Gold = Silver = Housing Market = Tulip mania
Tulip mania was a period in the Dutch Golden Age during which contract prices for bulbs of the recently introduced tulip reached extraordinarily high levels and
then suddenly collapsed. At the peak of tulip mania, in February 1637, some single tulip bulbs sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled craftsman. It is generally considered the
first recorded speculative bubble (or economic bubble).
A tulip, known as "the Viceroy", displayed in a 1637 Dutch catalog. Its bulb cost between 3000 and 4200 florins depending on size. A skilled craftsman at the time earned about 300 florins a year.
1. Nusteling, H. (1985) Welvaart en Werkgelegenheid in Amsterdam 1540–1860, pp. 114, 252, 254, 258.
2. "Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused." Mike Dash (2001).
3. Shiller 2005, p. 85 More extensive discussion of status as the earliest bubble on pp. 247–48.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_mania