Commodity money Commodity money Commodity money is money whose value comes from a commodity of which it is made. Commodity money consists of objects that have value in themselves (intrinsic value) as well as value in their use as money. Examples of commodities that have been used as mediums of exchange include gold, silver, copper, salt, peppercorns, tea, large stones (such as Rai stones), decorated belts, shells, alcohol, cigarettes, cannabis, silk, candy, nails, cocoa beans, cowries and barley. These items were sometimes used in a metric of perceived value in conjunction to one another, in various commodity valuation or price system economies.
Relative price Relative price A relative price is the price of a commodity such as a good or service in terms of another; i.e., the ratio of two prices. A relative price may be expressed in terms of a ratio between the prices of any two goods or the ratio between the price of one good and the price of a market basket of goods (a weighted average of the prices of all other goods available in the market). A relative price is an opportunity cost. Microeconomics can be seen as the study of how economic agents react to changes in relative