Avg life of fiat currency is 40 years. Gold has survived as a form of value for thousands of years.
Phys Gold in my eyes is an insurance for my life savings not a trade.
I like silver even better.
One could even insure their savings with a pile of class 5 rock or barrels of whiskey. Same concept.
Diversify in Hard Assets as insurance against fiat currencies because they can and will go to zero. There will be some sort of global currency reset in my lifetime and I am insured for that.
Then again this only applies to a very small percentage of people because 99% live paycheck to paycheck anyhow.
Don't have all your eggs in one basket ie paper.