We explain what is tangible, what are tangible assets and their differences with intangibles. Also, examples of tangible goods.
What is the tangible?
The tangible is what can touch. It is a term from Latin tangere, verb translatable as “to touch”, and is applied in many contexts of everyday life. For example, when someone refers to “tangible reality,” they speak of what exists in the world in a concrete, physical way, while the “intangible reality” is the opposite: that which exists in an abstract, imaginary, ethereal way.
The distinction between the tangible and the intangible is often important and requires specialized differentiation, since not everything that affects our lives or everything we own is necessarily tangible. In the field of culture, for example, this distinction is often made to encompass the totality of a human concept as complex as that.
Thus, a nation has tangible cultural assets, such as sculptures and paintings in museums. But it also has the symphonies that their orchestras perform, the dances that they dance at their parties and the stories they tell their children, which are intangible.
Tangible and intangible assets
In the business and financial world, in a similar way, tangible goods or assets and intangible goods or assets are often spoken of. Tangible assets are those that have a physical presentation; while the seconds, of course, are those that do not.
However, They are called assets because they are part of the assets of the company or the individual and they represent a benefit or the possibility of receiving one. This trait is important to distinguish it from liabilities or debts. It is important to emphasize that human capital, although it is known by this name, is not part of the tangible assets of a company, since its workers are not things, nor are they part of its assets.
Examples of tangible assets
The following are some examples of tangible assets owned by a company or an individual:
- Real estate, that is, houses, buildings or land, which are tangible but cannot be moved from one place to another.
- Machinery, tools and furniture, that is, furniture, objects that can be moved from one place to another.
- Raw material and / or products processed that are in stock.
- Capitals, that is, money in any of its presentations.