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by MaduroBU
Fri Jan 25, 2019 1:30 pm
Forum: Off-Topic
Topic: TEOTWAWKI…For Real
Replies: 15
Views: 4093

Re: TEOTWAWKI…For Real

The real weak point in our society is economic. How many people or families could survive 6 months without income? Without any mention of empty grocery shelves (except bread....people freak out and hoard bread at the drop of a hat), just the interruption in income would be catastrophic for well over 50% of families. Add to that the number of older folks whose savings would take a severe hit with a drop in the stock market, and a startling number of people are suddenly unable to provide for themselves. Economic calamity need not and likely won't involve any actually shortage of goods. Never forget that farmers were paid to destroy crops for most of the Great Depression, despite 1930s era technology and the Dust Bowl.

My great grandmother survived on her land in the 1940s and 1950s after my great grandfather was killed in WW2. The rest of the nation was prospering but she and our family were focused upon getting by. She did, but only because she had land and knew how to use it to feed herself and her family. Today, those skills are called "prepping" or "homesteading". I doubt that she knew what either of those words mean as they're used today, but she kept the family fed with those skills. My stepmother's family in Nebraska owned a farm, which until the advent of the tractor was devoted almost entirely to feeding the family.

Those skills are in short supply, and even if they were widespread, there isn't enough land to support a substantial part of the population applying them. Wealth is being warm when it's cold, well fed, healthy, and ideally able to maintain and grow that situation. Taking stock of how many levels of interdependent economic activity must cooperate to provide that "wealth" to me, I find it reasonable to look for ways to secure myself against interruptions in those supply chains.

The most common error in prediction is the Extrapolation of "right now" out to "forever". History is the study of the future, and provides a much better indication of assets and threats.

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