Can someone please explain the precious metals thing to me?

[FyredUp]

Okay, I am not stupid and I understand gold, silver and a few other metals have value in our capitalistic society. Assuming we have a meltdown of some kind, depression, pandemic, apocalypse, zombie invasion...what good will these precious metals do you?

I mean seriously, if the economy has completely collapsed and you have 5 pounds of gold, and I have 1000 days of food, which one of us is richer? Your 5 pounds of gold might buy you a couple days of meals from me, and then again maybe not. What guarantee do you have that those precious metals will even be anything more than a pretty rock ever again?

[pancho]

Originally Posted by FyredUp

Okay, I am not stupid and I understand gold, silver and a few other metals have value in our capitalistic society. Assuming we have a meltdown of some kind, depression, pandemic, apocalypse, zombie invasion...what good will these precious metals do you?

I mean seriously, if the economy has completely collapsed and you have 5 pounds of gold, and I have 1000 days of food, which one of us is richer? Your 5 pounds of gold might buy you a couple days of meals from me, and then again maybe not. What guarantee do you have that those precious metals will even be anything more than a pretty rock ever again?

Gold has always had a value. You might not sell what you have but there is always someone that will. That is the thing with gold or silver. You can put it back and never have to worry about it going bad. Never have to worry about it having no value. You can always find someone that wants it. You can trade it for anything. It is easy concealed and easy to carry.

Lots of people do not understand precious metals.

[Tarheel]

My thoughts are always make sure you have your staples put back first. Food,shelter,clothing, fuel etc. Then start on your metals either to buy or barter with.

The essentials always come first IMO !

[FyredUp]

Originally Posted by pancho

Gold has always had a value. You might not sell what you have but there is always someone that will. That is the thing with gold or silver. You can put it back and never have to worry about it going bad. Never have to worry about it having no value. You can always find someone that wants it. You can trade it for anything. It is easy concealed and easy to carry.

Lots of people do not understand precious metals.

I don't disagree that you will, up to a certain point, find someone that wants it. But if the situation gets bad enough, food and medicine supplies run low, and no one will deal anymore, what good will the gold do you? At that point it has no value at all. If you had spent that same money on more food, more guns and ammunition, more gardening supplies, you might see another year.

If the going rate for a 5 pound bag of potatoes is 1 pound of gold how much is your gold worth? That is my point, you may say the last market said this gold was worth $1200 an ounce and I would look at you and laugh hysterically. I may even advise you to go downtown and try and find an open financial institution to give you $1200 an ounce for it. Oh wait, the economy has collapsed and their is no monetary system.

At that point my 5 pounds of potatoes is worth more than all of your gold. My thousands of rounds of ammunition are worth more than all of your gold. My guns are worth more than all of your gold. My stack of wood for heating my house is worth more than all of your gold. The fact is real commodities in that situation will be the currency not a pretty rock.

[TnAndy]

You're making the same classic assumption that everyone that doesn't "get" precious metals does.....that the world will sink into a Mad Max society.

So, what is your plan if the world DOESN'T go that route, and instead, continues to do what it has since the FED came into existence in 1913, when a US gold eagle was worth $20, and a $20 paper note was worth $20. And now a US gold eagle is worth 1400 of those paper notes.

Let's say the world simply continues a long, slow slide downhill for the rest of your life, and you need money ( real, honest-to-God money ) for your old age, and to pay your property taxes and to replace the food you have set aside and a thousand other things.....

Are you going to continue to save long term in a paper note that has a near 100 year history of getting worse and worse ?

PLEASE tell me your plan for this ? Are you "prepared" or will you suffer ?

There is no one-size-fits-all prep and there are many, many survival scenarios.

The prep that you find to be vital in one scenario may be useless in another.

Therefore it is necessary for the prepper to put some thought into what one is preparing against.

It would seem to me that the wise person -if they can afford it- would have both the 1000 days of food AND the five pounds of gold. They are two entirely different preps and are not interchangeable one for the other.

In a great many scenarios you can survive on that 1000 days of food while things are settling down then find yourself anywhere from comfortably well off to quite rich trading that five pounds of gold for whatever it is that is available that will get you by. The food and the gold serve different purposes.

What guarantee do you have that those precious metals will even be anything more than a pretty rock ever again?

What guarantee do you have that you will draw breath again ten seconds after you read this? None. None at all.

There are no guarantees in this business. None at all. There is no absolute security. There just isn't.

All that we can do is to try to weight the odds in our favor and we do that through our physical preps, our knowledge and skills, and our attitudes (in no particular order). You may well be sitting on a five year supply of storage food and die anyway because you did not have the cumshaw to pay the shrimp boat captain (trucker, etc.) to get you and yours out of the country one step ahead of the death squads. If you think that cannot happen there are many who live in the U.S. today who found themselves faced with doing just that. Think Vietnamese boat people for one. The boat captain may not have any interest at all in a ton of wheat, but a handful of Krugerrands (and a concealed pistol to keep him honest) is highly likely to catch his attention. Or maybe a case of good whiskey, or a few rolls of U.S. silver dollars, or whatever else portable wealth you may have to offer.

On the other hand in a collapse scenario a 1,000 day supply of preserved food may enable you to sit out the collapse in your remote cabin in the woods three hundred miles from the nearest city until the vast majority of the fighting and dieing is over. By then you'll be able to stick your head out to see what it's going to take to continue surviving in the Brave New World that has come about. Could be when that five pounds of gold will make itself useful. Or your blacksmith's forge, medical skills, or whatever.

There are no guarantees in this business. None whatsoever. Nor is there any one best material prep unless you want to get down to some brass tacks specifics. In my opinion the best you can do is first develop a survivors attitude then start preparing as generally as you can then once you have achieved that start getting down to whatever scenario specific preps you think you might need. In a great many of which some form of portable wealth could play an important role if you can afford to acquire any in the ordinary, workaday world of right now.

[Ed Norman]

Let's say you have a one ounce gold coin and a splitting headache. I have a very rare bottle of ibuprofen. You desire the whole bottle, but I only want to sell you two pills. Do you take your knife and shave off a tiny sliver of gold that I have to try and find a use for somewhere, or do I leave with my full bottle and you leave with your headache?

If you offered me a handful of 22s, you would be swallowing pills in seconds.

[TnAndy]

Well said, Alan.

I've never said to anyone "go buy a bag of metals and you're set". In fact, my first advice to anyone that ever asked is "go buy some extra food"......followed by a water, and get out of debt. Because you can look around this country TODAY and find millions of folks that the S_has_already_HTF for them personally because of that last one.....debt.

But let's say you're fortunate, you got the basics squared away, got your place paid for so you (probably) won't be foreclosed on.....you know how many folks LOST their place to property taxes in the last depression because of lack of a fairly piddly little amount of money ?

THAT was the thing that brought me to precious metals.....that I would have enough REAL, HONEST money set aside to take care of my property taxes for years and years.

1,000lbs of food is hard to deal with if you're living under a bridge or out of your car.

[FyredUp]

Originally Posted by TnAndy

You're making the same classic assumption that everyone that doesn't "get" precious metals does.....that the world will sink into a Mad Max society.

So, what is your plan if the world DOESN'T go that route, and instead, continues to do what it has since the FED came into existence in 1913, when a US gold eagle was worth $20, and a $20 paper note was worth $20. And now a US gold eagle is worth 1400 of those paper notes.

Let's say the world simply continues a long, slow slide downhill for the rest of your life, and you need money ( real, honest-to-God money ) for your old age, and to pay your property taxes and to replace the food you have set aside and a thousand other things.....

Are you going to continue to save long term in a paper note that has a near 100 year history of getting worse and worse ?

PLEASE tell me your plan for this ? Are you "prepared" or will you suffer ?

Nice use of my signature against me.

I don't believe the world will turn into a Mad Max scenario. That is why I look at people that have buried caches of food, guns, ammo and the like on the trail to their bug out location as being extreme. I also look at people that have dozens and dozens of EBR's and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammo as being extreme. The truth is more likely somewhere in the middle, we will continue a downward economic slide that may end in a depression. But I seriously doubt we will ever see a complete economic or social collapse of our society. People have been preaching that for decades and while we have had a depression, and more recessions than I care to count, society has not collapsed, the economic system has not collapsed and we somehow manage to keep on trucking.

Okay, so why do I prep? For the same reason I have auto, home and life insurance...just in case.

[TnAndy]

Originally Posted by Ed Norman

Let's say youhave a very rare bottle of ibuprofen...

....and you've been sitting on it for years after it's "good by" date, and you find it's going bad....as most things DO have a limited shelf life.

What if I did have a splitting headache and took my gold coin and split it into "pieces of eight" ( because that is EXACTLY how they made change in the old days, my friend. Do you know where the expression "2 bits" came from ? Two 1/8's of a silver dollar...or a "quarter" of a dollar....look it up) and I offered you 1/8 of an ounce of gold for your medicine that may not be worth ANYTHING down the road ? Would you take it ?

You see....THIS is why folks invented MONEY.....it's a STORE OF VALUE ( and incidentally WHY the Federal Reserve Note is NOT money )...so you can store the value of labor and goods in something that will hold it's value, and not degrade over time.

[TnAndy]

Originally Posted by FyredUp

Nice use of my signature against me.

I wasn't "using it against you"....merely asking if you believe it.

Now you also said in your OP: Assuming we have a meltdown of some kind, depression, pandemic, apocalypse, zombie invasion...what good will these precious metals do you?

And yet, now you say you don't believe any of that will happen....well, which is it ?

AND you haven't answered my question:

What' your plan for saving for old age if the "money" the govt prints gets worse and worse every year BY DESIGN.

[Ed Norman]

Originally Posted by TnAndy

....and you've been sitting on it for years after it's "good by" date, and you find it's going bad....as most things DO have a limited shelf life.

What if I did have a splitting headache and took my gold coin and split it into "pieces of eight" ( because that is EXACTLY how they made change in the old days, my friend. Do you know where the expression "2 bits" came from ? Two 1/8's of a silver dollar...or a "quarter" of a dollar....look it up) and I offered you 1/8 of an ounce of gold for your medicine that may not be worth ANYTHING down the road ? Would you take it ?

You see....THIS is why folks invented MONEY.....it's a STORE OF VALUE ( and incidentally WHY the Federal Reserve Note is NOT money )...so you can store the value of labor and goods in something that will hold it's value, and not degrade over time.

Yes, I know about pieces of 8 and gold chain links being nipped off for payment and rai stones. I also know I could use my bottle of pills when I needed them, and trade them to people who needed them that had something I needed, like some snare wire or sewing thread. But when I am cold, wet, hungry, and my knee hurts, your 8th of a gold coin will be of little comfort to me.

Originally Posted by FyredUp

I don't believe the world will turn into a Mad Max scenario. That is why I look at people that have buried caches of food, guns, ammo and the like on the trail to their bug out location as being extreme. I also look at people that have dozens and dozens of EBR's and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammo as being extreme. The truth is more likely somewhere in the middle, we will continue a downward economic slide that may end in a depression. But I seriously doubt we will ever see a complete economic or social collapse of our society.

But here, you see, is where we begin to get down to the brass tacks specifics.

The more specific we become the better tailored the suggestions for how to prep can be.

In the scenarios that YOU envision then many of these preps your outline would not be the best way to expend ones resources.

But in the scenarios that OTHERS envision they may very well be.

Only time is going to tell who is wrong and who is right.

FWIW my preps are probably a lot more similar to yours than the folks who are going the Mad Max route. But that's because I've thought about and came to my own conclusions of what me and mine are ever likely to have to cope with. Others may go through the same analysis only to come to a different conclusion. Part of the joy and the hurt of being free citizens is that we get to live with the consequences of the decisions we made for good or ill.

My personal goal is to live to at least 102 years of age and never need a dang one of the preps that I made (other than the stuff we use in our everyday lives). It can all sit there in their storage containers until I have died of old age and my kids can deal with it. Hopefully they'll all be able to gather around me just before The End, drink my best whiskey, and laugh about what a ---- fool Alan was to have squirrelled away that stuff for all those decades.

And I'll laugh and laugh with them for I will have won my game. Oh yes, I will have won my game.

[Ernie]

Originally Posted by FyredUp

Okay, I am not stupid and I understand gold, silver and a few other metals have value in our capitalistic society. Assuming we have a meltdown of some kind, depression, pandemic, apocalypse, zombie invasion...what good will these precious metals do you?

I mean seriously, if the economy has completely collapsed and you have 5 pounds of gold, and I have 1000 days of food, which one of us is richer? Your 5 pounds of gold might buy you a couple days of meals from me, and then again maybe not. What guarantee do you have that those precious metals will even be anything more than a pretty rock ever again?

There comes a point when you are "prepared enough" but still accumulating wealth. You have 2 years of food, a generator, a healthy stockpile of tools, livestock, and a series of other things you know you will need.

What else is a safe bet to put your money into other than precious metals?

According to family history, one branch of my family (the one that spawned me) fled out of Kentucky in the Civil War when the Union soldiers burned them out. They were allowed to take nothing but the clothes on their back, but some visionary male relative of mine had cached some silver coins, which suddenly became their entire net worth. After the war, they weren't able to prove they'd owned land or anything else since the Union soldiers had also torched the courthouses and all records (common practice in a genocide).

For its portability and stability, nothing beats precious metals. It would be foolish to have only silver or gold instead of food, but I feel it is EQUALLY foolish to have only food.

[tgmr05]

If someone only has 5 pounds of gold, or only 1000 days of food they have failed to prepare properly. It does not matter what it is, if it is simply one thing and is all you have. Folks whine about their 5 potatoes being worth more than 5 pounds of gold in a crisis, but seriously, you can put anything to that test. Your 1000 days of food are worthless if I have one extra bottle of water and you have none. I am taking your 1000 days of food as payment for my bottle of water, Nanananananah..... The reality is this, if your life depends on it, you may sacrifice something of greater value, simply to stay alive. So, prep accordingly, and spread out your prepping to cover as many bases as you can....

Now, how do precious metals play a role in things? That is up to each person, and what they decide to prep for and with. Precious metals have value, always have, always will. Doubt it??? Think about this, even in Mad Max type SHTF, would you simply walk over a gold coin without picking it up because it is worthless? Would you walk over a pearl, or a silver coin? Some things are simply valuable, no matter the time. That gold coin could buy you a house, a business, a place on the town board, or that bottle of water you need to stay alive. Should you buy only precious metals?NO. But if you had a 1000 days of food, and enough gold to buy a 1000 days of food, which would you rather have to tote around if you had to leave your location and flee? The smart thing would be to carry as much food as you can, along with some gold. You would be amazed at how many days of food you can carry if stored in gold coins, versus the food. Same for water, same for shelter. Still does not mean you should only buy precious metals, though. BUT it does show what precious metals can do for you.

[Ohio dreamer]

Well said Ernie, as usual.

[FyredUp]

First of all, I never said I don't have any precious metal. I have old silver coins. I do not have any gold.

Prep as you will, I wasn't criticising your decision.

My belief is my money is better spent on other things.

As for how I will fund my retirement. I am debt free and have a small nest egg set aside. Assuming things don't go totally caflewy I have a pension as well as a deferred comp account.

[Ernie]

Originally Posted by FyredUp

First of all, I never said I don't have any precious metal. I have old silver coins. I do not have any gold.

Prep as you will, I wasn't criticising your decision.

My belief is my money is better spent on other things.

As for how I will fund my retirement. I am debt free and have a small nest egg set aside. Assuming things don't go totally caflewy I have a pension as well as a deferred comp account.

Far be it for me to give you specific retirement advice, but inflation is going to erode whatever nest egg you've set aside faster than you can even spend it.

As for the pension, well ... according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, public pensions in Wisconsin are $10.9 billion short right now. Not sure how firefighter pensions are specifically funded, but I think if I were planning on eating, living in a house, and wearing clothes in my old age I might come up with an alternate plan.

Things are ALREADY caflewy. There's rioting in Europe, Bernanke has been printing money so fast he broke his printing presses, and Russia, China, and Japan just announced they won't be using the dollar anymore. DHS just announced their plans to have a "no work" list as well as a "no fly" list.

If canning peas is to be considered "prepping 101" then precious metals should be considered the advanced course, not to be undertaken until you've accomplished the more basic goals. However it ought to be on everyone's horizon.

[pancho]

Look at what has happened to gold and silver in the last 10 years. Don't think your aspirins or potatoes would have dones quite as well.

[FyredUp]

Originally Posted by pancho

Look at what has happened to gold and silver in the last 10 years. Don't think your aspirins or potatoes would have dones quite as well.

Perhaps not. But if the world goes cow ---- tomorrow and all you have is your gold and silver, I am going to outlive you. And that is my point and the point others have made, prepping is a multi-faceted event. You and others put great value in having more gold and silver. I put more value in commodities like food, water, fuel, guns, ammunition, medicine, live stock, a garden, tools, and skills that I can barter for more food and so on. As I said to someone else, time will tell who is right and it may turn out that all the prepping in the world was for naught because it was never needed for the apocalypse.