Posted on 04/17/2012 7:37:51 PM PDT by Broker
Should our fine financial system cease functioning cash will become a rare and precious medium. Over the years Americans have exchanged paper currency with confidence. Yet, today everyone's cash is a digital value out of hand. Our vast nationwide cash money market holdings greatly exceed any paper currency supply making any Bank run a momentary event. Should the financial house of cards crash, holders of green back US Dollars will be able to engage in trade. Gold hoarders will not know what to do. Credit cards won't work. Checks won't either. If you can't barter, cash will be king. Get cash and stash it. Money markets pay nothing and can't truly guarantee any liquidity when you really need it.
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When it does hit the fan, cash will be nothing but kindling and toilet paper.
Having lived through numerous hurricanes while I was in Florida, I know to keep around a several $k in cash.
However, in a crash of the magnitude you are suggesting, I believe cash won’t be worth much of anything. It will be barter. Or theft, plenty of that to go around you can be sure.
I agree there is a realistic chance we will have that crash, I just don’t see paper money as the key.
Uh, sorry, but your post makes no sense. Modern money is an abstraction. Even the “printing press” is electronic these daze. Unless electricity stops working, commerce will still go on. And if the that ever happens (aka, an EMP attack), cash will be worthless anyway.
As for the cash, don't get me wrong, things like silver/gold/ammo/water/food/ canned veges/garden/farm cannot be put into value in a really bad situation.
I've never heard of wheelbarrows full of gold being exchanged for cash in Hyperinflation Weimer.
Actually, his post makes A LOT of sense. Consider what would happen if the credit market freezes up (as it nearly did in 2008), and there is a "bank holiday", where the banks are closed for some number of days, and your credit card doesn't work and the ATMs either don't work or limit how much you can withdraw.
What are you and everyone else gonna do? Your digital dollars are worthless in the short term. How are you going to get to them? What medium of exchange are you going to use to put gasoline in your car? Cash that you have under your mattress will be king, until the crisis subsides.
Broker is wise in recommending an emergency cash stash in small bills.
As the Boy Scouts motto goes, "Be prepared."
Thanks, Broker.
Funny - just watched a review this weekend on C-Span of a book called “The End of Money” - the writer was all in favor of doing away with cash, saying we hardly need it any more except in minor cases such as tipping in airports - he did admit that cash would be essential when and if we have a societal breakdown as you suggest - he also mentioned some examples of where small comunities have voluntarily adopted their own currencies for local use - “Ithica Doillars” was one name that stood out - sort of a formalized system of barter with intermediary currency.....
My stash is in .30/06, 7.62NATO, and .45ACP.
Optimist hoard gold. Pessimists hoard brass and lead.
I think the chances of that happening are NIL because of the resulting social chaos. A more likely scenario is that the Government immediately creates more $$ out of thin air and lends it to the banks to keep ‘em afloat. Just like in 2008. Again, this is all electronic, so could happen in a matter of minutes.
I think the chances of that happening are NIL because of the resulting social chaos. A more likely scenario is that the Government immediately creates more $$ out of thin air and lends it to the banks to keep ‘em afloat. Just like in 2008. Again, this is all electronic, so could happen in a matter of minutes.
I don’t know. Barter is real work in exchange for work. Cash as an insurance I think is a bit lazy. It’s going to take some brains, for sure, to stay alive.
Yep, and haters hoard schemes of murder suicide because they know or feel they are not intelligent enough to survive,, barter, market or make anything work... and that is the liberal disease and Obama’s disease, and also the globalistas disease because they are too lazy and nincompoops as GOP RINOs to figure their arse from the back of their hand.
Walk into a Walmart and stand up front and watch people “pay” for their stuff. Very few use cash. If the debit cards stop working you better get out fast!
If the $hit hits the fan, everyone's fantasies will come true.
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