Post by papaof2 on Nov 14, 2023 22:30:44 GMT -6
www.mypatriotsupply.com/blogs/scout/how-to-barter-in-a-post-currency-world-insights-from-post-wwii-germany
Many people could be trying to learn to barter in a matter of days after certain types of failures. Loss of power or internet communications for a matter of days would probably have more than 90% of the people unable to buy anything because the communications needed for credit/debit card usage and getting $20 bills from ATMs would be gone.
Barter might come into play if you have food and your neighbor has the ability to cook - but do you trust them enough to share food with them? Are you armed and willing to protect what you have if your "helpful" neighbor decides they want to help themselves?
Offering to share "the rest of the dozen eggs" you have is different from telling them "Let's use the oldest dozen of eggs." If you don't see the significance, don't bother reading the rest of this.
Do you have a useful amount of cash put back? Do you want others to know you have it? Does your grocery / pharmacy / Walmart have a way to ring up a purchase, accept a $20 and give you change if commercial power is off? (We have ONE grocery store close by that has limited generator power. The last big outage that one of us was there, they eventually got maybe a third of their registers powered but I don't know how many days of fuel they have.) Does the gas station have backup power to run the pumps and the satellite comms for credit / debit card use? (None close to us do.)
Some people with the prepper mindset would be good for a few days with no outside additions to their supplies, others maybe a few weeks but most are not likely to truly be ready for two or more months without the normal avenues of commerce. Among other things, no power could rapidly mean no city / county water. For people with their own well, that would be no water unless they had a hand pump or backup power. Some folks might have a year or more of food but only 60 days of Rx meds. Limited meds might be more likely for older folks but I knew a Type 1 diabetic from the time she was 4 years old until we lost her a couple of years ago. No power or no communications mean no pharmacy orders can be processed - not even adhesive bandages and alcohol. How many items have you seen with a price sticker on them? There is a UPC code and there may be a price at the front of the shelf but will the clerk be willing to go through a mostly dark store with a flashlight, pad of paper and pencil to write down prices and quantities - and the only adding machine is the calculator on her/his phone and it can't produce a tape or figure this week's discounts or scan and deduct coupons. What about people of all ages on asthma or allergy meds? What about someone with a serious allergy to peanut butter or insect stings and they have used their last EpiPen? How much fuel does the nearest hospital have for their backup generator - or do they even have a gen?
Most Rx meds rarely come in more than a 90 day supply. Some Rx pain meds are only available as a 30 day supply (been through a lot of those 30 day prescriptions over the past 3 years). What if the power failure occurs the day before your heart meds are supposed to ship? Realistically, how much could you cut back your activities so you could cut those pills in half and double their number of effective days while you waited for shipping to resume? How much OTC meds of what type does your household need? Aspercreme with Lidocaine can help with some types of joint pain but do you have enough on hand for 90 days? 9 months? What about aspirin for someone's heart?
Do you have food and a means to prepare and preserve it for a week? Two Weeks? 90 days? The stock of food can easily be expanded by always buying the shelf stable things you eat when they're BOGO - and buy 4 cans / jars / bags / boxes, not just two. You can keep most shelf stable foods in shallow cardboard boxes under the bed. If you put the leaves from the dining table in front of the boxes, they're reasonably well hidden from your hungry neighbors. Just be sure to keep that stale jar of peanut butter and the two-year-old Ritz crackers at the front of your pantry ;-) Being able to preserve food is a totally different thing. How much frozen food do you have on hand? Can you power the freezer(s) to keep that food frozen until you can eat it or can it? Do you have supplies to do that canning? Jars? Lids? Rings? Heat? If you can preserve the food, how will you prepare it for people to eat it next month? If power is off, electric cooktops don't work. Gas cooktops can be lit with a spark lighter but the majority of gas ovens have an electric igniter, not a pilot light. A Coleman stove that burns unleaded gas might be useful because there are likely to be vehicles that are not in use - but were those vehicles abandoned because they were out of gas? Are there any parts you can salvage from those vehicles?
Do you have heat or cooling? Nearly all central heat and cooling requires at least power for the blower (460 watts for the blower on our gas-fired central heat). Most cooling is with electric-powered compressors but there are cooling systems that use a flame. There are unvented gas logs for fireplaces (ours run have a pilot light, connections for LP and natural gas and remote and thermostat run from batteries), unvented wall-mounted heaters for LP and natural gas, unvented space heaters for both. Wood stoves can deliver large amounts of heat IF you have one that's correctly sized, properly installed and you have multiple cords of seasoned wood to burn. Fireplaces are better than no heat but if you can build a small stove that will fit in the firebox and vent out the damper, you will get more useful heat from those cords of wood. Do you have parts, tools, plans or ideas for building that stove? Can you close off a large portion of your house / apartment / whatever and live in a space that you can heat / cool?
Many people could be trying to learn to barter in a matter of days after certain types of failures. Loss of power or internet communications for a matter of days would probably have more than 90% of the people unable to buy anything because the communications needed for credit/debit card usage and getting $20 bills from ATMs would be gone.
Barter might come into play if you have food and your neighbor has the ability to cook - but do you trust them enough to share food with them? Are you armed and willing to protect what you have if your "helpful" neighbor decides they want to help themselves?
Offering to share "the rest of the dozen eggs" you have is different from telling them "Let's use the oldest dozen of eggs." If you don't see the significance, don't bother reading the rest of this.
Do you have a useful amount of cash put back? Do you want others to know you have it? Does your grocery / pharmacy / Walmart have a way to ring up a purchase, accept a $20 and give you change if commercial power is off? (We have ONE grocery store close by that has limited generator power. The last big outage that one of us was there, they eventually got maybe a third of their registers powered but I don't know how many days of fuel they have.) Does the gas station have backup power to run the pumps and the satellite comms for credit / debit card use? (None close to us do.)
Some people with the prepper mindset would be good for a few days with no outside additions to their supplies, others maybe a few weeks but most are not likely to truly be ready for two or more months without the normal avenues of commerce. Among other things, no power could rapidly mean no city / county water. For people with their own well, that would be no water unless they had a hand pump or backup power. Some folks might have a year or more of food but only 60 days of Rx meds. Limited meds might be more likely for older folks but I knew a Type 1 diabetic from the time she was 4 years old until we lost her a couple of years ago. No power or no communications mean no pharmacy orders can be processed - not even adhesive bandages and alcohol. How many items have you seen with a price sticker on them? There is a UPC code and there may be a price at the front of the shelf but will the clerk be willing to go through a mostly dark store with a flashlight, pad of paper and pencil to write down prices and quantities - and the only adding machine is the calculator on her/his phone and it can't produce a tape or figure this week's discounts or scan and deduct coupons. What about people of all ages on asthma or allergy meds? What about someone with a serious allergy to peanut butter or insect stings and they have used their last EpiPen? How much fuel does the nearest hospital have for their backup generator - or do they even have a gen?
Most Rx meds rarely come in more than a 90 day supply. Some Rx pain meds are only available as a 30 day supply (been through a lot of those 30 day prescriptions over the past 3 years). What if the power failure occurs the day before your heart meds are supposed to ship? Realistically, how much could you cut back your activities so you could cut those pills in half and double their number of effective days while you waited for shipping to resume? How much OTC meds of what type does your household need? Aspercreme with Lidocaine can help with some types of joint pain but do you have enough on hand for 90 days? 9 months? What about aspirin for someone's heart?
Do you have food and a means to prepare and preserve it for a week? Two Weeks? 90 days? The stock of food can easily be expanded by always buying the shelf stable things you eat when they're BOGO - and buy 4 cans / jars / bags / boxes, not just two. You can keep most shelf stable foods in shallow cardboard boxes under the bed. If you put the leaves from the dining table in front of the boxes, they're reasonably well hidden from your hungry neighbors. Just be sure to keep that stale jar of peanut butter and the two-year-old Ritz crackers at the front of your pantry ;-) Being able to preserve food is a totally different thing. How much frozen food do you have on hand? Can you power the freezer(s) to keep that food frozen until you can eat it or can it? Do you have supplies to do that canning? Jars? Lids? Rings? Heat? If you can preserve the food, how will you prepare it for people to eat it next month? If power is off, electric cooktops don't work. Gas cooktops can be lit with a spark lighter but the majority of gas ovens have an electric igniter, not a pilot light. A Coleman stove that burns unleaded gas might be useful because there are likely to be vehicles that are not in use - but were those vehicles abandoned because they were out of gas? Are there any parts you can salvage from those vehicles?
Do you have heat or cooling? Nearly all central heat and cooling requires at least power for the blower (460 watts for the blower on our gas-fired central heat). Most cooling is with electric-powered compressors but there are cooling systems that use a flame. There are unvented gas logs for fireplaces (ours run have a pilot light, connections for LP and natural gas and remote and thermostat run from batteries), unvented wall-mounted heaters for LP and natural gas, unvented space heaters for both. Wood stoves can deliver large amounts of heat IF you have one that's correctly sized, properly installed and you have multiple cords of seasoned wood to burn. Fireplaces are better than no heat but if you can build a small stove that will fit in the firebox and vent out the damper, you will get more useful heat from those cords of wood. Do you have parts, tools, plans or ideas for building that stove? Can you close off a large portion of your house / apartment / whatever and live in a space that you can heat / cool?
