This post is a follow-up on last week's post about the very real probability of a global Great Depression coming on, something that will severely affect the US and Canada, but tied to every other economies in the world.
In fact, the more advanced your country's economy is, the more affected you will be. The reason for it is discussed at length in my previous video (Breakdown of the current economical system soon ? ), but in a nutshell, technology is destroying jobs at an alarming rate while new jobs aren't being created.
We're essentially advancing ourselves out of our means of living (work) in the technologically advanced areas of the world to a point where the currency system is going to just crash to make way for another system.
In the medium to long term, its a great thing because it'll most likely lead to what futurists like myself call a "Leisure-based society" where people no longer need to work to live. The basics you need to survive and live decently is provided almost solely through automation and Artificial Intelligence while you can dedicate your time to providing value in your local community and/or the global community through what you are really good at, and what you enjoy doing etc...
Anyhow, the topic for this week was about how to survive the scary transition between the few days where the markets totally crash and your money has no value anymore, AND the unemployment + underemployment rates suddenly double.
Once again, it all comes down to being prepared for the worst, without going into panic mode here. You can't depend on the government or area services to do everything for you since they are controlled by people too, who have families they do want to take care of as well.
I'll summarize the tips here. If you want more information, please watch the video above. I'm giving a bit more information.
1. DON'T PANIC. Information is king. Just be aware that this is likely coming sooner or later, so being psychologically prepared is the first step and probably 80% of what you need to do to avoid real problems.
2. Talk about it to others. Of second importance is to try to make sure others around you also DON'T PANIC and make your life a living hell if things break down. Instead you can talk with your extended family and local community and neighbours about sharing resources, and making some of the basic living tips happen together, so everyone can be prepared together, and no one feels alone in all this.
3. Get your Basics covered:
- Housing. Make sure you own your property or land. Can't repo if you totally own it. If you don't, its best to have an alternative location you can go to with others, like a cottage, someone's owned house, just in case. Banks will likely try to get your house and you can't be sure how your rented apartment owner will react in situations like this, so best have some options to have a roof over your head at the very least (especially in winter).
- Food:
- Gardens are super easy to make, even indoors, even in winter. Just surf the web and check it out. Very cheap, and good whether or not things go bad. Eating your own veggies tastes really nice and healthy when coming from a home garden.
- Try to save up about 3 month's worth of canned goods as a reserve. They won't spoil so good for whatever reason (good or bad).
- Make sure you have access to another water source than the city water. You can easily filter drinking water using a long pipe/tube packed with soil or sand and running the city water, the river, or rainwater in there to drink on a daily basis. Tips on doing that on the web are out there, so unless you're in a place where it doesn't rain or running water, you should be good to go.
- Energy: Especially important for heating.... Don't rely on the grid to be there to serve you. You don't know. However, there are great ways you can generate your own energy for your home for less than $500. Ideas below.
- Wind Turbine: Build one from scrapyard bits and a car battery. Some parts are a little harder to find, so you may want to buy, but if you're mechanically inclined and know a bit about electricity conversion of Volts and Amps, you can do this setup totally free (or almost) and provide electricity for your whole family no problem.
- Water turbine: Same as above but instead of a wind blade (or propeller blade) spinning, your turbine is turning by hitting pallets that dip in a rapid stream. Great for cottages where there is water flowing nearby.
- Solar Energy: you can buy solar panels that will suffice for your family home for about $4000-$6000 expenditure. it'll be good for your home with all the kit working in it. However, even better is to take advantage of some programs in some states and provinces where they totally or partially subsidize the conversion of your home's whole roof to solar panels, plug it into the grid and whatever you don't use, is sold back to the power company for $1k-$2k / month. In the case of a Great Depression where the Grid isn't providing energy to people in your neighborhood, you can shift that excess energy to serve all your neighbor's houses, which is great.
Hope you all at least receive this information well and find ways to be prepared for what may come, so that the transition towards a great technological future (and way better social infrastructure) is the least painful and even perhaps positive!
Enjoy!
As always, I'm available for speaking engagements about this subject and others on request.
Sylvain Rochon
The Peaceful Revolutionary
