Bank Collapse—Surviving & Thriving in Uncertain Times
I have been asked to write an article about the recent news involving the collapse and near collapse of certain banking institutions in the USA.
This is something I have resisted because I see that many journalists, economists and commentators are doing this, and I didn’t want to add to the noise with no solution.
This is a difficult task, because I will attempt to explain something complex in less than 1,000 words. Part of the complexity is because the reasons we are in this mess are not what you hear in the press and therefore some people will look at this with disbelief.
I will begin by telling you a story:
From the late 1400s until the late 1600s there was a great empire in Europe which had an unlimited supply of money.
They had shiploads of silver continuously arriving at their ports for a little over 200 years.
They spent so much money, so much silver, that they alone created an inflation in Europe of about 3 to 1. In other words what was worth, say, $10 became $30 simply because of the amount of silver they dumped into the European economy at the time.
Their wealth was so great, that they managed to finance and create the biggest banking businesses in Italy, such as in Genoa.
In addition to their great wealth, this great empire owned about 1⁄3 of Europe, had strong economic ties to the rest of Europe and owned about 1⁄2 of the known World.
It built the biggest fleet of warships known to Man—not just one time but three times— to attack one of their sworn enemies.
In one of these attempts, they almost deforested their own country by cutting so many trees to build these ships.
This unlimited money supply allowed them to expand to every corner of the known world and their currency became the monetary standard of the World. Their currency was the monetary standard in the USA previous to, during and after the American Revolution. The US dollar as defined in the Constitution was based on the most popular coin of this European Empire.
This, the greatest empire on Earth in terms of economic power, was reduced to the dust of history and, for many years until the mid 20th century, was the backwater of Europe. Even today, its name does not conjure or convey the importance this nation had as a first rate actor on the international scene.
The enormity of their failure is such, that I bet you that even as your read this you are wondering who that could be! imagine, no one remembers them!
The biggest and most powerful Empire of Earth has been completely forgotten!
This country that I am talking about is Spain.
What happened? How could you go from being the ruler of the world with an unlimited money supply and lose it all?
That takes some doing, and some time—after all, they did have 200 years to lose it all. But even then, it takes a special talent to go broke on unlimited funds.
By the way, I am not picking on Spain, I love Spain; the food, the people, the weather, and their culture. I was raised in a country that was colonized by Spain, and I feel completely at home in Spain or in a Spanish country.
But how can you manage to go broke on unlimited money? That IS a challenge; it is not as easy as you think!
Even if you partied every single day of your life, bought every single luxury you could for yourself and all your friends, bought a mansion everywhere in the world, you would still not even scratch the surface of unlimited wealth.
Nothing that you, your friends or hundreds of thousands of people could do, would dent unlimited wealth, except one things and one thing only.
And this one thing has destroyed:
Athens
Rome
Spain
France (yes, France was a HUGE POWER)
The British Empire
The USSR
and now the United States
Can you guess what it is?
WAR drowned, bled, stifled and little by little made Spain the pariah of Europe until all nations united against it! And it died, despite their unlimited money and being the owners of 1⁄2 or more of the Known World. It was sad, and it took them 200 years to lose it all!
What do you think happens when you siphon a big portion of your income and ship it overseas for WAR?
You will never see this in the press today. You will hear convoluted economic explanations but never the root cause.
So what can you do about this as a private citizens?
Economically speaking, one of the first casualties of war is currency. Inflation is a direct result of war. As prices go up, our currency buys less and less.
Before the Vietnam War, the US government budget was more or less balanced. After Nixon removed the peg to Gold, then the spending started to increase exponentially. They needed that in order to finance the Vietnam War.
The USA was the most productive nation on Earth by far at that time. However, after 50 years of destroying our economy, printing money even more exponentially to fund even more wars.... Sooner or later, something has to give. Spain’s downfall lasted 200 years, but they were “conservative” spenders in comparison to us!
Our latest war, the “war du jour,” has simply precipitated the trend that a lot of people much smarter than I have been warning about for over 52 years.
We are basically almost at the end of the line.
From the age of 6 to the age of 9, I lived through a similar period in my country of origin, after the Marxists destroyed it.
The key to survive what is coming is the opposite of what most people are doing.
Disclaimer: I am not a financial advisor, and the following should not be construed as financial advice, and this is my personal opinion only:
Keep a portion of cash to last you about two months.
Consider switching to a credit union instead of a regular bank.
Consider investing in something physical—for example, a silver coin at the time of this writing can be acquired for about $30 and in California if you buy $1,500 or more it is exempt from sales tax.
If you have a substantial amount of cash, consider buying a property.
If you are a professional or specialist, invest more in your education and become the best at what you do that you can possibly be.
If you ever considered starting a business, now IS the time, when things are dicey. If you learn how to negotiate the bad times, when the cycle turns around, you will most certainly be in affluence.
Most importantly get to know your community personally, physically and in the flesh. Meaning your neighbors, the people around you. To survive effectively, you need a group of real, in the flesh people.
Keep about a month of food supply.
Have a generator and a short wave radio for news.
Don’t listen to the news—it is mostly propaganda, and it will be much more so as we approach increasing volatility.
A last word of advice. This War that we are currently in is not only happening overseas, it is happening here on the home front too—and here you can do something to stop its spread. Don’t contribute to it, don’t push the insanity, don’t become a part of it!
I know this may be hard to hear, especially if up until recently you thought everything was “normal” and you just tried to live your life and be the best human being you could. But it is best to be prepared.
If you are awake, kudos to you! if you are just finding out that something does not seem to add up, my praise goes to you!
Everything goes in cycles. Take California, back in the 1950s, 60s and 70s it was the land of freedom and opportunity—pretty much what Florida is today—and now we have sunk to a shadow of our former glory.
The pendulum will go the other way, but unfortunately not for a while. Nothing remains static.
Be brave, make real physical friends, create a support group, buy supplies, keep cash, move away from the “too big to fail” financial centers, invest in physical things and don’t push the insanity. Stick to your traditional American Values—after all, they created the richest country in the history of the world, surpassing even Spain!
Good luck to you!
And let me know if you need any assistance from me!
