Cash only and bank failures possible?
 

Hello,
I love the vast knowledge and great wealth of experience you guys have here so I ask this question (because I know you guys will give a honest, straight forward answer) based on what I am reading on the internet, my question is:

Do you think if china, russia, iran, etc decides to have big balls and attack our power grid, will that have an effect on our banking systems and us having access to our money. is this likely? I ask this because lets say our banking power grid goes out nationwide, and we dont have access or the ability to go to an atm and get money out (this could be for days, weeks or even months in a worse case scenario) how do people survive if their bank funds get turned off. or if electronic cash registers lose power. how do you pay for things like groceries? do you recommend maybe going cash only so in case this happens you would have cash on hand? again, how likely of a scenario is this and is cash only the way to go? Will cash always be king?

No

Seems someone has been watching too many Generac generator commercials.;):D

thanks guys, I guess I cant believe everything that I read on the internet nowadays!

More true than ever.

Well . . . Cash IS King!

Could always try using baseball cards as currency. :D

It's statements like this that make this account difficult to take seriously lol

Well, I read on the Internet that I will be underwater in ten years unless I repent my beliefs, I am treating that as the gospel truth.

you funny guy! I like!

I don't see a major problem unless there's a prolonged outage nationwide. All the critical systems have power backups. So while the ATM or point of sale terminal might be down for lack of power - and in some case the stores have backup power- there won't be much disruption. If it's 100% of the country and lasts a week or more, maybe? But the account info is probably also on servers that aren't US based.

Consider how long parts of Texas were without power, and unless you dealt directly in those areas or lived there, there wasn't much impact at all.


I do see some things shifting gradually to cash.
After years of me resisting using my debit card for anything, (very early on there were fees to use it.) I finally stopped insisting on getting cash. Like going to the bank and writing out a check to cash and cashing it like the olden times:D ....

As soon as I do though one of my favorite sub shops went back to cash only with a fee charging ATM inside the place.
And during the pandemic, another favorite restaurant went cash only for eat in but still takes cards for pickup. Both said it was because of the processing fees.

Thank you Steve, I appreciate your thoughts on this. I also noticed a few places lately having signs saying "cash only" (but they also have an ATM inside to get cash) and I even saw a restaurant that said on the menu that if you pay cash, the price is cheaper and at my local gas station if you pay cash the price is cheaper.

Could be different in different locations. In the location I live in the part I made bold has to be worded as using cash gives you a discount from the normal price. It is illegal to charge more than the normal price for using a card.

Several places I know have a minimum amount for using a card. It is also why most things cheap are now expensive. Too many people buying a $.75 candy bar or soda and nothing else using a card. The store would actually lose money on those transactions so now $.75 items are $2.

Stores won’t have money either if there was as severe a banking collapse as you’re imagining and I would think cash at that point would not buy you much. Commodities would be king not useless money.

Thanks guys, I appreciate your thoughts on this. I know a lot of countries are trying to figure out how to disrupt our lifes in the next couple to few years if things don’t change for the better so I’m trying to get ahead of the game and prepare as best I can.

Move to a very rural area and hoard food, guns, and bullets. It is the only way to survive. Also hoard silver and gold because the farmers will charge a tariff to use the roads.

My area has had the "discount for cash" at gas stations for decades. Same thing about the wording, which has always struck me as a big loophole, since there isn't any real difference between a discount for cash and charging more to use a card besides how the signs are worded.

I did once see a place with a discount for cash, with a second sign saying debit cards were not cash, and a third sign saying checks were not cash either.
I wanted to know the story, but it seemed a bit of a sore point, so I didn't ask.

If you have hoarded guns and ammo, you will get to use the road for free... one way or another.

Of course, you might not get any food then, unless you grow your own.

It is error and variation card investments that are going to put us under water Cliff

Yeah, that’s what I meant, in ten years I won’t be able to give away 63 Topps missing borders, 74 Topps yellow ink bombs, or 76 Topps blue dots error cards :D.

Is that a revision, Cliff, or are you just repeating the one you read over 20 yrs ago?

I’m not saying another word out of abject fear of conjuring up you know who :eek:.

LOL. Don't blame you. :D

Cash is king and only for the Eastern North Carolina Mom & Pop's Barbecue, no credit cards or checks

Well, it is true that if we get hit with an EMP weapon (electro magnetic pulse) anything with a computer or a computer chip will get fried. Cars, electrical grids, water supplies, cash registers, cell phones, gas pumps etc.

It is estimated that if an EMP is detonated by ballistic missile 200 miles above the USA or yet by an even better delivery system, such as a balloon - (sound familiar?) that 90% of our population would be dead within a year.

The good news is that old cars and aircraft would still be able to run until they run out of gas and maybe coal powered trains which would be tough to find.

On that note have a nice day!

As far as I know the only way to generate an EMP of that magnitude is to explode a nuclear weapon in high atmosphere above your target. If you're going to do something like that, you'd just drop the bomb on your target.

Doesn't seem like a practical thing to worry about.

If you live in SoCal, it is more or less an article of faith that when the San Andreas Fault finally pops, we will spend up to 2 weeks or so at home holed up without electricity or water. We stock our pantry and emergency supplies accordingly. A calamity affecting the power grid, like a terrorist attack in CA or, apparently, breathing hard on the grid in TX, is the same idea, so same prep. There are some benefits to living in SoCal, though, that outweigh the risk of an earthquake, like excellent universities:

https://photos.imageevent.com/exhibi.../caligirls.jpg

I don't really want to get into a debate on this, but the first part of that meme, ie. "NASA now admits..." does not correlate with what is currently on the NASA.gov website.

Statistics can also be twisted to fit a narrative, which is maybe what the person who made that meme did. I really don't know, because they didn't state their source, but the first statement in that meme appears to be BS, so how can you trust the rest of it?

Here is the direct link, which may be difficult to explain away:

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/arctic-sea-ice/

The meme in question

The other big advantage to this is that you're then not dependent on a city water supply, which could run out, be knocked out, or become polluted. Living on a lake and having my own well does give me peace of mind. When solar panels become efficient in Minnesota, I'll add a few of them too.

Attachment 579859

LOL, or stop drinking heavily.;)

Doesn't have to be a big nuke, its the enemies way of killing you without actually killing you...

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard...er-than-losses
https://climate.nasa.gov/explore/ask...lobal-warming/
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/im...ier-is-growing

I'd say the meme is 100% spot on, but if you think otherwise, I don't blame you, as, just like the news about covid and vaccines, the news changed/flip flopped about 100 times since the first report.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/08/us/gl...rnd/index.html

Can you tell me what the ideal temp is supposed to be and at what point in time in the earth's history has the climate never changed?

"To alcohol, the cause and solution to most of life's problems"

-Homer Simpson

Dale, I am talking specifically about this statement:

NASA now admits polar ice has increased beyond its 1979 volume and there's been no significant warming in 18 years.

None of the links you posted give evidence to the above statement. Some of them refute it.

The first link talks about SNOW accumulation being a factor, but it still points to "thinning glaciers".

The 2nd link you provided you may not have actually read beyond the headline, as it actually gives more evidence to global warming:
Your 3rd link refers to a single Greenland glacier, the same one mentioned in your 2nd link. We should be more concerned about polar ice in general, not just one glacier. even if it is a large one. The world has over 200,000 glaciers. The 3rd link also states this:

So let's completely ignore the fact that this glacier has spent "decades in retreat", and instead focus on a one to three year span in which the glacier has grown thicker. It also mentions that this short term growth is related to cool ocean water, not an absence of global warming:

Later in the article:

So the glacier is not growing because global warming is a myth, it is growing due to a shift in a climate pattern (ie. NAO) which simply brings colder water to the North along Greenland's west coast where that particular glacier exists.

It does not seem like you read these articles beyond the title, as the content within the articles actually lend more scientific evidence towards global warming. And again, none of the articles you posted lend any evidence that "NASA now admits polar ice has increased beyond its 1979 volume and there's been no significant warming in 18 years."

No, Dale, I cannot tell you what the ideal temp is supposed to be -- I admit I am not an expert. And just because the Earth's climate has changed drastically many times over the course of millennia, that does not mean that man made factors are not having an effect now or over the course of the last few hundred years. Those two ideas are not mutually exclusive -- both can exist at the same time.

It is also possible that global warming does exist, AND there are people and governments out there that can profit massively due to this scientific fact. Again, both things are not mutually exclusive.

I'll keep believing the science, you keep reading and posting the Reddit memes created by some 23 year old sitting in his basement.

Pulls up a 2 month old post then continues on and on with a bunch of other global warming blah blah blah and says "he doesn't really want to get into a debate about it". Hmm.

I'll tell you what, CW, as I don't want to ruin your day nor drag you into a debate you don't want, I'll just leave it by saying you go right ahead and continue to trust those scientists of your choosing and I'll continue to choose and trust those that have been silenced, shunned and shamed instead like I did with those medical experts regarding covid and the vaccines.

However, if you ever figure out what the ideal temp is supposed to be or when the 8 yrs is suppose to start before we're out of time to safe the planet, I'll be all ears.

In 75 years you and I will have to eat crow and admit we were wrong and they were right, the only problem is I will be 131 years old and I imagine you won’t be too far behind. Maybe we can make archival mea culpa videos that will pop up in 75 years.

I guess it will never cease to amaze me, Cliff, what some people will believe just because it comes from their govt's mouth and their funded media propaganda sites. :(

First it was "we only have 10 yrs to save the planet as all the ice, snow and cold weather will be a thing of the past. NY, Florida and other cities/states/countries will be underwater in 10 years (said over 30 yrs ago) but since none of that happened, and actually the opposite did, they now say "due to global warming" we are seeing an increase in ice, snow and cold and the sheep lap that right up just like they did with the original narrative. But trust the science!!!! :rolleyes:

https://twitter.com/wideawake_media/...NEv9QA26s%3D19

Well I'm about ready to gather 2 of every animal after the rains here in NY

Oh no, they got to you too? :D

I've always been somewhat annoyed at Noah for bringing along 2 mosquitoes.

Now with the current world situation since the last post, anyone new updates/thoughts on “cash is king” “don’t trust banks” “invest in silver or coins as a hedge” etc, etc

I actually do. Taking the advice of this board, I have begun to prepare for Native American and farmer run toll roads and began disposing of my stock portfolio, cash reserves, arms and ammunition to purchase pure silver instead. When the end times are brought by whatever situation people are upset about, I will be prepared. I can't trust the banks but I can trust the silver pushers.

Just remember, whatever they tell you to do, "it's for the greater good" and your compliance would be appreciated. ;)

Pure silver, darn. I have been selling off everything to buy shiny beads, malt liquor, and cheap Canadian whiskey.

I have begun salting fish and regularly carry a can of sardines in my pocket in case I need to buy passage in a pinch.

Crap, I hadn’t thought of this. I should have asked the board if I should go all silver or diversify into other assets. I’ll see if I can trade a plate carrier for malt liquor. I want to be prepared for the collapse of the banks and civilization as we know it.

I’m collecting marbles now because marbles will be in high demand then! I can also barter with my uncle Elmer’s stamp collection in a dire situation. (To buy food and water) but I’ll keep my slingshot at all costs so I can hunt rabbit and sell their hides to the trappers that might come by! Oh and I’ll stock up on batteries and lard.

You are a better prepper than I!

Yes, and I make a great possum stew and also figgy pudding! (Grandma Ethel’s family recipe) I just wonder if my collection of soda pop can pull tops will come in handy?

I remember making chains out of the old pull tops so they will be extremely useful.