Dollar failing, whats the alternative?

I have been wondering about this lately, and i keep seeing things pop up here and there about dollar falling and inflation, and money being pumped into the system etc etc... realistically if the prices are going up it doesnt mean the things are becoming more expensive, its the dollar thats loosing its value because the government keeps pumping more cash into the system.

So looking at it from a point of view that the government is trying to make the dollar to fail, so a new currency is brought in, or so people work harder and earn less, whatever the reason, what can you do with your hard earned cash before it shrinks to toilet paper??

I was thinking doing a currency exchange, but i doubt that will do any good at all, just more headache. also i was thinking maybe investing into vehicles that might be in need when times are hard, for instance 4x4 SUVs. Im also thinking into getting a house here in a few months, seems like it would be a smart choice as well. Buying a secluded piece of property with a few acres, trying to maybe get ready to live of the land, maybe not far from river or lake for water, and not far from forest to possibly hunt if needed

I was also thinking maybe buying gold coins and saving them, because once the dollar fails, gold will be great for buying bulk supply of food, vehicles, other items, land?

If a new currency is to go into effect, im assuming at that point the dollar will be barely holding on, and owning it then would be almost pointless?

what do you guys think, what are you doing with your hard earned cash, what are you investing in, please share for those of us who are aware of whats coming and to also be prepared and have a back up plan for the cash we have earned.

the alternatives are :

1) Gold
2) silver
3) Yuan (currency of China, the only economic-financial superpower of the world)

4) platinum (problem is its too expensive)


off course investment in diamonds,rubies and other gems is favourable

A Tough Question:

I am torn between buying a bit of Gold and some silver.... (Gold is so damned expensive)

OR


Brass & Lead & Copper & Tin.... (Ammunition an canned Food that is)


I have a feeling the latter may go up in value more than the gold & silver but it is 50/50 for me right now.



[edit on 31-1-2009 by infolurker]

Salt, soap, food supplies and such. Since if dollar would fall, it will take down economies of all the countries in the world - including "only economic-financial superpower". Maybe Zimbabwe will remain as it is - since sinking lower it simply cannot.

I do not think that dollar will fail - nobody will let it fall. But if i did i would be stocking supplies in tons. It will cost more then gold or even platinum if your scenario will be correct.

The only alternative is to realize that we are more than our money makes us.

The only way to beat the coming storm is to find a new priority in our lives beyond financial gain or social status.

You don't need a new iPod.
You don't need the latest mobile phone.
You don't need a new car if you have one that works.
You don't need to spend a few $ on McDonalds when you could buy more ingredients and cook yourself a decent, healthy meal.
You don't need branded clothes made in sweat shops where kids are paid $5 a week.

Live within your means, shop wisely, and only when you have to.

If you feel you have to invest, invest in local farming, growing your own produce, finding alliances and community who can support each other.

Nothing financial is stable.
Buying Gold or Silver will do what exactly if the time comes when the $ collapses?
Where are you going to take it? What are you going to exchange it for? Who is going to accept them when they have little chance of finding another trader interested in metals?

Stock up on essentials, make a plan, form alliances within your community, seek sources of essentials away from the supermarkets and corporate giants.

Most importantly, detach yourself from the value a piece of paper holds, it's meaningless.

Originally posted by ZeroKnowledge
Salt, soap, food supplies and such. Since if dollar would fall, it will take down economies of all the countries in the world - including "only economic-financial superpower". Maybe Zimbabwe will remain as it is - since sinking lower it simply cannot.

I do not think that dollar will fail - nobody will let it fall. But if i did i would be stocking supplies in tons. It will cost more then gold or even platinum if your scenario will be correct.

I suggest you refer to economist Peter Schiff on this issue , according to him , China will not collapse, while USA will ...

China is already giving massives stimuluses to its internal economy , and yes Yuan is on the verge of becoming a global reserve currency

The advice to buy gold has haunted me for a while now, but I keep getting stuck on the notion of what to do with it once you have it. Where do you keep it so its safe and secure? How do you buy a gallon of milk with it? If everything collapses, who do you trust to give you fair exchange if that is what you have to do?
It just doesn't seem at all practical.

Gold and Silver eh? Outside of very specialized uses I can't see a lot of practicality to converting paper money over to these supposed precious metals. Say what you want about them always holding 'value' but i would much rather have something that actually has use. A bar of gold wont till a garden for me, field dress a deer, or pump water.

this is why buying metals seems so... not as smart as some make it seem. As some have stated, it would be hard to buy stuff with it, hard to determine its value, and not many will believe thats its pure gold either if you were to exchange it. Back in the day they had all sorts of ways to check, they could feel it taste it. Now its just a piece of metal that anyone can spray Gold on it and start scamming people.

So yes Gold doesnt seem as practical as some say, it might be just as useless, not because it will be worthless, but i think because nobody will believe how much its worth, and scammers will try taking advantage of people by making fake Gold.... couldnt exactly fake gold 2000 years ago, they didnt have gold spray cans haha

As for the property, land, garden, supplies, seems the best solution.

Im currently in the process of changing jobs, if things go well then i would be able to buy property in a more secluded area, the tri to work would still be a bit longer than i would like, but it would be about 30-40 minutes closer than at my present work location.

If God permits, and we have faith in Him then im sure He will provide as long as we dont give up and sit on our butts whinning. A lot of people give up to fast to easy, then they wonder why God isnt helping them.... well, He doesnt want to make you, and wants you to have a choice in being lazy. problem with america is, lazy is a priority

Originally posted by sadchild01
the alternatives are :

1) Gold
2) silver
3) Yuan (currency of China, the only economic-financial superpower of the world)

4) platinum (problem is its too expensive)

Gold and platinum have nearly identical prices right now.

I see a lot of gold bashing on this thread so let me point out the big advantage of gold over food or guns. Gold is compact. You can hold 10 pounds of gold in your hand and yet it's worth $150,000. You can hide it anywhere.

Everyone should have some gold stashed away.

Buy gold and stare at it.

Or, sell it....when the dollar means nothing.

Or, build a house in uncharted land.

Gold is nearly valueless during a SHTF situation - it's much more likely to make you a target than anything else.

The value of the investment metals is when the smoke clears and things are starting to go back to normal. At that point a dollar may be worth nothing at all, but the gold will still have value.

Gold is not a survival investment, in the strictest sense. It is a forward-looking, long-term capital investment, nothing more, nothing less.

More stable than T-Bills at this point, certainly, but it won't defend you, it won't feed you, it won't house or clothe you.

If you have everything you need to survive a years-long struggle against the elements and your fellow human animals, then you might consider buying gold in the interest of making the trip back up the ladder faster and more comfortable, that's it, I think.

reply to post by NickT916


The most popular bartering items will be cigarettes, liquor, silver, gold, long lasting foods... no matter how bad things get, food, cigarettes and liquor will always be worth something.

Originally posted by sadchild01


I suggest you refer to economist Peter Schiff on this issue , according to him , China will not collapse, while USA will ...

China is already giving massives stimuluses to its internal economy , and yes Yuan is on the verge of becoming a global reserve currency

China's economy won't fail according to this guy huh???? Think again my friend!

I've never heard of this Peter Schiff guy But I do know one thing. The U.S. has the largest economy in the world! And if the U.S. Economy completely collapses so will every economy in the world including China's!!!

Notice how when the U.S. economy slowed it started dragging down everyone elses including China's? with globalization if the largest economy gets in trouble it brings down the next smaller one, which brings down the next and the next and the next until eventually it collapses every economy. Now if the smaller economies slowed before the larger economies it wouldn't be so bad as the larger economies would absorb the stress of the smaller economies.

If any other economy would have taken a hit as bad as the U.S. economy has it would have collapsed them instantly! the Hit the U.S. economy took only dropped us to our knees.

I agree with Razimus The most popular bartering items will be cigarettes, liquor, long lasting foods, some barting with gold and silver but not near as much as some people think. its to easy to pass fake gold and silver off as the real deal.

Buying suv's, cars, trucks, gas powered generators, farm equipment etc., would be a waste of time. most people can't store enough fuel for them to last a year plus.

if your going to buy items, buy long lasting foods, seeds to grow your own veggies and fruits, water, ammo, if you have the land and know how to take care of them buy some cows, horses or mules, chickens, pigs. you can barter a horse, and eggs from the chickens. and you can barter the meat from a pig and cow.

and if you have a few acres you can use the horses or mules to plow your fields.

reply to post by Mercenary2007


China has all the advanced industrial complexes unlike USA firstly,

secondly , Peter Schiff is an economist , not a sheeple like you

Notice how when the U.S. economy slowed it started dragging down everyone elses including China's? with globalization if the largest economy gets in trouble it brings down the next smaller one, which brings down the next and the next and the next until eventually it collapses every economy. Now if the smaller economies slowed before the larger economies it wouldn't be so bad as the larger economies would absorb the stress of the smaller economies.

in any event of US default on loans or attempt to hyperinflate dollar, China can effectively nationalize ALL OUTSOURCED INDUSTRY , THUS delivering a deathblow to american economy ....

by the way, China is making the yuan convertible and Russia and 8 other nations have agreed to accept only yuan and euro for oil and gas payments , thus another blow to USa and + for yuan which which is on verge of becoming a reserve currency



[edit on 1-2-2009 by sadchild01]

Originally posted by NickT916
what can you do with your hard earned cash before it shrinks to toilet paper??

Use it to prepare yourself for...

get ready to live of the land, maybe not far from river or lake for water, and not far from forest to possibly hunt if needed

Originally posted by wayno
The advice to buy gold has haunted me for a while now, but I keep getting stuck on the notion of what to do with it once you have it. Where do you keep it so its safe and secure? How do you buy a gallon of milk with it? If everything collapses...

...it may be impossible to buy a gallon of milk. Better off buying a goat.

Originally posted by Helig
Gold and Silver eh? ...
...A bar of gold wont till a garden for me, field dress a deer, or pump water.

That's well said. If someone has food, who's to say in a crisis, they would want to exchange it for a piece of metal? Better off buying a good knife.

Originally posted by Make Speed Limit 45
Everyone should have some gold stashed away.

Fair enough, but I must warn you it doesn't taste very nice.

Originally posted by WyrdeOne
Gold is not a survival investment, in the strictest sense. It is a forward-looking, long-term capital investment, nothing more, nothing less.

Would be nice to have some when the smoke clears, but as you imply, the primary thing is to make it that far.

reply to post by sadchild01


yeah he's an economist alright... seems he predicted the finacial mess the u.s. is in right before it happened but looks like he's more wrong then right.

Schiff's Investment Thesis

* US Dollar Will Go To Zero (Hyperinflation).
* Decoupling (The rest of the world would be immune to a US slowdown.
* Buy foreign equities and commodities and hold them with no exit strategy.

12 Ways Schiff Was Wrong in 2008

* Wrong about hyperinflation
* Wrong about the dollar
* Wrong about commodities except for gold
* Wrong about foreign currencies except for the Yen
* Wrong about foreign equities
* Wrong in timing
* Wrong in risk management
* Wrong in buy and hold thesis
* Wrong on decoupling
* Wrong on China
* Wrong on US treasuries
* Wrong on interest rates, both foreign and domestic

ONE OF MANY ARTICLES LAYING OUT ABOUT MR SCHIFF

And my friend before you call some one a sheeple look in the mirror first! and look for more than one person that's a so called "professional" that agrees with your position.

anyone can claim the economy is going to have problems within X amount of time. they have a 50/50 chance of being right. But I just showed you a list of 12 things he "predicted" would happen in 2008 that never came to pass and is now back peddling saying he meant 2009

edit to add:
And encase you didn't know most of China's economy is already nationalized. since China is a comunist country the state owns everything. and China produces mostly cheap crap that no one is buying right now. The government of China is telling its factory workers to go back to the small villages that they came from because the factories they worked in have closed. and they can't pay them.

yeah china is going to be an economic superpower It shouldn't be to much longer and they will be worse off than the U.S. If they aren't already. Can't really gauge how bad it truly is in China with the State run propaganda i mean media.



[edit on 2/1/2009 by Mercenary2007]

reply to post by Mercenary2007


I don't remember Peter saying these things are all going to happen in 2008. So in reality, he isn't wrong because the game isn't over yet. The things you say he was wrong about are now starting to happen, albeit some slower than others. When its all said and done he will be right once again.

For example: (the dollar.) The dollar found temporary strength because of the shrinking trade deficit (29%) down to only 40 billion. the inability to continue spending and consuming has artificially and temporarily inflated the dollar. As the Obama administration fires up the printing press to continually print money and flood the markets with liquidity, what do you think is going to happen? A stronger dollar? I don't think so. I could make a case for everything you said he was wrong about, but I think you get the point.

# Wrong about hyperinflation # Wrong about the dollar

get your facts straight ,
the person had stated that hyperinflation would begin anywhere between 2008 to 2010 ...

# Wrong about commodities except for gold # Wrong about foreign currencies except for the Yen

again Peter Schiff stated that this should happen in a timeframe of 2008 to 2010

# Wrong on China # Wrong on US treasuries # Wrong on interest rates, both foreign and domestic

not even Austrian economists would agree with you , as his predictions are on a timeframe of 2008-2012 ,

anyone can claim the economy is going to have problems within X amount of time. they have a 50/50 chance of being right. But I just showed you a list of 12 things he "predicted" would happen in 2008 that never came to pass and is now back peddling saying he meant 2009

he predicted that some of the things he stated will happen in 2008 , that US financial crisis not all... please refer to his interview with Russiatoday

reply to post by Mercenary2007


peter Schiff responds and exposes fallacies on your report:

The full text of his response is after the jump.

My popularity on television and the internet has led a very small money manager to use his popular financial blog to promote his fledgling business by attacking the recent poor performance of my long-term investment strategy. The post is causing quite a stir and compels me to provide some badly needed context.

To achieve his ends, this individual has distorted much of what I have been saying and writing, and has twisted the facts to support his own preconceived conclusion. In essence, his piece is nothing more than an overt advertisement (and a highly deceptive one at that) to use my popularity to advance his career. In so doing he has given my critics, particularly some who have been embarrassed by their roles in the "Peter Schiff was Right" video, their moments of retribution. In addition, some members of the press who have never been among my greatest fans are seizing the opportunity to discredit me as well.

The crux of the blogger's arguments are that my beliefs in "decoupling, hyperinflation, and that the dollar is going to zero" have been completely discredited by the events of 2008, and that the resulting investment losses suffered by my clients last year confirms the fatal flaws in my approach.

In addition to mischaracterizing many of my beliefs, he also is confusing short-term market fluctuations with long-term economic trends.[/b

First of all, the hyper inflation issue is a straw man at best. While I often talk about the possibility of hyper inflation, I have always said that it would be a worse-case scenario that would play out over many years. The fact that it did not appear in the first year of the economic crash (2008) does not invalidate my position. I have always maintained that this worst-case scenario will likely be avoided by what will ultimately be a dramatic shift in policy once our leaders come to their senses. However, until then the dollar will likely lose a substantial portion of its value.

Second, I never said that the dollar would go to zero, either in 2008 or any year thereafter. I have said that in the event of hyper inflation the dollar's value would approach zero. My actual forecast in my book "Crash Proof" was that the Dollar Index would fall to 40 (currently about 85), with a realistic worst case scenario, assuming very high but not hyper inflation, of 20 or lower.

Third, the blogger points out that because the decoupling theory (foreign economies improving while the U.S. falters) that I wrote about in "Crash Proof" has yet to occur, that the theory itself was ridiculous. In my book I wrote that this process would not occur overnight, that initially our creditors would come to our aid, and in so doing our problems would become manifest abroad. I wrote that it would take time for the world to realize that what had been decoupled from the economic train was not the engine but the caboose. In fact, that is precisely the way it is playing out.

Chapter Ten of "Crash Proof" is specifically focused on the need to keep funds liquid to take advantage of the buying opportunity that would initially develop once our stock market began its collapse. I specifically mentioned that when U.S. stocks began to fall, we could expect sympathetic declines overseas. While I did not know the precise timing of those events, I advised readers to prepare.

I did not expect the huge dollar rally of 2008. But to discredit my long-term view of the dollar based on an eight month move is absurd. So while I believed that a weak dollar would cushion the temporary decline I expected in foreign stocks, a strong dollar ended up exacerbating it. In the meantime, I believed that the high dividends these stocks were paying would make it easier to ride out any correction. The problem was that the dollar fell so far leading up to the crisis (in 2005-2007) that by the time the crisis finally erupted the dollar was poised for a bounce.

Central to the argument that my investment thesis is wrong is the belief that the crisis is over or that the recent trends will continue until it is. But the crisis is just beginning and the movements thus far in the dollar, commodities, and foreign stocks, are mere head fakes. Once the speculators have been flushed from the markets, the underlying long-term trends I have been following should return in earnest.

To illustrate the flaws in my investment strategy the blogger has posted a client's statement that shows a loss in excess of 60%. In addition, he claims to know of other Euro Pacific clients who have experienced similar losses. The inference of course is that most, or all, of my clients must have suffered similar losses, and the existence of such losses proves that I am wrong. In fact, some have gone a step further, claiming that such losses prove that I am a fraud.

First let's deal with the one client's account. I have been following several key investment themes for the past ten years. The basis for my strategy is that recent U.S. prosperity has been false, and that the consequences of the bursting of our bubble economy would ultimately play out in a substantial decline in the value of the U.S. dollar, higher commodity prices, the re-monetization of gold, and foreign equities substantially outperforming U.S. markets. From an investment perspective, those themes played out extremely well in the eight years from 2000-2007. Recently we have seen a sharp, and I believe temporary, reversal of these trends. Those that came late to the party (at least based on where we are today) now have to ride out a particularly difficult correction.

In addition to mischaracterizing many of my beliefs, he also is confusing short-term market fluctuations with long-term economic trends.
www.usnews.com...:a41:g29:r2:c0.5:b21355269&s_cid=loomia:peter-schiff-right-on -the-crisis-wrong-on-investing.html


lol, the person who you refer to is a small money manager

small money manager

next time , use proper sources or else you will sound LIKE SORCHA FAAL