Gunner Quinn
Editor’s Introductory Note: This young man is prayerfully seeking a wife. He is offering an after-marriage gift of up to $50,000 to whoever introduces him to his bride with $18,000 after their marriage and another $16,000 to the individual who provided the introduction after the first two births of healthy children born to him and his wife, for a total potential gift of $50,000. For further details, see this link to his article posted on February 24th, 2025: My Quest For a Wife.
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(Continued from Part 4.)
Gold: What one ounce can buy in a grimy world
In the event that a “collapse” occurs and there is some sort of barter event in my area, you will likely not see me or any members of our group. It is incredibly doubtful that I or any member of our group would ever show up at a barter event as we already have everything that we need and stock extra in quantity just to avoid such events. An event such as this would likely have many security and OPSEC issues, could lead to the spread of contagious diseases, and likely would involve many desperate individuals. As you win 100 percent of the unnecessary fights that you avoid, this is relatively easy win for well-prepared individuals to achieve.
There are probably some out there who have a nice stack of gold and silver and somehow think there is a gigantic value in a grimy world as things will somehow automatically adjust in value. Maybe someday, but in this scenario, not so much. I do not need your gold and silver, but you probably need the goods that I have put away for such a time as this. How much is a meal worth when you are starving? For Esau, it was his birthright that gave him a right to the first-born blessing and a double portion of the inheritance. (See Genesis 25:29-34). How much is medicine worth to you that doctors have stored away when your child is dying?
Please do not tell me that people are somehow cruel for allowing unprepared individuals to die in such a scenario if on some theoretical level they could maybe possibly could save one person. The truth is that these individuals made a series of unfortunate decisions that got them to that point and prepared people made a series of decisions that got them to this point. Some families get regular bouts of “food poisoning” or gastrointestinal illness, but we do not as we have studied proper techniques of food preparation and sanitation to break cycles of illnesses and disease. I have had people tell me that it does not matter how they prepare or store their food and they are often the ones regularly writhing in pain. I learn very quickly, but some are slow learners.
There is a preparedness concept called “triage” and you should learn it sooner rather than later, as survivalists use it. We have limited resources. We made sacrifices to get to where we are, and we make decisions based on that. We have stored thousands of pounds of food and supplies including another large amount recently purchased for charitable purposes to distribute to people in genuine need in a collapse scenario. My conscience is very clean as my family has spent decades encouraging preparedness with others and yet few have listened. Temporarily saving people who will die anyway would just expend our limited resources.
Since you are probably wondering what an ounce of gold would buy in a grimy world in this scenario, it is probably not much. Gold’s value is only in what people are willing to trade for it. Right now in early February 2025, gold trades for more than $2,800 per ounce. (Twenty Eight Hundred Dollars an ounce. Just take than figure in.) Gold at the turn of the century traded at almost 90 percent less — or you could easily purchase one ounce of gold for less than the price of one 1/10 ounce bullion Gold Eagle today. It is not gold that is worth so much, but people have been placing a gigantic risk premium on dollars over the past 25 years.
I cannot emphasize this enough: Buy the supplies that you can afford now, because currently they are historically inexpensive. In an economic collapse scenario, I do not foresee people who have stored their supplies often sacrificing their pleasures today to save resources willing to trade scarce goods for small or even large amounts of gold or silver. There are many people today who are living great lives and saving nothing tangible for tomorrow. They are living the “good life” now and are putting nothing aside. If the gold is really gilding and becomes grime, they will likely regret their choices. Frankly, I am very blessed that I live a great life, have resources to prepare, and give generously to those in genuine need,. But that is a function of my family being involved in preparedness for three generations.
This is a theoretical discussion for nothing has happened and nothing is being offered by me for “sale.” I cannot see people who have put away supplies parting with them for very small amounts of “precious metals” as that is their “legacy” inventory unlikely ever to be replaced perhaps for decades. Western Europe did not achieve the level of sanitation and civilization of the late Roman Empire in the 4th century again until the 1800s. So, in the event of a collapse, rebuilding could take some time depending on the level of damage, the number of technicians available, and the re-establishment of law and order. A shrewd businessman must always consider his replacement cost. Perhaps pounds of precious metals may buy you something in trade when an item is truly scarce and you need it.
I have the benefit of a vast collection of catalogs and magazines showing the prices of the past, because family members have saved them. Swiss-made water filters back in the 1980s were selling for about $150 each and recently I saw them for under $250 each. One hundred fifty dollars was a lot of money back in the 1980s. So the price of water filters has actually decreased relative to the overall price level increase, with inflation. Consider a grain mill: Yes, grain mills have increased in price over the years and according to my research have more than doubled in price in the past 25 years. It would not be unrealistic that if someone asked for an ounce or even a pound of gold in exchange for a water filter or hand crank grain mill in such a scenario. There is a lot of gold and silver in circulation, but how many people have extra water filters or hand-crank grain mills on their shelves?
So many people think a monster box of U.S. Silver Eagles (500 one-ounce U.S. Mint silver eagles are in a plastic monster box) will be able to buy so much in a grimy scenario, but will it? As this is being written, I have seen a monster box recently offered for a little over $18,000 with a $5 premium over spot, per ounce. If you are extremely heavy on metals, but light on preps, wouldn’t it be better to be a little more diversified and have equipment of your own and some backups in case your barter plans do not work? Note that I am not saying go out and buy a bunch of stuff that you cannot afford. But if you are solely depending on barter trade in an emergency, then you may find that the trades are not in your favor. Gold and silver are actually fairly plentiful, but survival items are not. How many water filters are for sale even in a large city, but how many coin and jewelry shops are there filled with inventory? Finding a hand-operated grain mill for sale in most major cities is even more rare than finding a water filter for sale.
Food Storage is Key
All of this writing about grain mills makes me think of food. Stored food is one of the key preparations that is often very neglected. Food storage will be absolutely critical and there are very few excuses not to store it. Even if you are in an apartment, you could have some limited food storage in case of some type of disruption such as an unusual winter storm. In our country, we have become very spoiled with having large amounts and varieties of food available to us in a historically abnormal pattern. One day the historical norm could revert to the historical average and food could become scarce again.
Only about 20 percent of Americans have read the Bible cover to cover. Since the following account is in Second Kings which is about halfway through the Old Testament most people have not heard of this tragic story of hyperinflation, cannibalism, betrayal, and a broken king:
“And it came to pass after this, that Benhadad king of Syria gathered all his host, and went up, and besieged Samaria. And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until a [donkey’s] head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a cab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
And as the king of Israel was passing by upon the wall, there cried a woman unto him, saying, Help, my lord, O king. And he said, If the Lord do not help thee, whence shall I help thee? out of the barnfloor, or out of the winepress? And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow. So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son. And it came to pass, when the king heard the words of the woman, that he rent his clothes; and he passed by upon the wall, and the people looked, and, behold, he had sackcloth within upon his flesh.” (2 Kings 6:24-30)
Most people are not familiar with these Biblical concepts, so I will provide a little background on what occurred: During a protracted siege, there was so little food that a donkey’s head became worth over 32 Troy ounces of silver — what 80 pieces of silver was worth back then. So you can imagine the desperation of people who would pay the equivalent of $1,000 for a donkey’s head, which contains very little nutrition. The “dove’s dung” was not a deal either costing about two ounces of silver for very little. The people became so desperate that they resorted to making deals of eating each other’s children to survive with one woman unfortunately getting the worst deal as she and another woman made a meal of her son and the other woman’s son was supposed to be a meal tomorrow, but she hid him and the woman who “cooked” her son was asking the king for justice because the other woman did not go through with the “deal.” The king was so upset that he tore his clothes revealing that he was secretly suffering by wearing very uncomfortable clothes (sackcloth, where the phrase “sackcloth and ashes” is often used) under his robes to suffer along with his people.
The first time I heard that account it turned my stomach, but I was reminded as a child that unfortunately this is the historic norm. We are living in an age of abundance which could end at any time. There is no guarantee of how long food will continue to be plentiful.
It is Time to Prepare
Some of you reading this are fathers with children. So you need to develop and implement a plan now, when the lights are on if you are to have the best possibility of surviving for when the lights are off. I cannot emphasize this enough. The circumstances of the present day are likely merely an interlude, an intermission, a pause. This is not a permanent and perpetual golden age. That has never happened before in the cycles of human history.
(To be concluded tomorrow, in Part 6.)
Read the full article here