Preparedness and Cryptocurrency
07 Jul 2020
Cryptocurrencies are one of the greatest technological innovations. Cryptocurrencies are decentralized payment systems in which ownership is demonstrated cryptographically. These units are stored in a data structure called a blockchain. There are many types of cryptocurrencies, the best known are Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Litecoin, EOS, Cardano, NEO, Dash, and Monero. So how does this relate to preparedness?
In our current world, people are being forcefully put into quarantine, businesses shut down, almost all businesses if open are operating at half capacity, all while the U.S. reserve continues to deflate the dollar. Many preppers have and continue to diversify into gold and/or precious metals in the case of hyperinflation. Some preparedness enthusiasts think that if SHTF cryptocurrencies could be a good way to diversify if we as a community buy-in. Now, I know you must be wondering- Well … if SHTF and there is no internet what good would it be? In a total SHTF scenario, yes- cryptocurrencies would not be useful, but there are plenty of other disaster situations in which you would benefit from having that crypto insurance policy.
Let me paint a picture. The U.S. dollar value has steadily gone down in the last 20 years alone. Many expert financial analysts believe we will see our generation’s “depression” in the next few years, because of the global pandemic and political uncertainty. If you have $100 in cash right now in 2 short years it would be worth much less because of hyperinflation. We haven’t even talked about the trillions of dollars in debt the U.S. is in right now. America’s balance sheet might finally implode and along with it the value of our money. This is not an “if” but a “when," because we are still to this day in over $3 Trillion of debt to foreign countries. Most people only know of the debt owed to China, but in actuality, we owe more to Japan to date. The point here is that at some point they will want to cash in on what is theirs.
Preppers are leaning towards crypto investments because it is not bank, gov, or company owned. Cryptocurrencies are also gaining traction for the below additional reasons:
- It can be completely anonymous
- The tech is distributed across millions of highly-encrypted computers around the world, meaning there’s no single point of failure/control and it can’t be hacked/corrupted.
- The value/price of cryptocurrencies aren’t correlated with disasters or geopolitical events the way a local currency is.
- There could be emergency scenarios where cash is hard to get or use, but you can still pay for things with crypto.
- You can move money across borders instantly, without insane bank fees or government permission.