41–50 of 254 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you don’t get paid interest at a bank, and no brokerage is going to take you on (or you don’t trust them), then what else are your options?
I mean isn't that the reason preppers love gold/silver bullion?
The “real” gold and silver people use it to avoid taxation. The high spreads and illiquidity are less than what you owe the tax guy or your ex-wife.
I guess we live in a time when cash is now a scary thing. This is kind of funny... And makes me feel old.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The precautionary savings of physical cash may even be on the rise as people realize how easily their economic lives could be switched off in an instant in the increasingly digital world, whether by being intentionally targeted or accidentally disabled with a lot of bureaucracy slowing down the correction. Having enough cash under your mattress that authority figures can't easily take from you is a psychological comf…
Pseudo-relevant anecdote: I wanted to buy a used car a few months ago off someone on Facebook. We were meeting up same day so the easiest method seemed to be cash. I went to the bank to withdraw $7000 and was informed, much to my surprise, that it is impossible to withdraw more than $3000 without 48 hours notice. Suffice it to say, I've been seriously considering the tradeoffs of hoarding cash under my mattress.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
But there is also a record level of natural disasters in term of flood and fire. I wonder if an unusual level of cash was destroyed
Fire/water proof safes aren't terribly expense. Also, safe deposit boxes are an option, which have different security tradeoffs from a safe in your home.
And fire-proof safes aren't "fire proof". They're generally rated for a reasonable amount of fire resistance - 1 to 2 hours - which is usually enough time for a house to burn down around them and be extinguished (they also only promise to protect paper, for example).
Whether they would survive the inferno of a bushfire, wherein the house is not extinguished, is far less clear.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean isn't that the reason preppers love gold/silver bullion?
i've never understood how this would work in these doomsday scenarios. are people going to walk around with scales to weigh the gold for every transaction as well as test the purity of the gold? are they going to mint their own coins? I just don't see how it's supposed to work
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean isn't that the reason preppers love gold/silver bullion?
i've never understood how this would work in these doomsday scenarios. are people going to walk around with scales to weigh the gold for every transaction as well as test the purity of the gold? are they going to mint their own coins? I just don't see how it's supposed to work
Which gave way to IOUs from gold smiths, since carrying large amounts of coins was still hard. Which, well, everyone knows the rest.
I have like $200 cash just sitting in my room for years in case I need it for something that doesn’t take debit or credit like a carnival trip (I haven’t carried cash, ever, in years). I wonder how many others do the same? It adds up I imagine.
i've got ... ~$1000/cash in the house. There's an occasional consideration of regional power outages where we might need to leave the area for a day or two (has happened yet, but we came close twice). Mostly useful to pay handyman/lawn guys now and then, then top it up now and then. Have considered holding on to a bit more, but we've never really needed more than a few hundred at any one point, so not sure there's much utility.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
But there is also a record level of natural disasters in term of flood and fire. I wonder if an unusual level of cash was destroyed
Fire/water proof safes aren't terribly expense. Also, safe deposit boxes are an option, which have different security tradeoffs from a safe in your home.
I also have 1 real US dollar that I keep in my wallet as a reminder, it was minted in New Orleans in 1901, it's 120 years old, and can't be inflated away like Johnson sandwiches or paper money.
There is a lot of rumor and speculation about very benign things. 1. Precautionary savings. In a low interest rate environment, there is not the same penalty for holding cash as getting interest in a savings account. A lot of people find it prudent to have a buffer of cash, say enough to cover 1 month of expenses. So cash withdrawn from an ATM but put into a piggybank or under the mattress will appear here as "missin…
The precautionary savings of physical cash may even be on the rise as people realize how easily their economic lives could be switched off in an instant in the increasingly digital world, whether by being intentionally targeted or accidentally disabled with a lot of bureaucracy slowing down the correction. Having enough cash under your mattress that authority figures can't easily take from you is a psychological comf…
Not to mention close to zero rates on savings.