Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 341 posts

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#131

Post by dmje »

danuker wrote: post #89
dmje wrote: post #74

Diversify in as many areas as you can. In income terms, diversify away from a single source by learning new skills, training up in areas you're a bit rusty in, learning totally new ones. In savings or investments: diversify where you put them, spread them around so you're not dependent on any one scenario. In eating: eat more interesting and cheaper things. Become vegetarian, if you aren't already. In exercise: drop…

> Become vegetarian, if you aren't already. This is very healthy. But make sure to take B12 if you're going vegetarian. > Though deficiency for those starting out with adequate stores may take years to develop, the results of B12 deficiency can be devastating, with cases reported of paralysis, psychosis, blindness, and even death. https://nutritionfacts.org/topics/vitamin-b12/ Edit: To the downvoters, care to explain…

32 year vegetarian. Never had to take a supplement.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#132

Post by throwmeariver1 »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #45
throwmeariver1 wrote: post #8

Leave the city.

I'd recommend the contrary: stay or move to the city at least if you can own an apartment. - housing: pick in a flat to keep your energy costs low (neighbors heat one another), and make sure you can walk to a park or a river. Fight to make your city more walkable and bikeable, and support your local businesses. Make sure to live close to people you like or to build new relationship (can't beat cities for that!). I lo…

When economic hardship hits crime rates spike and they spike worse in cities I don't want to be even near cities with sky high rent and a big homeless population. A community doesn't need much hardship to become unstable.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#133

Post by arvinsim »

dmje wrote: post #74

Diversify in as many areas as you can. In income terms, diversify away from a single source by learning new skills, training up in areas you're a bit rusty in, learning totally new ones. In savings or investments: diversify where you put them, spread them around so you're not dependent on any one scenario. In eating: eat more interesting and cheaper things. Become vegetarian, if you aren't already. In exercise: drop…

I am confused on the suggestion to become vegetarian.

In economic hard times, one mist be picky and learn how to eat anything available.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#134

Post by pawsforthought »

CaptArmchair wrote: post #117
oDot wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Diversification is indeed the best strategy, but please do not become vegetarian on a whim. Consider the health implications it involves.

Another avenue is just being more conscious about the meat you eat. There's a difference between having meat-based products as a staple food (e.g. preprocessed meat, fast food / restaurant / take-out,...) and reducing which types of meat you eat, the frequency and where you buy meat products. For instance, a local butcher shop might offer local products, and will be more expensive. But you can offset the expense by o…

And let’s not forget that cheap meat is possible only because of industrial-scale mistreatment of animals, the abuse of antibiotics, mass devastation of the natural world to grow feed for said animals, etc., etc.

We reap what we sow. We’re killing Earth’s biosphere, and soon enough our own species will face its doom.

But hey, let’s get another bucket of chicken and keep stuffing our faces with hamburgers.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#135

Post by astrange »

mav88 wrote: post #63
pm90 wrote: post #34

Quoted post unavailable.

The problem is not the midterms. The problem is that the world has been thoroughly spooked by the West cutting off Russia from trade and payment systems. Countries like India, China and Saudi Arabia are already moving to other currencies for international trade. When that trickle becomes a flood, then the dollar will crash - because there's nothing holding it up apart from its reserve status. You already have $5 per…

Nah, the USD will be fine. Where are you going to go? China won't let you use the yuan and everyone knows they'd be even more controlling with it.

See Question D on https://www.igmchicago.org/surveys/ukraine/.

Also, USD has actually gotten stronger in the last month, and the sanctions were mostly on EUR anyway.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#136

Post by ddorian43 »

astrange wrote: post #116
ddorian43 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Become vegetarian, if you aren't already. Try keto diet, or maybe even carnivore. Save yourself first, and then look up into saving the planet.

The question wasn't about saving the planet, it was about spending less on food.

> The question wasn't about saving the planet, it was about spending less on food.

My bad. Then my answer is don't save by eating bad food. It will limit you more compared to the extra cash you'll save (unless you're poor and you have no choice).

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#137

Post by mrsuprawsm »

jiggunjer wrote: post #125
joefife wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need to be an immigrant. Vegetables are cheap in UK supermarkets. 1kg carrots - 39p https://groceries.morrisons.com/products/morrisons-carrots-2... 2.5kg potatoes - £1 https://groceries.morrisons.com/products/morrisons-white-pot... And so on. Vegetables are cheap. It's frustrating seeing people complain about food but not learn to cook. Making casserole is cheap.

Raw, yes. But I use alot more seasoning with vegetables. I spend more time chopping and simmering. And the end result just isn't as enjoyable as a steak.

With respect, this implies that you are not very good at cooking.

You can make delicious, quick and easy food both with meat and with vegetables. If you try and cook a steak like vegetables, you will have poor results. If you try and cook vegetables like a steak, you will have poor results. If you treat each ingredient - meat, vegetable, or otherwise - in its own right and cook/season appropriately, then you can and will make excellent food.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#138

Post by ddorian43 »

uxcolumbo wrote: post #122
ddorian43 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Become vegetarian, if you aren't already. Try keto diet, or maybe even carnivore. Save yourself first, and then look up into saving the planet.

So on a plant-based diet you can't save yourself? Plant-based meals require far fewer resources and is cheaper, which means maintaining societal stability when resources are becoming low - as there is more to go around. A lot of farm land is being used to grow foods for livestock. We could use that land to grow food for ourselves.

> So on a plant-based diet you can't save yourself?

I'd generally go for keto since that is more studied compared to strict carnivore.

> Plant-based meals require far fewer resources and is cheaper, which means maintaining societal stability when resources are becoming low - as there is more to go around.

But your health will (probably/maybe) be worse. There are ways to make cheap keto (ex: eating 10 eggs/day in my local area).

> A lot of farm land is being used to grow foods for livestock. We could use that land to grow food for ourselves.

Then eat grass-fed meat. I do so myself.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#139

Post by davedx »

astrange wrote: post #114
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #87

I've always found that "living at my means" has paid dividends. To many folks, 'round these parts, they'd consider it "living below my means," but that's mostly because they "live beyond their means." I avoid personal debt like the plague. If that means living in a small house, and driving an old car, then so be it. I've also found that learning to deliver software, as opposed to just "writing" software, has made me…

> I avoid personal debt like the plague. If that means living in a small house, and driving an old car, then so be it. Going into debt that you can pay off and will make you a profit is good - because making a profit is literally the thing that gets you through bad times. (That's why having savings be 100% cash is riskier than investing - you are 100% guaranteed to not have it go up.) And recent years' zero-to-negati…

Your advice might be okay for good times (investing, buying land, houses).

But in hard economic times, the global economy will be doing badly and therefore most investments will too, even housing (see 2008). Going into debt that you then invest is doubly risky: you have debt, plus you have a risky investment.

Saving cash is actually indeed the best way to prepare for hard times.

Re: Ask HN: How can I prepare for hard economic times?

#140

Post by MagnumOpus »

astrange wrote: post #123
mccorrinall wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Stocks might go sideways for quit a while. Nasdaq-100 is down 21.33% in 7 weeks. According to wikipedia a stock market crash is a decline "of over 10% in a stock market index over a period of several days". DAX declined even sharper (-16.5% in 12 days; -24% from recent highs). Just as a heads up: this is similar to the 1990's where Iraq invaded Kuwait. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 18% in three months, f…

DJIA is calculated using some unusual math on only 30 stocks and you should probably ignore it. It doesn't work the same way any other index does.

If you weren't just interested in derailing the conversation, you would have looked up how this stacks up with a better index. I did, so you might be cheered to know that the S&P 500, a cutting edge market-weight based broad index, dropped 20.2% from 1990-07-03 to 1990-10-11 compared to the DJIA's 18%.
Post reply on HN