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Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

newyorker.com

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Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#111

Post by 1812Overture »

beachstartup wrote: post #26
ratsbane wrote: post #7

I've got a titanium spork and some dental floss in my backpack and in the trunk of my car I've got a hi-vis vest, white hard hat, and a two-way radio. Am I missing anything? Are some of these prepper people are missing out on the key concept that to live by your wits you need wits? Or maybe they're aware of that and that's why they stockpile the shotgun shells and dehydrated water capsules...?

if you found yourself in the middle of koreatown during the 1992 LA riots, do you think that stuff in your trunk would get you very far?

This is why I keep a roof Korean in my trunk.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#112

Post by 1812Overture »

che_shirecat wrote: post #32

>He is less focussed on a specific threat Call me a nit, but why are there typos in an article from the new yorker? Edit: apparently doubling the consonant is something they just do - http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-double-l

The New Yorker intentionally uses a bunch of archaic spelling and grammar to look smart despite the often mediocre content of what they're saying.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#113

Post by rabboRubble »

throwaway2016a wrote: post #10

> To protect his wife and daughter, he said, “I don’t have guns, but I have a lot of other weaponry. I took classes in archery.” This whole article reads like some surreal parody of what eccentric SV mil/billionaires would do. Although I suppose there is probably some truth that in a post apocalyptic / post rule of law world... the person in the big house with the expensive stuff to loot probably has a huge target on…

Yeah, all talk about emergency bags and archery, zero talk about earthquake proofing their damn houses in California.

Sort of missing the point of emergency preparedness, methinks.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#114

Post by sjg007 »

tossaway322 wrote: post #57
ratsbane wrote: post #7

I've got a titanium spork and some dental floss in my backpack and in the trunk of my car I've got a hi-vis vest, white hard hat, and a two-way radio. Am I missing anything? Are some of these prepper people are missing out on the key concept that to live by your wits you need wits? Or maybe they're aware of that and that's why they stockpile the shotgun shells and dehydrated water capsules...?

+10 on the dental floss. I've been trying to find a way to buy (the remainder of) a lifetime's supply in case of thermonuclear war. Once out of floss, I can either pull my teeth out (Well, OK, every _other_ tooth) or kill myself. Life w/o floss is unimaginable.

Floss actually isn't necessary and its benefits haven't been scientifically proven. Sugar is the enemy. Drink water.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#115

Post by bootload »

bootload wrote: post #104

“I typically ask people, ‘So you’re worried about the pitchforks. How much money have you donated to your local homeless shelter?’ This connects the most, in my mind, to the realities of the income gap. All the other forms of fear that people bring up are artificial.” I like Max Levchins idea behind this statement. The underlying anxiety shown by a lot of the characters interviewed in this article display a real huma…

another example: "Hawaiians call Mark Zuckerberg 'the face of neocolonialism' over land lawsuits" https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/23/mark-zuck...

Bode well to get on with the local tribe with goodwill instead of using the blunt violence of the (questionable) law.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#116

Post by bootload »

jly wrote: post #50
ucaetano wrote: post #20

I grew up in a 3rd world small farm, raising pigs, chicken, setting traps and planting a bunch of stuff, not to mention a light version of WROL (without rule of law). Reading this article I feel that I'm more prepared for the apocalypse than all the "super-rich"...

I agree with this, too. Most of the super rich have wealth and resources that matter in a stable global capitalistic economy/society, but these will have no value with the breakdown of that system. The truly important skills, post-disaster, will be those needed to survive without civilization. The ones that survive will be those that already have those skills or are quick to adapt, AND are physically located in areas…

"I agree with this, too. Most of the super rich have wealth and resources that matter in a stable global capitalistic economy/society, but these will have no value with the breakdown of that system."

Thinking about this doing some PT this morning. Super optimised for our technological civilisation but not not much else. The important skills in my view is working out how tribes work and be part of one. If your competitive advantage is money, how do you operate when money has no value or the biggest group in the block comes along and takes it?

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#117

Post by Tomminn »

bootload wrote: post #104

“I typically ask people, ‘So you’re worried about the pitchforks. How much money have you donated to your local homeless shelter?’ This connects the most, in my mind, to the realities of the income gap. All the other forms of fear that people bring up are artificial.” I like Max Levchins idea behind this statement. The underlying anxiety shown by a lot of the characters interviewed in this article display a real huma…

In NZ there is free healthcare, free accident insurance and a decent welfare program. Being a capitalist country, there is still income inequality, but the situation is no way near as bad as it is in the US because of these safety nets for the bottom quartile.

The homicide rate in NZ is less than 1 per 100,000 inhabitants. And almost all of those homicides are solved, because the police force is large compared to the number of homicides.

I disagree strongly that NZ has the same problems as the US. If I lose my leg doing wheelies while drunk on a motorcycle cos I'm idiot, I will be taken care of at hospital, free of charge. If I get cancer, I will get surgery/radiotherapy/chemo till its beaten, free of charge. If I have trouble getting pregnant, the government will fund up to 3 IVF attempts. When I am prescribed drugs, they will basically only ever cost ~$5 a month.

All this is possible because the government does a cost/benefit analysis to decide whether various health treatments are actually worth doing. And if it decides something is worth doing, it buys/trains in bulk. As a result, NZ spends ~$3200 USD per capita on healthcare, compared to the >$7500 USD the US spends.

And if you're rich, then buy private health insurance. It's waaaaay cheaper, because the government program will happily use private hospitals if they pass the cost/benefit analysis. So private hospitals have a real incentive to provide health care cheaply.

But back to the poor. Because of these safety nets, you can be super happy and relaxed in NZ even if you're in the bottom quartile.

I would know. I'm in it.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#118

Post by LyndsySimon »

Spooky23 wrote: post #99
jandrewrogers wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reality is that there are enough firearm cartridges in the world, and particularly in the US, to last a very, very long time without manufacturing any more. Americans currently buy more than 10 billion cartridges per year and cartridges have an extremely long shelf life, upwards of a century if stored properly. Given that there are probably a thousand cartridges for every man, woman, and child in the US today, it…

Plus the gun companies and NRA types stir up paranoia, so people frantically hoard this stuff. One of my dad's neighbors out in the sticks has a stockpile of like 50k rounds of ammo, waiting for god knows what.

Are you sure it's a "stockpile", and not just a "stash"?

If you include .22, I probably have 25,000 rounds in my closet in my apartment. That's only about a year's worth of ammo for practice at most.

People who shoot regularly go through seemingly ridiculous quantities of ammunition. It takes hundreds of thousands of rounds to become a skilled marksman.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#119

Post by LyndsySimon »

manarth wrote: post #106
Spooky23 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No way. If civilization implodes, a brisk trade in AK-47's would develop.

a brisk trade in AK-47's would develop Sure, popular gun, available in large numbers (outside most western countries). How long would it take for them to become commonplace in western countries/Europe? Hypothetically imagining a trade in AK-47s between Turkey and the UK (around 3,000 km), how quickly could those guns (and ammo) be moved, in enough numbers to be significant? Would the traders be threatened along the w…

Given the collapse of civilization, I'm confident that I could be producing basic automatic weapons (submachineguns) in less than a month. Six months on the outside before I could be turning out high-quality automatic rifles. The hardest part would be the barrel rifling, but even that is doable. This is without electricity, of course.

Re: Doomsday Prep for the Super-rich

#120

Post by LyndsySimon »

Spooky23 wrote: post #101
Karunamon wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you elaborate on B a bit? I don't quite see the moral value judgment in surviving while society collapses.

What do you do in your bunker? Sit around, eat canned food and watch DVDs? What happens when the beer runs out? It's one thing to seek shelter. It's another to go live in a hole. The other issue is that billionaire or not, once everything goes poof, your billions go with it.

I think the idea is that they're looking for a safe place to ride out the collapse itself - the transitionary period between our current civilization and whatever follows, where a large percentage of the population dies from violence and resource shortages.
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