I'm not a survivalist - just a prepper who wants to take care of his family in the event of any number of SHTF situations. Including unemployment.
My most realistic scenarios are as follows (in no particluar order):
1. I lose my job - that would rock my world. The side benefit of smart prepping is that some of the items you purchase keep place with inflation and/or go up in value.
2. Our train wreck of an economy continues in slow motion until it falls off the first cliff - unemployment increases dramatically, we see interruptions in basic services, and crime skyrockets but is still contained within the usual bad parts of our cities and neighborhoods. Stage two is things getting really bad with unemployment and emergency state and federal funds running out. Stage three is our creditors selling out of US Treaury holdings and trying to repatriate their gold, platinum and silver holdings (as is happening today with Venezuela's gold and mining operations). Additionally, Middle Eastern, European Union, Pacific Rim and Russian central banks will move off the US dollar as a standard reserve currency and currency of choice for oil transactions. End result - further action towards a police state with passive taxation of your investments and greater restrictions on constitutional rights will probably be the "catastrophe" rather than a complete failure of society.
3. Some sort of wide scale natural disaster- earthquake, major hurricane striking our petroleum industry, or major solar flare activity. All three are plausible, but the "guberments" ability to react may be impaired if our financial condition worsens. BTW, don't discount the possibility of solar flares knocking out electronics and communications. It's happened three times in the past hundred years, and our dependency on our electronic infrastructure is a hundredfold of what it was during the fist half of the 20th century.
4. Pandemic - I'm not exactly sure of how plausible this is. An unexpected flu virus seems most likely, but it would have to be awfully fast moving to get past the WHO and government monitoring programs. Governments and the medical profession are much more likely to stop the spread of such a pandemic unlike the flu that killed millions worldwide in the early 20th centruy.
5. EMP attack - this is on the books as a possibility in the government's war scenarios. Same effect as a solar flare except the requirement of the earth needing to be in the path of that stream of energy is replaced by the calculated precision of a nuclear detonation. Current theory says there a number of countries that could use EMPs as a false flag scenario. Ex-military, ex-intelligence and think tanks have repeatedly warned about this scenario. There is very little collateral damage and the attacker doesn't need to commit extensive military resources to make this happen. Basically, you're in your office and a small nuclear weapon designed to produce a massive EMP effect is detonated at high altitude - you wouldn't even notice it. From horizon to horizon, all unshielded electronics goes dead including computers, cell phones, cars, radios, banking systems, law enforcement communications, trucking, hospitals, medical facilities, etc., etc. This is the one that has me most concerned because society essentially just stops.
So, what does all of the above really mean? Look at how frequently all of the above have happened in the past 100 years (including a solar flare event). People who are laughing need to read their history. The only saving grace is that they've happened to different countries at different times. Just because we're America doesn't mean we can instantly defeat or prevent anything that comes our way. Can we eventually overcome it? Yes.
Bottom line - I pray for God to watch over my family, and if the circumstances enabling our protected existance were to end, that we would act as His servants and have the wisdom to not just survive, but also help others.
Wow. That is the type of post on ODT that is all too rare. The articulation and description is impressive. You also understand that the first part of preparing is getting your spiritual house in order. Only then can you go forward in a SHTF situation and be a source of positivity. The SHTF episode will separate those who are positive and in order, and those who have the traits of the most selfish and barbaric aspects of the human psyche.
God guide us all.
ps. If I may, I would like to kind of expand upon some of the situations that you mention. Probably tomorrow.
