This seems pretty important to crowdsource and talk about, so I’m gonna go ahead and risk violating the no politics rule from a few days ago, because I don’t see a better community to ask this. My defense for it not “being politics” is, I’m asking you to keep it to purchasing decisions and how the details of how the tariffs are likely to work, as opposed to who did what. This thread has the potential to save people lots of money if it gets big!
Tariffs are gonna make things more expensive for Americans; what are you planning on buying now instead of later, or stockpiling a little of?
as someone else said, plan for a long term(longer than four years). as for me I’m going to phase it out over three years to be reliant on the system as least as possible. the fourth year would hopefully be close to 80% self-reliant.
I’m planning on going all out on a garden next year. nothing fancy; potato, onion, carrot, tomato, squash (fall and winter), peas, string beans, misc herbs, sun flowers, maybe some corn(everybody grows it around here so bartering for some would be easy, besides corn is a pita to grow).
whatever I can’t dry, I’ll can.
my goal is to be at least 50-60% self sufficient after the first year. this should only require me to buy meat and seasonings mostly. then add on anything else I’ll need.
consumables like TP and tissues can’t really be stocked reliably as they degrade over time due to humidity.
I’ll also be stocking up on common medications for my kids for at least the four years. the last time we went through this there were many product recalls. this time there’s talk of defunding the FDA/CDC. I can only imagine the chaos parents will be in when a pandemic sweeps through again and you can’t even trust the medicine anymore. common things like cold/flu, fever reducers, epi-pens. (if you plan on doing this, don’t be a dick and buy everything at once. take a third so others can still get what they need and get more next week).
I also plan on stocking up on slingshot rubbers and maybe some more ammo. There’s a lot of wildlife around me that could either be eaten and/or used a fertilizer. I hope I’ll never need to resort to it, but would rather have it and hunt rather than not and starve. probably add some bow strings and arrows to the list for bigger game like deer.
I have kind of been planning for this for years so it’s not my first time doing this. my best advice, do anything you feel you can accomplish successfully. don’t waste time or resources growing food if you don’t have space for a garden (don’t experiment with hydroponics if you don’t have the time or resources to fail multiple times).
Find other ways to contribute to your community like; cleaning and maintaining weapons, fixing tools, home repair, technology/PC repair. anything you can do successfully will give you an edge that gives you an opportunity to barter for what you need, this includes credit in the community.
I once did tech support and one day someone couldn’t pay me. so they gave me some deer they had hunted recently. a year later that person called me and asked if I wanted a job making triple what I was making at my old job(not IT related). credit can’t be eaten, but it goes a long way and is indispensable.
stay strong, be smart, we’ll get through this yet.