Of course, we already have black markets for illegal stuff and things we aren't allowed to talk about on ATS. But I'm talking black markets for more daily-use goods: tinned food, say, or freshly field-dressed racoon. Clothes, soap, tissue paper, you name it.

When there is no money in a community, people may begin informally swapping goods and services just to get by. Then eventually perhaps a dual currency system evolves, with dollars being basically worthless and it being foolish to waste money on overpriced "officially sanctioned" goods. Then, if the dollar continues its disasterous drop on world markets, there may come a time when certain goods are impossible to get -- because we've given up on manufacturing them in the US and the foreigners who make them may not want to trade them for increasingly worthless dollars. And of course if the gov't gets deeper involved we may see soviet-style people waiting lines for "ration coupon books" (most likely scanned onto a card of some kind, say) or actual goods. "I hear they are giving out real pork-meat today! A shipment came in!" Instant two-hour line forms.

In such circumstances, black markets pop up. There's always a guy who "knows how to get stuff." ("My cousin just came back from china with a suitcase full of saran-wrap and safety pins: are you interested? Hard currency only, please: I only take silver dimes, yen, euros, or yuan.")

This kind of thing may be a few years off but I expect to see it soon. People would have laughed at the idea of tent cities 5 years ago...now they are everywhere. Think about it.

Not until we're all required to have the mark of the beast.

HA! Just realized I posted this to the wrong thread Ok, well, FWIW, read on...

I tried posting a thread on this before, but lost my text because I happened to pick a name that was already in use and forgot to copy my text the clipboard before subitting... *argh*

Anyway, I have thought of this concept many times in terms of neighborhood support groups. Here are two ideas I have been mulling:

1) Community Gardens -- insteading of leaving empty houses to rot, convert the yards into full fledge gardens for food. Use the interiors to grow herbs and fragile plants that need specific climates. Those who help plant,weed, maintain, and sow share in the harvest.

2) Community power generation -- there are so many ways to make electricity on the small scale level it's crazy, but none of them are really feasible on a mass utility level. Still solar, geo-thermal & wind, alchohol generators, even human powered generators (in a pinch) could easily be setup in front yards or vacant lots to provide power to a neighborhood. These could be maintained by locals and the revenue from cogen profits could go back to the project for repairs and upgrades.



[edit on 9-13-2009 by rogerstigers]