DON'T keep all of your money in one place. Keep a stock of cash outside the bank.

About Greece

If you haven't been paying attention to how everyday people are faring during Greece's economic crisis, perhaps you should:

It could be a sneak preview of what YOU might have to live through in the Not So Distant future.

From How one weeping man put a face on Greece’s debt crisis:

By Andrew Katz July 8

Giorgos Chatzifotiadis sits on the ground crying outside a national bank branch in Thessaloniki, Greece, on July 3, as pensioners queue to withdraw cash. (Sakis Mitrolidis/AFP/Getty Images)

It’s an image that some have said crystallizes the despair felt across Greece, a country in the grips of a spiraling financial crisis.

Giorgos Chatzifotiadis, an elderly man in Thessaloniki, sat down in front of a crowd and cried last Friday after he waited for hours in front of numerous banks to withdraw cash but was unable to do so. Chatzifotiadis was among many pensioners who aimed to take out money on the fifth day of the bank closures, after hundreds of branches had reopened for those without bank cards to withdraw 120 euros.

AFP photographer Sakis Mitrolidis recalled the scene in a blog post on Tuesday, writing that he and reporters from a TV channel approached the man and began to chat. After the 77-year-old explained his story, the journalists accompanied him to talk to a bank employee. “Fortunately,” he said, “they were able to help him.”

"I see my fellow citizens begging for a few cents to buy bread,” Chatzifotiadis told the photographer at the time. “I see more and more suicides. I am a sensitive person. I cannot stand to see my country in this distress. That's why I feel so beaten, more than for my own personal problems.”

It wasn’t until later that Mitrolidis understood what he had captured. “Back in my office, when I saw the pictures on the monitor, I understood this was a powerful series,” he writes. “The composition, the papers scattered beside him, the policeman coming to help, the people watching as they queued, and the old man himself.”

Photos Of Greek Pensioners As They Desperately Try To Collect Funds From Banks

Sobbing Greek pensioner who became symbol of crisis offered help - from 8,000 miles away

Cash Is King During A Crisis

Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy should've have taught everybody that cash is king during a crisis: 

Without Electricity, New Yorkers on Food Stamps Can't Pay for Food 

I'll note that this also affected people who were totally dependent on any kind of credit card to purchase food or other essential items.

People, Get Ready.

Comment Overflow for the Post, "If You're Not On One of These 10 Roads to Riches, You're Heading Toward the Poorhouse"

*Reader's Note* We're transferring our discussion from the 3/2/09 post, "If You're Not On One of These 10 Roads to Riches, You're Heading Toward the Poorhouse" to the comment section here. [I don't like having the scroll down miles of computer screen to read new comments, and we've reached almost 100 comments in the comment section of that particular post.] Please post your comments to the "Roads to Riches" post right here. Thank you.

If You're Not On One of These 10 Roads to Riches, You're Heading Toward the Poorhouse

I'm reading a book called The Ten Roads to Riches: The Ways the Wealthy Got There (And How You Can Too) by Ken Fisher.

It's time for African-American women to finally leave Fantasy Island and face reality. My Dad taught me that in real life there's no such thing as treading water. If you're not moving forward, you're falling behind. And it's just a matter of time until you drown. In the current economy, this means that if you're not working to build wealth, you're working to become poor. The days of being able to rely on "good jobs" are OVER.

Furthermore, I've been reading disturbing reports comparing this current depression not to the Great Depression of the 1930s, but to the Long Depression of the late 19th century. The Long Depression lasted from 1873-1896! What if the current economic tailspin goes on for the next 20 years? What will you do?

Here are the ten roads to riches that Mr. Fisher lays out. [My comments are in blue.]:

"1. Start a successful business---the richest road! [This is a hard road, but the most promising one in terms of the odds, and level, of success.]

2. Become CEO of an existing firm and juice it---a very mechanical function. [Not very likely for the vast majority of Black women.]

3. Hitch to a successful visionary's wagon and ride along---it's high value-added. [Translation: Look for a winner to "to drag you along through his or her success." Look for a winning CEO, entrepreneur, etc. to play sidekick to, and ride along with.]

4. Turn celebrity into wealth---or wealth into celebrity and then more wealth! [The odds are not in favor of this option. Black folks need to let go of "hoop dreams" and "hip-hop dreams" and focus our energy on things that have greater chances of success.]

5. Marry well---really, really well. [I strongly urge every African-American woman to pursue this option, along with another road to wealth. As Evia has often pointed out, it's just as easy to love a wealthy man as a poor man. Women from every ethnic group EXCEPT African-American women seem to understand this basic fact.

This is why other women look to marry well, and thereby ensure the future of any children they have. Meanwhile, many AA children are in the condition described by Min. Farrakhan as "naked, hungry, and out of doors." This is because their mothers did NOT marry well. Or marry at all. And their mothers had these children by men who aren't going anywhere productive in life.]

6. Steal it, legally---no guns necessary! [Translation: Practice law. Ouch! I would say that the odds of this option panning out are not promising for the vast majority of Black female attorneys. For a variety of reasons,which are too many to get into here. ]

7. Capitalize on other people's money (OPM)---where most of the mega-rich are. [Translation: Manage other people's money. A lot of it.]

8. Invent an endless future revenue stream---even if you're not an inventor! [The author explains that this doesn't only mean actually inventing something like Post-Its; it also means making "an annuity-like future cash flow from something that you create, own or patent that just keeps spewing cash. A gadget, book, song, movie, or even experience." The Ten Roads to Riches, Amazon Kindle Locations 2552-69.]

9. Trump the land barons by monetizing unrealized real estate wealth! [Translation: Building skscrapers---Umm, not in this economy. Or collecting rent as a landlord---Yep! People will always need somewhere to live.]

10. Go down the Road More Traveled---save hard, invest well---forever! [The idea of trying to scrimp your way to wealth sounds crazy to me. I have heard of elderly people who had accumulated huge sums of money over many decades with U.S. Savings Bonds, but they were all too old to enjoy it. What's the point of that? Also, all of this was before the current economic depression.]

Follow one of these ten roads. Or a combination . . . If you can do two at once it's faster. Harder, but faster." The Ten Roads to Riches, Amazon Kindle Locations 146-55 through 155-68.

Which roads to riches are you willing to follow?

Which roads to riches are you preparing yourself to follow?

Which roads to riches are you already following?

For Your Own Survival, You Must Become a "Sovereign Individual" Instead of a Typical Employee

Don't Stake Your Survival on Pres. Obama

Don't stake your (and your loved ones') survival on anything that Pres. Obama might do. First of all, there's no way of knowing whether or not his economic proposals will actually work. Second, there are MANY other parties that don't want any of his proposals to succeed. Including many individuals that are nominally on his "side."

Pres. Obama Does NOT Have His Own Posse. Nobody is Watching His Back. This Means That Anything He Does WILL Be Sabotaged. From the Inside-Out.

I can see that the masses of our people will be devastated (in many different ways) when various factions from within as well as outside the Democratic Party finally pull down the Obama-ssiah.

It doesn't matter how much Pres. Obama tries to appease these factions. The problem is that these various factions cannot be appeased. This is because they don't want to be appeased. What they want is to make sure that whatever efforts the Obama-ssiah makes fail, and he gets ALL of the blame, while they position themselves to reign. . . err, rule. . . err, govern. . . once he's been politically destroyed.

This illustrates another problem with most Black folks' concept of politics. We don't understand that the "ruler" is only as strong as his infrastructure (aka "posse"). In Chicago terms, his political "machine." Does Pres. Obama actually have a loyal, faithful, strong posse of his own? Or is he somebody who was loaned the use of other people's posses? We know the answer to this.

It looks like he didn't understand that these various "retainers" are only loyal to the people who actually own and created them. They are loyal to the individuals who loaned them to him. NOT to him. He didn't create any of these people. This is one of the unspoken consequences of Pres. Obama being a crossover candidate who did not come from any sort of organized Black movement or infrastructure.

Black voters simply hopped on the Obama-ssiah bandwagon after they saw that Whites in Iowa were willing to vote for him. Pres. Obama did not come from us. Not that our infrastructure or organizations are particularly solid, but Pres. Obama has NOTHING but thin air under his feet.

Pres. Obama's recent blindsided stumbles with several cabinet nominees should be a signal to you. The manner in which all of that went down made it quite apparent to me that he doesn't have anybody who is actually watching his back. He doesn't even have an old-school, Chicago political "machine" to watch his back. That's his own fault for being naive.

Machiavelli warned about the dangers of a prince being dependent upon mercenaries. Especially foreign ones. They have a nasty habit of abruptly abandoning the prince (at the worst possible moment) in favor of the highest bidder, and/or their previous employers.

For the love of God, don't rely on this one (naive) man for your survival.

The "Factory Age" of Rising Income Equality is OVER

From a 1997 book, The Sovereign Individual, by James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg:

"[Otto Ammon, a 19th century German economist] believed that high abilities naturally result in people rising in income and social position. . . . He also believed that the 'true form of the so-called social pyramid is that of a somewhat flat onion or turnip.' . . . Modern industrial societies are indeed all turnips, with a small wealthy and upper-professional class at the top, a larger middle class, and a minority poor at the bottom. Relative to the middle, both the extremes are small.

. . . All of this is intriguing, but the immediate interest of Ammon's work lies in the major long-term shift we are experiencing in the relations, financial and political, between the top and the middle. . . . Most people could master the skills required for operating the machines of the mid-twentieth century, but those jobs have now been replaced by smart machines which, in effect, control themselves. A whole arena of low- and middle-skill employment has already disappeared. If we are correct, this is a prelude to the disappearance of most employment and the reconfiguration of work in the spot market. " pgs. 212-213.

"Societies that have been indoctrinated to expect income equality and high levels of consumption for persons of low or modest skills will face demotivation and insecurity. As the economies of more countries more deeply assimilate information technology, they will see the emergence---so evident already in North America---of a more or less unemployable underclass. [Khadija interrupting the quote here: Guess who this is? You get one guess.] This is exactly what is happening. This will lead to a reaction with a nationalist, antitechnology bias, as we detail in the next chapter.

The Factory Age may prove to have been a unique period in which semistupid machines left a highly profitable niche for unskilled people. Now that the machines can look after themselves, the Information Age is pouring its gifts onto the top 5 percent of Otto Ammon's turnip." pg.214 [emphasis added].

No More "Good Jobs"

". . . The model business organization of the new information economy may be a movie production company. Such enterprises can be very sophisticated, with budgets of hundreds of millions of dollars. While they are large operations, they are also temporary in nature. . . While the people who work on the production are very talented, they have no expectation that finding work on the project is equivalent to having a 'permanent job.'" The Sovereign Individual, pg. 237.

Also, read the following blog post about how, in a connected world where "productivity is portable," the artificial differences in salaries between workers in different countries are evaporating. http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2009/02/journal-normalizing-wagessalaries.html Please note the linked CNN story about how IBM offered its laid-off employees the "opportunity" of moving to India, Russia, and Nigeria and working at LOCAL salaries in order to keep their jobs.

My God.

Do you want to have your salary "normalized" with that of a similarly-educated worker in China? I didn't think so. Well, that's what's heading your way unless you make yourself as "sovereign" as possible. This means as independent as possible from your employer. This means having multiple income streams.

People, Get Ready.

Reader Alert: You Might Want to Consider Taking Some of Your Cash Out of the Bank NOW

First the preamble: The following is NOT intended to serve as anything other than commentary. I am NOT engaged in rendering legal, accounting, financial, or any other professional advice. If expert assistance is needed, the services of a competent professional should be sought. This post is NOT a substitute for legal or any other kind of professional advice.

Alright, now that all of that is out of the way, let me simply say that my "antennae" are buzzing even more than usual about the economy. Not in a good way. I would urge everyone to consider pulling some of their cash out of their banks within the next two days (if you haven't already done so). Don't be surprised if your local ATMs start "malfunctioning" and have to be "temporarily shut down for repairs" (like some of the ones in my area were for a few days last week).

Listener's Guide For The 2nd Great Depression

I recently came across this podcast while browsing in the iTunes store. I haven't listened to the entire set of shows, but I've been impressed with the ones I've heard. Unsurprisingly, it sounds like the host is a White Libertarian. It worries me that Black people don't seem to be talking about the "nitty-gritty" of contingency planning. We're too busy following the minutiae of the Obama campaign. {long sigh} Anyway, the podcast is called The Survival Podcast: "Helping you live the life you want, if times get tough, or even if they don't."

You can also listen from the website at http://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com/ I suggest you start with the following 3 shows:

"An Introduction to The Survival Podcast" (6/20/08).

"The Unique Challenges of Economic Collapse Survival Planning" (8/11/08).

"The Missed Lessons from Hurricane Katrina" (6/27/08).

People Get Ready.

Reading List for the 2nd Great Depression

Those of you who know me already know that I've been yelling the alarm about the coming financial collapse. And about how most Black folks (due to Obama-related-mania) are not doing anything to prepare. Here's a recap:

1. This economy is going to crash around our heads. This process has already begun. I strongly urge everyone to develop as many income streams as possible. ASAP. Depending on a single paycheck is courting disaster.

2. We haven't seen the full extent of the damage because the powers that be (PTB) have been hiding much of the damage. The PTB have done this to protect the image of the boy-prince, George W. Bush. The PTB won't extend the same service to Sen. Obama if he is elected president. In fact, if Obama is elected, they'll let it all fall apart to ensure that he gets the blame for the past 8 years of fiscal mismanagement.

3. In the midst of frolicking in our Obama-mania, most Black people haven't thought through the repercussions of having Sen. Obama elected.

4. For example, if Sen. Obama is elected president this means that the days of crying to Whites about racism are OVER. For real. They won't entertain that noise anymore. They will say that racism can't be that bad---after all, a Black (sort-of) man was elected president.

[For the purposes of this discussion, I won't go into detail about how in order to be the first viable "Black" presidential candidate, it seems that the candidate must be half-Other and half-foreign origin. In order to have a serious chance to be the first Black president, it helps that Sen. Obama is half-White and half-something-other-than-African-American. Politically, this is a a new "paper bag test" in operation.]

5. Black leadership (such as it is) does not have any other strategy beyond protesting racism. Collectively, Black folks don't have a back-up plan. This is a problem.

6. If elected, a Pres. Obama will feel the need to prove to Whites that he's not partial to us. He will do this by ignoring our issues and problems. There won't be any help coming from an Obama Administration. Not specifically for Black folks.

7. Because Black folks are addicted to symbol over substance, most of us will continue to support a Pres. Obama no matter what he does. Even while he literally ignores us to death. After all, we "gotta support a brother." We love seeing Black faces in high places. Even when these Black-skinned folks do a great deal of damage to our interests. [For examples, see Black folks' continued expressions of support and admiration for Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, etc.]

Here's a quick reading list for those who are ready to face reality and prepare:

8. The excellent articles by Dmitry Orlov posted at www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net. Check out his series entitled "Post-Soviet Lessons for a Post American Century," and "Surviving a Financial Collapse."

9. And the following books:
a. When Technology Fails: A Manual for Self-Reliance & Planetary Survival by Matthew Stein.
b. Gardening When It Counts: Growing Food in Hard Times by Steve Soloman.
c. The Secure Home by Joel M. Skousen.

People, Get Ready!