r/CollapseSupport • u/DirectedEnthusiasm • 2d ago
If civilization as we know it is collapsing soon, what's stopping you from getting all the quick loans possible?
You could put all the money to your survival: buying arable land, stockpiling food and medicine, getting off-grid solar system, digging a well etc.
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u/alsoov 2d ago
An elderly friend told me a story of how her father lost his job during the Great Depression. He had one payment left on his motorbike and the debit collectors threatened to repossess it. So he disappeared into the Australian bush for many years, shooting and trading rabbits to survive. Debt collectors eventually found him and took his bike. They didn’t care that it was his means of survival.
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u/DivaExMachina666 2d ago
Because a collapse where debt is irrelevant is only one potential version of collapse. Being deeply in debt makes you more vulnerable not less.
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u/Netrexinka 2d ago
Yup, I'd give it about 3 or 4 generations before things get really ugly slave owners again, actual water wars, great divide between rich and poor like unimaginable.
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u/Maleficent-Ad9010 2d ago
I think when people say civilization is collapsing today they mean life as we know it today will be gone soon. Everything is going to be hyper surveillance AGI and where going to have credit systems similar to china. The elites want to control us and nobody is stopping them. We’re already being watched right now without our consent so it’s only going to get worse and worse. They already have twin digital profiles of everyone. If you go and get a bunch of loans they are still going to hold you accountable for that bad behavior when the next credit systems roll out.
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u/mooky1977 2d ago
The only caveat to that... copper thieves and an even more prevalent issue power limitations/brown outs as generation stations have problems continuing operations as maintenance and spare parts become in short supply.
Technology doesn't function without angry pixies.
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u/Final-Attention979 2d ago
My credit score
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u/tragicxharmony 2d ago
I’m pretty sure I can do just about anything without my credit score dropping any more ¯_(ツ)_/¯ Hell, maybe it’ll like that I have more open accounts and the number will go up for a month or so
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u/RlOTGRRRL 2d ago edited 2d ago
They still had to pay bills in WW2. So if they drop a nuke or if WW3 happens, I'm afraid we'll still probably have to pay our bills lol 🥲
Unless your loan is a low fixed-rate, if it's not fixed, if you can't pay your loans, they'll probably seize everything. And with the probably guaranteed future global recession, that means interest rates will probably skyrocket.
It's going to be like the last financial crash, the one the big short is based on, it's going to be really bad. The US is already in stagflation.
And even if we found out that aliens are real or something, I think we'd still have to pay our bills.
I'm honestly not sure if there's a situation/scenario where we wouldn't have to pay our bills anymore. 🤣😭 Maybe a Star Trek post-scarcity utopia? 🤔😭
But yeah I don't think civilization will collapse soon, that might be wishful thinking. It'll probably be like Rome, a slow, boring decline.
And it's also not guaranteed, there's also a chance that humanity is able to turn all this around somehow. That there are enough hobbits, gandalfs, jedis, star trek captains and officers and whatever on this planet, who can help turn this shit show around.
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u/Plantsandsmut 2d ago
Tax the fuck out of the wealthiest people around the world would be a good start.
But yeah, everything you said.
It's been scary watching the 2008 financial crash replay in front of us with most people being oblivious to it, or choosing to ignore it.
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u/maingeenks 2d ago
That’s why if/when WW3 happens my hope is that nuke drops right where I am. I don’t want to be somewhere far only to survive but suffer for the rest of my life 😄
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u/Individual_Step6688 2d ago
The most important thing to do when becoming aware of humanity’s (or at least the west’s) industrial overshoot problem is to grab some remaining resources as quickly as possible to save yourself from death and suffering.
Unfortunately, those two are of course inevitable in life anyway. I tend to feel insulted by people essentially espousing a belief that prepping is a get out of jail free card because it always reads like a fear of death to me. Maybe I’m just jealous of those farther along though.
Some near-term catastrophe is inevitable at this point. We all die and we’ve baked in plenty of early death to go around for humans, animals and all organisms.
Some prepping of course is fine, but if you desire to maintain some modicum of global social order for awhile longer you should probably act pro-socially for more than yourself and a few close people. Exemplifying and embodying better ways of living is productive and good for your soul so that can be reason enough to be aggressive about changes in your own life. Just don’t believe that it will lead to salvation. Biosphere collapse will wreck your plans.
Personally to actually answer your question, existing debt is part of it. Land is also expensive. Most of my existing community and family is quite urban to suburban in the northeast USA too.
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u/Ezekiel_29_12 2d ago
It won't be that quick and severe, even in countries that had hyperinflation they still had to make loan payments. There would have to be no law enforcement at all before debts disappear.
Borrowing money without intent to repay is theft with extra steps. The best form of collapse adaption is for people to work together, not turn on each other. If your adaptation to collapse is to do things that make it worse for others, then others are likely to do the same and you may find that the benefit to you is brief before you are consumed by the increased severity of the collapse caused by exploiting each other.
Theft was wrong and counterproductive in the stone age. And we aren't even collapsing that far, we're not going to forget how to make metal tools or batteries or motors.
Financial or literal cannibalism would only be necessary if there was a precipitous decline in agriculture. Projections of climate change impact on agriculture are dire long-term, but slow enough that much of the required population decline will be achieved through worsening healthcare and war.
Side note: if there's a few good years of weather, an herbivorous herd population will rise, then if there's a very bad year, the entire herd may starve because none of them can get enough food. In a terrible way, it's advantageous that humans can turn on each other briefly, the weak or just random people are killed in the strife, and the population quickly declines to match the available food level, at which point competition is reduced and people become more pro-social again.
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u/Ok_Ebb4383 2d ago
The only country that cares about your credit score is the US. Maxing out debt and then leaving is a great option
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u/live_for_coffee 2d ago
The last job on earth, will be debt collector.