Well, what would be the solution to an asteroid the size of the moon heading towards Earth? It's great to have a can-do attitude, but some things are just going to play out despite everyone's best efforts.
Your proposal is to not even try to do anything? Just accept it, crash and burn?
I need to know which side of the aisle you guys in this thread are repping, so we can settle it once and for all who тАЬwants to destroy AmericaтАЭ, and all that Jazz.
Also, if youтАЩve accepted this fate, does that mean that your preferred political candidates canтАЩt, in fact, fix it, and therefore one day soon all of your partyтАЩs issues that theyтАЩve run on since the 80s will finally be resolved by irrelevancy in a collapsed society?
I'm not sure who you mean by "you guys". I'm commenting as an individual, not as part of some kind of group. I'm also not American.
Accepting something as inevitable is not the same as not trying anything. There may be nothing to prevent the finacial apocalypse, but there's plenty to do to navigate it.
So by your analogy, we should put a small asteroid into the orbit of the impending debt crisis, let it change trajectory, and completely avoid the problem?
To the extent that most of the top 20% of incomes- the ones disproportionately benefiting from the economy over the previous 40 years- are Boomers (a disproportionate number), that should probably happen.
To just put it all on "Boomers", per se (the youngest Boomer is now 60) is quackery. The lower 80% of Boomers is scraping along with everyone else in that category, and also ending decades spent in the labor force.
So, yes, I support a raise in the marginal income tax rate for the people who have benefited disproportionately from the economic policies of the previous 40 years
But if your solution is to cut Social Security and Medicare, you're a quack. Fortunately, even the Duopoly parties understand that the political penalty of doing that is too high a price for any Administration of Congress to get near. So you'll have to wait for the Wild In The Streets Utopia To Come, somewhere out there in the middle distant Future, in order to have a chance of enacting that particular solution.
I think people should work well into their 70s now with the level of healthcare avid longevity available. This isnтАЩt 1950. And they have tons of marketable skills given their experience. No SSI while working. Medicare will help cover their naturally higher cost to employ, so there wonтАЩt be discrimination on that basis. This will help stimulate the economy and cover the debt crisis. ThatтАЩs the sketch of my approach.
Lucky us itтАЩs not up to you. How come the boomers are responsible ? The results of the criminal and irresponsible policies of others shouldnтАЩt be put on the shoulders of people who deserve the retirement. You go ahead and work until your seventies, be my guest, I have been working hard for 40 years and deserve some rest, and yes , btw get at least some skills for godтАЩs sake
No you're not entitled to some rest, this was a lie sold to the silent generation and WW2 generation, then the Boomers, instead of reforming, said to heck with everyone else, we're going to get our piece too. Early adopters of Ponzi schemes always benefit to the detriment of the late adopters. Of course, GenX like me and down the line had no choice to not adopt . . .b/c of Boomers, the "me" generation. Thanks a lot bud. I've worked hard too for over 30 years, but I'm not getting squat, so that you and your elders could reap benefits.
I think advancing eligibility to age 70 would be reasonable. It's already been advanced- but only to age 66, because that's how democratic politics works. No one is forcing older people to vote in droves and young people to ignore elections, but that's the way the reality plays out. I'm a Boomer who advocated for raising that age to 70 immediately, 15 years ago. I can read the longevity tables from the date when SSI was established under the Roosevelt administration. But as with a lot of policy issues, the mere idea of bringing up facts like those in a serious media discussion is taboo. Like we're all little kids who will have a tantrum if someone says that their hot fudge sundae sundae doesn't come with chopped walnuts. Anyway, in the case of yours truly, that ship has sailed.
But raising the age of SSI eligibility would be only part of a balanced approach to the deficit- one would include that trigger phrase TAX RAISE on the top 20% of incomes, which would yield about triple the additional revenue from a tax raise that only effects the top 2%. And this is where you really see that the Democratic Party is fake, because even though the top 20% of income households have evidently been leaning majority Democratic Party for the previous 16 years or so, no Democrat wants to risk alienating the 2%-20% cohort by increasing their income tax bill. Which is chickenshit. And it also indicates that the Democratic Party "leadership" is continuing to offer a vote of confidence to the assumptions of Reaganomics. The top 20% of income earners in this country are also the beneficiaries of nearly all the capital gains. https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu/power/wealth.html
The Dems haven't suggested any policies that would address the debt any more than the Republicans. They just kick the can down the road. It's phony Keynesian economics, not real Keynesian economics.
Keynes and von Mises actually understood each other better than their axe-grinding partisan offspring do nowadays. Responsible Keynesian economics means that an economic downturn with effects buffered by incurring a lot of government debt is required to repay it with a tax increase in the boom part of the business cycle. Just a little skim of the extra cream during the times when everything is going great. Maybe even with a sunset clause. (I wanted a 1% national sales tax surcharge with a sunset clause, to pay off those trillions in government debt from the emergency covid era "rebates.") But neither the Republicans or the Democrats are willing to get serious about the need to raise taxes on the top 2%-20% of incomes. The Republicans trumpet their bankrupt "not tax increases ever, because taxes" quackery, and the Democrats are, as I've said, too chickenshit to level with their own high-income supporters. The majority of the top 20% of American earners haven't just done measurably better than the other 80% for the past 30+ years on a year by year basis; they've had the opportunity to leverage their surplus capital to benefit from windfall after windfall. But the Republicans when get out the crying towel and start lying about "confiscation" aimed at "the middle class", and how "all tax is theft", the Democrats duck out the side door instead of airing it out.
I'm libertarian enough to want to shift the income tax burden to a Huckabee-type sales tax with a rebate. But not libertarian enough to dogmatically oppose the restoration of a marginal income tax schedule aimed at the highest income earners, for the remaining tax burden. Or, say, a flat tax of 50% on all earnings over the median income of around $75,000.yer. So someone making less than $75,000 pays zero. Earned income of $150,000 a year would owe $37,500 (or a 25% rate). And someone who earns $50 million in a year pays $24,925,000. (Still lower than the marginal tax rate under Eisenhower, and probably JFK, too.) That policy doesn't outlaw billionaires, it merely balances the disproportionate influence of the wealthy over government policy.
The US already has the solution. It has 331 million people in their county that would work for free if need be. See this is what humans fail to realize in this capitalist society of greed. When most тАЬgoodтАЭpeople see an opportunity to help for a greater cause, they do it. America is also able to run self sufficient food and energy wise with free labor to offset the cost of importing technology for replacements. I promise you we have this already strategized. Even if our government acts like this needs diamond clearance ЁЯШВ
What are you talking about? You people really need to stop with the I compassionate labeling and admit that we are in crisis mode! I wouldnтАЩt care what тАЬnameтАЭ you would call what IтАЩm proposing if it works! You called it Communism, I called it charity! ItтАЩs what we do anyway when we have a natural disaster, or are you so numb of a person you wouldnтАЩt help your community when you see people тАЬdrowningтАЭ! I just used that as an example because of the context. But since you have a lane for me, letтАЩs see what you propose my friend? IтАЩll be waiting for your answer.
Oops, apparently I posted this comment in the wrong place but here's my response
I agree we're in crisis mode but guess what: I didn't create the crisis, nor did any of the younger people that you're volunteering to bail everyone out via slavery. It's not charity when someone holds a gun to your head and demands you work yourself to death to save a system that never even served you. It ain't my friend drowning, it's an old water buffalo that's gonna gore me if I try to help
We both are messing up on this technology ЁЯШВ IтАЩm new to this app (or social media for real) so IтАЩm trying to figure out how to edit responses ЁЯШВ
I didnтАЩt mean to sound so cold on my first response and then when I reread it I was like fuck not only did I misspell multiple words but even my misspelled words made my response seem cold and aggressive, so I apologize for that.
I agree with you, we didnтАЩt create the mess (problem) but I can assure you it is тАЬourтАЭ responsibility to clean it up. Your talking to a young minority man. And when I say minority, I mean the most minority, marginalized, attacked, person in American. I mean that! And I can still say with certainty that it is our responsibility to clean this mess up that was caused by this racist, corrupt, bias, capitalistic terrorism acting, evil empire. We are the ones my friend. I promise you this is why we were put on this planet. To clean up their mess and to create a better world for our children bro. Every parent will understand and agree with this statement. You totally see the world differently as a parent. It makes you more optimistic, objective and empathetic. All ЁЯТЪ From a True Believer ЁЯС│ЁЯП╛тАНтЩВя╕ПЁЯХЛ
America collapses- which it is going to(along with the rest of the west).
In the resulting chaos & anarchy real men appear out of the masses of weak & compliant to eliminate the "elites" and their puppets.
Then the rebirth/rebuildcan begin.
You dream if you imagine America or the west are getting out of this with "cooperation".
Nature, people, societies, countries & empires run in natural cycles.
Spring-birth
Summer-growth
Fall-maturity
Winter-death
Spring can't appear until the "old" have died.
Not only old people.
Old ways
Old societies
Old empires
Old elites
Winter also culls the weak.
Lord knows the "west" has a huge number of weak.
Man is not the master of the universe.
He is just the most evolved animal on this particular piece of space debris.
The world will not end when America & the west collapse.
America & the west will be reborn. They will likely look and be different- but the DNA will still be there to sprout & grow.
America & the west are facing their Soviet Union moment. Collapse and fracture.
Russian DNA/history held. Russia emerged, much smaller than the soviet union. But now 30 years later back in the top 5 economies in the world- with 10 to 15 years of improving quality of life.
America and the west likely face the same- 10 to 20 years of very hard times with mass death because they populace is so weak & dependent on the "system"- then rebirth into a new 80 to 100 year cycle of spring, summer, fall & winter.
Ignore history.
Ignore nature.
Live in your fantasy of cooperation.
Nature does not care about your feelings or fantasies.
I respect your opinion. I donтАЩt know if this reality can take another 6,000 years of barbaric actions anymore. I know we live in a polarized, holographic universe, but I just donтАЩt see after all this time of written history killing each other that we could sustain this behavior any longer. I feel that considering all these crisesтАЩs acting together, that humans will finally see that we donтАЩt have to act like this. But hey ЁЯд╖ЁЯП╜тАНтЩВя╕П what do I know, I just keep getting bombarded with these тАЬsignsтАЭ showing me a loving way to exemplify for the world to internalize and express themselves.
And what is fake about the news? You truly believe weтАЩre not in 35 trillion in debt? That China is selling most of its American debt? That weтАЩre in a Weimar Republic crisis? What do you think is fake?
Do you really even know what communism is? Lmaoooo.
Do you believe it is interchangeable with democracy?
Learning the two categorizations of these two systems really helps you identify what is problematic, and I can assure you it is not an economic system.
Please ЁЯЩПЁЯП╜ reread what is written. I said тАЬlike when we come to support for a natural disaster.тАЭ I was there to help pass out food and retrieve people from floods, did I get paid for that? No. I know you may not leave out your house to help your community when itтАЩs in peril, but I have. If you take a look at the US position in politics, economics and morality. It is having a natural disaster moment. If you canтАЩt see that. Then I guess you have to wait till our country is under occupation before you look up and say, yeah this is bad! Come on now please be proactive instead of reactive and even this is sort of reactive because the writing has been on the wall. All sensitive energy having people know we are at a vicious age!
Without the market you are not able to grow your own food. Stocking up on thing you can bartel is probably a better option but still I don't believe you can avoid the problems in total collapse.
So instead of learning marketable skills and saving for retirement because SSI will default, you propose wasting our time becoming survivalists. Got it.
ThatтАЩs the situation IтАЩm referring to, actually.
When financial systems collapse and money is worth less and less, survival itself becomes paramount. You and your family canтАЩt eat money or even gold. Skills and equipment are needed to provide for yourself, but can also be a source of income.
In the period leading up to collapse anyhow, I guess IтАЩd simply cut frivolous spending and conserve cash (in the hopes that it maintains some purchasing power). Not much else you could do, as a tiny piece of a gigantic machine. Having varied skills can help supplement during tough economic times, though. See above.
Great article.. According to you what would be a solution to this ever growing American debt?
Well, what would be the solution to an asteroid the size of the moon heading towards Earth? It's great to have a can-do attitude, but some things are just going to play out despite everyone's best efforts.
Your proposal is to not even try to do anything? Just accept it, crash and burn?
I need to know which side of the aisle you guys in this thread are repping, so we can settle it once and for all who тАЬwants to destroy AmericaтАЭ, and all that Jazz.
Also, if youтАЩve accepted this fate, does that mean that your preferred political candidates canтАЩt, in fact, fix it, and therefore one day soon all of your partyтАЩs issues that theyтАЩve run on since the 80s will finally be resolved by irrelevancy in a collapsed society?
I'm not sure who you mean by "you guys". I'm commenting as an individual, not as part of some kind of group. I'm also not American.
Accepting something as inevitable is not the same as not trying anything. There may be nothing to prevent the finacial apocalypse, but there's plenty to do to navigate it.
ThereтАЩs an aisle? US is all in on this problem. Deficit spending is a problem to BOTH aisles
So by your analogy, we should put a small asteroid into the orbit of the impending debt crisis, let it change trajectory, and completely avoid the problem?
Sure. How would it be done?
I didnтАЩt make the analogy, I donтАЩt know. Make the boomers responsible, perhaps?
To the extent that most of the top 20% of incomes- the ones disproportionately benefiting from the economy over the previous 40 years- are Boomers (a disproportionate number), that should probably happen.
To just put it all on "Boomers", per se (the youngest Boomer is now 60) is quackery. The lower 80% of Boomers is scraping along with everyone else in that category, and also ending decades spent in the labor force.
So, yes, I support a raise in the marginal income tax rate for the people who have benefited disproportionately from the economic policies of the previous 40 years
www.archive.org/details/politicsofrichpo00phil/page/n7/mode/2up
But if your solution is to cut Social Security and Medicare, you're a quack. Fortunately, even the Duopoly parties understand that the political penalty of doing that is too high a price for any Administration of Congress to get near. So you'll have to wait for the Wild In The Streets Utopia To Come, somewhere out there in the middle distant Future, in order to have a chance of enacting that particular solution.
I think people should work well into their 70s now with the level of healthcare avid longevity available. This isnтАЩt 1950. And they have tons of marketable skills given their experience. No SSI while working. Medicare will help cover their naturally higher cost to employ, so there wonтАЩt be discrimination on that basis. This will help stimulate the economy and cover the debt crisis. ThatтАЩs the sketch of my approach.
Lucky us itтАЩs not up to you. How come the boomers are responsible ? The results of the criminal and irresponsible policies of others shouldnтАЩt be put on the shoulders of people who deserve the retirement. You go ahead and work until your seventies, be my guest, I have been working hard for 40 years and deserve some rest, and yes , btw get at least some skills for godтАЩs sake
No you're not entitled to some rest, this was a lie sold to the silent generation and WW2 generation, then the Boomers, instead of reforming, said to heck with everyone else, we're going to get our piece too. Early adopters of Ponzi schemes always benefit to the detriment of the late adopters. Of course, GenX like me and down the line had no choice to not adopt . . .b/c of Boomers, the "me" generation. Thanks a lot bud. I've worked hard too for over 30 years, but I'm not getting squat, so that you and your elders could reap benefits.
I think advancing eligibility to age 70 would be reasonable. It's already been advanced- but only to age 66, because that's how democratic politics works. No one is forcing older people to vote in droves and young people to ignore elections, but that's the way the reality plays out. I'm a Boomer who advocated for raising that age to 70 immediately, 15 years ago. I can read the longevity tables from the date when SSI was established under the Roosevelt administration. But as with a lot of policy issues, the mere idea of bringing up facts like those in a serious media discussion is taboo. Like we're all little kids who will have a tantrum if someone says that their hot fudge sundae sundae doesn't come with chopped walnuts. Anyway, in the case of yours truly, that ship has sailed.
But raising the age of SSI eligibility would be only part of a balanced approach to the deficit- one would include that trigger phrase TAX RAISE on the top 20% of incomes, which would yield about triple the additional revenue from a tax raise that only effects the top 2%. And this is where you really see that the Democratic Party is fake, because even though the top 20% of income households have evidently been leaning majority Democratic Party for the previous 16 years or so, no Democrat wants to risk alienating the 2%-20% cohort by increasing their income tax bill. Which is chickenshit. And it also indicates that the Democratic Party "leadership" is continuing to offer a vote of confidence to the assumptions of Reaganomics. The top 20% of income earners in this country are also the beneficiaries of nearly all the capital gains. https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu/power/wealth.html
The Dems haven't suggested any policies that would address the debt any more than the Republicans. They just kick the can down the road. It's phony Keynesian economics, not real Keynesian economics.
Keynes and von Mises actually understood each other better than their axe-grinding partisan offspring do nowadays. Responsible Keynesian economics means that an economic downturn with effects buffered by incurring a lot of government debt is required to repay it with a tax increase in the boom part of the business cycle. Just a little skim of the extra cream during the times when everything is going great. Maybe even with a sunset clause. (I wanted a 1% national sales tax surcharge with a sunset clause, to pay off those trillions in government debt from the emergency covid era "rebates.") But neither the Republicans or the Democrats are willing to get serious about the need to raise taxes on the top 2%-20% of incomes. The Republicans trumpet their bankrupt "not tax increases ever, because taxes" quackery, and the Democrats are, as I've said, too chickenshit to level with their own high-income supporters. The majority of the top 20% of American earners haven't just done measurably better than the other 80% for the past 30+ years on a year by year basis; they've had the opportunity to leverage their surplus capital to benefit from windfall after windfall. But the Republicans when get out the crying towel and start lying about "confiscation" aimed at "the middle class", and how "all tax is theft", the Democrats duck out the side door instead of airing it out.
I'm libertarian enough to want to shift the income tax burden to a Huckabee-type sales tax with a rebate. But not libertarian enough to dogmatically oppose the restoration of a marginal income tax schedule aimed at the highest income earners, for the remaining tax burden. Or, say, a flat tax of 50% on all earnings over the median income of around $75,000.yer. So someone making less than $75,000 pays zero. Earned income of $150,000 a year would owe $37,500 (or a 25% rate). And someone who earns $50 million in a year pays $24,925,000. (Still lower than the marginal tax rate under Eisenhower, and probably JFK, too.) That policy doesn't outlaw billionaires, it merely balances the disproportionate influence of the wealthy over government policy.
Read The Politics Of Rich And Poor! www.archive.org/details/politicsofrichpo0000phil/page/n7/mode/2up
There is no solution as no one wants to fix it, Jagan.
Telegram ЁЯСН
stfu scammer
The US already has the solution. It has 331 million people in their county that would work for free if need be. See this is what humans fail to realize in this capitalist society of greed. When most тАЬgoodтАЭpeople see an opportunity to help for a greater cause, they do it. America is also able to run self sufficient food and energy wise with free labor to offset the cost of importing technology for replacements. I promise you we have this already strategized. Even if our government acts like this needs diamond clearance ЁЯШВ
So what you're proposing is... Communism? Sounds great that was never tried I hear. The atrocities are all fake news
What are you talking about? You people really need to stop with the I compassionate labeling and admit that we are in crisis mode! I wouldnтАЩt care what тАЬnameтАЭ you would call what IтАЩm proposing if it works! You called it Communism, I called it charity! ItтАЩs what we do anyway when we have a natural disaster, or are you so numb of a person you wouldnтАЩt help your community when you see people тАЬdrowningтАЭ! I just used that as an example because of the context. But since you have a lane for me, letтАЩs see what you propose my friend? IтАЩll be waiting for your answer.
Oops, apparently I posted this comment in the wrong place but here's my response
I agree we're in crisis mode but guess what: I didn't create the crisis, nor did any of the younger people that you're volunteering to bail everyone out via slavery. It's not charity when someone holds a gun to your head and demands you work yourself to death to save a system that never even served you. It ain't my friend drowning, it's an old water buffalo that's gonna gore me if I try to help
We both are messing up on this technology ЁЯШВ IтАЩm new to this app (or social media for real) so IтАЩm trying to figure out how to edit responses ЁЯШВ
I didnтАЩt mean to sound so cold on my first response and then when I reread it I was like fuck not only did I misspell multiple words but even my misspelled words made my response seem cold and aggressive, so I apologize for that.
I agree with you, we didnтАЩt create the mess (problem) but I can assure you it is тАЬourтАЭ responsibility to clean it up. Your talking to a young minority man. And when I say minority, I mean the most minority, marginalized, attacked, person in American. I mean that! And I can still say with certainty that it is our responsibility to clean this mess up that was caused by this racist, corrupt, bias, capitalistic terrorism acting, evil empire. We are the ones my friend. I promise you this is why we were put on this planet. To clean up their mess and to create a better world for our children bro. Every parent will understand and agree with this statement. You totally see the world differently as a parent. It makes you more optimistic, objective and empathetic. All ЁЯТЪ From a True Believer ЁЯС│ЁЯП╛тАНтЩВя╕ПЁЯХЛ
America collapses- which it is going to(along with the rest of the west).
In the resulting chaos & anarchy real men appear out of the masses of weak & compliant to eliminate the "elites" and their puppets.
Then the rebirth/rebuildcan begin.
You dream if you imagine America or the west are getting out of this with "cooperation".
Nature, people, societies, countries & empires run in natural cycles.
Spring-birth
Summer-growth
Fall-maturity
Winter-death
Spring can't appear until the "old" have died.
Not only old people.
Old ways
Old societies
Old empires
Old elites
Winter also culls the weak.
Lord knows the "west" has a huge number of weak.
Man is not the master of the universe.
He is just the most evolved animal on this particular piece of space debris.
The world will not end when America & the west collapse.
America & the west will be reborn. They will likely look and be different- but the DNA will still be there to sprout & grow.
America & the west are facing their Soviet Union moment. Collapse and fracture.
Russian DNA/history held. Russia emerged, much smaller than the soviet union. But now 30 years later back in the top 5 economies in the world- with 10 to 15 years of improving quality of life.
America and the west likely face the same- 10 to 20 years of very hard times with mass death because they populace is so weak & dependent on the "system"- then rebirth into a new 80 to 100 year cycle of spring, summer, fall & winter.
Ignore history.
Ignore nature.
Live in your fantasy of cooperation.
Nature does not care about your feelings or fantasies.
I respect your opinion. I donтАЩt know if this reality can take another 6,000 years of barbaric actions anymore. I know we live in a polarized, holographic universe, but I just donтАЩt see after all this time of written history killing each other that we could sustain this behavior any longer. I feel that considering all these crisesтАЩs acting together, that humans will finally see that we donтАЩt have to act like this. But hey ЁЯд╖ЁЯП╜тАНтЩВя╕П what do I know, I just keep getting bombarded with these тАЬsignsтАЭ showing me a loving way to exemplify for the world to internalize and express themselves.
And what is fake about the news? You truly believe weтАЩre not in 35 trillion in debt? That China is selling most of its American debt? That weтАЩre in a Weimar Republic crisis? What do you think is fake?
Do you really even know what communism is? Lmaoooo.
Do you believe it is interchangeable with democracy?
Learning the two categorizations of these two systems really helps you identify what is problematic, and I can assure you it is not an economic system.
They would work for free? Why would they do that? They would happily be unable to support their families? It what universe?
Please ЁЯЩПЁЯП╜ reread what is written. I said тАЬlike when we come to support for a natural disaster.тАЭ I was there to help pass out food and retrieve people from floods, did I get paid for that? No. I know you may not leave out your house to help your community when itтАЩs in peril, but I have. If you take a look at the US position in politics, economics and morality. It is having a natural disaster moment. If you canтАЩt see that. Then I guess you have to wait till our country is under occupation before you look up and say, yeah this is bad! Come on now please be proactive instead of reactive and even this is sort of reactive because the writing has been on the wall. All sensitive energy having people know we are at a vicious age!
You sound like the economist in the Lionel Shriver book, THE MANDIBLES
Learn to grow your own food. Stock up on firearms, ammunition and basic medicines. Buy tools and learn how to use all of them.
Drink your own urine. ItтАЩs actually not as bad as it sounds.
Without the market you are not able to grow your own food. Stocking up on thing you can bartel is probably a better option but still I don't believe you can avoid the problems in total collapse.
There are always markets, even in total financial collapse. My comments were not about how to thrive in such a situation, but rather just survive.
And survival is always full of problems, of course - thatтАЩs why it is so hard and so many just want others to do it for them.
Let me frame your reply in a different way: set yourself with options that aren't dependent on finances.
Sounds very reasonable to me.
So instead of learning marketable skills and saving for retirement because SSI will default, you propose wasting our time becoming survivalists. Got it.
Pretty sure I wrote nothing even remotely like that, but I hope you enjoyed your тАЬkillтАЭ regardless.
Stocks up on things you can use for barter later
See what the people of Venezuela have done. TheyтАЩre going through this right now.
ThatтАЩs the situation IтАЩm referring to, actually.
When financial systems collapse and money is worth less and less, survival itself becomes paramount. You and your family canтАЩt eat money or even gold. Skills and equipment are needed to provide for yourself, but can also be a source of income.
In the period leading up to collapse anyhow, I guess IтАЩd simply cut frivolous spending and conserve cash (in the hopes that it maintains some purchasing power). Not much else you could do, as a tiny piece of a gigantic machine. Having varied skills can help supplement during tough economic times, though. See above.