Bartering in a Post SHTF World – Part 1

by Sarah Latimer, Survival Blog:

What is Bartering?

Bartering is the exchange of goods and services between two interested parties that does not utilize the current U.S. fiat monetary system, or any national currency system for that matter. Movies and television have presented numerous visuals that help people conceptualize what this might look like on a large scale like “The Hob” in the movie The Hunger Games. In lay terms, incorporating barter items in your preparedness plans is an attempt to anticipate the future needs of those near you or at your destination if bugging out.

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Words of caution when it comes to bartering:

1. Anyone contemplating the accumulation of bartering goods, do so only after you’ve gotten your own situation/home squared away.
2. Considerable time, financial resources, and planning are generally required to begin including barter items in your preparedness plans.
3. If you find yourself bartering in a post-SHTF world, then do so away from prying eyes until things settle down unless there is organized community or regional swap/faire with reasonable security.

First things first, let’s differentiate between some common terms often found floating around the concept of bartering. How does bartering differ from preparing and hoarding?

If a fiat currency (U.S. or other) becomes untenable, what do you use to ‘buy’ the things you need? Well, first, you have to look at how you are actually defining the word ‘currency.’ The term ‘currency’ CAN be defined as a tangible commodity, equivalent value, or tradeable skill. Here’s a brief explanation of each:

• Tangible Commodity:
  Items that contain some sort of intrinsic monetary value.
  Examples: bars, coins, nuggets, and jewelry.
• Equivalent Value:
  Items that can be bartered or swapped in a like-for-like scenario.
  Example: Excess items in your larder, finished goods, and animals are traded for needed items being ‘sold’ by someone else.
• Tradeable Skill:
  Knowledge/experience-based skillset exchanged for a similar service.
  Example: room/board/food for security or fieldwork.

Tangible Commodity

If you’re considering the inclusion of coins, gold, silver, etc. then you will need to plan years ahead and budget accordingly as none of these options are on the inexpensive side of the scale. However, if you are looking to utilize silver in the form of coinage, before you go to the bank and start procuring roll after roll of quarters, dimes, and nickels here’s what the US Mint has to say regarding the specifics for each modern coin they presently produce:

Modern Coinage Weight & Composition Table

As you can see from that table, today’s modern coinage contains no silver other than a light flashing on some coins. If any of these coins did have silver, then you’d see the periodic table symbol ‘Ag’ in the Composition column. Today’s coins, other than the nickel, are essentially knock-offs of traditional American coinage. They look, feel, and weigh the same but in terms of using a modern coin for its precious metal content, there isn’t any. In fact, the US Mint hasn’t used silver in its composition since the mid-1960s when they went from 90% silver and 10% copper to an all copper-nickel alloy.

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