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You are not on the dole, govt is. Govt has nothing w/o people. People's value is monetized by both municipal and transnational corporations. All that good faith and credit comes from people. The only reason govt offers a service is the same as any other corporation. It is to increase their wealth.
There are people, clearly, who want to whine if you are on any form of government support.
I readily admit that I receive a government pension [though I would have a higher income level if I were flipping burgers]. And I have not paid income taxes for decades.
I am not self-sufficient. We only produce at the most maybe 80% of our food and heating fuel. That is it.
I am concerned that too many people have allowed themselves to become 100% dependent on government and on society. Governments fall, it happens. Societies collapse, it happens.
It is possible to produce much of what you need, for yourself.
It is possible to become less dependent on the government.
If you do not like the list of ingredients on a package of junk-food, it is possible to eat better food.
I'm not a big fan of the organic food movement because it's not based on sound science. For example, all fertilizers, whether inorganic or organic, contain 3 main chemical elements: nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), and potassium (K). Arguing that these chemicals coming from cow/chicken/horse poop are somehow "better" than coming from mined/synthetic versions of these same chemicals is downright silly. It's cheaper if you have the critters to produce it, but organic fertilizer is not somehow "better" chemically. In fact, depending upon your soil requirements for trace minerals and what you are raising, it may be less than satisfactory since inorganic fertilizers can be created with the elements adjusted for specific purposes.
I think that you have made a 'strawman'.
Is anyone saying that plant nutrients in manure are superior to petrochemical synthetic fertilizer nutrients?
What I hear is the dependence on this huge system to make nutrients is less than ethical.
the U.S. Department of Agriculture recently gave the green-light to four chicken processing plants in China, allowing chicken raised and slaughtered in the U.S. to be exported to China for processing, and then shipped back to the U.S. and sold on grocery shelves here.
Actually, what was being described sounded much more like sharecropping ... and sharecroppers were even poorer than tenant farmers.
Was someone somewhere poorer than someone somewhere else? Talk about throwing up a hundred variables and making a general statement.
When I was a child, my family share-cropped. It was a business arrangement. If both parties disliked it, they were not required to agree to it.
Today, where I have settled, there are folks sharecropping around here. If your old/frail and no longer up to farming, then getting $20/acre to allow a neighbor to farm your land, is not a bad arrangement.
To say that is better or worse than some other arrangement, is very cloudy.
Was someone somewhere poorer than someone somewhere else? Talk about throwing up a hundred variables and making a general statement.
When I was a child, my family share-cropped. It was a business arrangement. If both parties disliked it, they were not required to agree to it.
Today, where I have settled, there are folks sharecropping around here. If your old/frail and no longer up to farming, then getting $20/acre to allow a neighbor to farm your land, is not a bad arrangement.
To say that is better or worse than some other arrangement, is very cloudy.
There is also the following question:
I have no debt, grow x% of my food and barter for y% leaving me with a small portion to purchase. I own my place outright and have x amount of $$ to pay in income taxes and what not. I make a small income doing something like selling excess veggies, making this or that and selling it to people online or at home.
Then there is someone who pulls in $100K per year, has a $3K/month mortgage (or paying $1500/month in rent), two car loans, college loans, cell phone bills, gym memberships, credit cards etc. They want to eat right so they shop at farmer's markets in town or Wholefoods. They are educated, have a salary, commute an hour+ per day. Home insurance, property taxes, income taxes in high bracket etc. They pay for all car maintenance, home maintenance etc. since their interests are elsewhere.
There is a pill for that, don't worry. The machine is not done making a profit on you. You eating this will employ doctors, hospital administrators, nurses, pharma reps - one chicken and one man set the whole set of cogs into motion....
Actually, that wasn't the OP's "radical idea" at all. The OP posed the questions of why more people weren't as enamored of "self-sufficiency" as he was and how could self-sufficiency become somehow economically viable. Posters gave their views on that. Then the thread turned to how much better food produced by "self sufficient" people supposedly was than the food produced by market farmers. That some posters, myself included, think that that idea is bunk and that you don't have any rational counter- arguments is what has chapped your behind.
FTR, I live in a community that actually produces some of its food, so it's not a "radical idea" at all. In my county, we have extensive orchard, vineyard and truck crop agriculture. We have both dairy and beef farms as well as more small scale chicken keepers than you can count -- "Eggs for sale" signs are everywhere. We have numerous maple sugar producers as well as a few small-scale bee keepers.
There's no "resistance and animosity" to "self-reliance" as you claim, just a realization on the part of sensible people that it's not a realistic model for 21st century America. Hell, it wasn't even a realistic model for 19th century America unless you were living in the wilderness.
I have no debt, grow x% of my food and barter for y% leaving me with a small portion to purchase. I own my place outright and have x amount of $$ to pay in income taxes and what not. I make a small income doing something like selling excess veggies, making this or that and selling it to people online or at home.
Then there is someone who pulls in $100K per year, has a $3K/month mortgage (or paying $1500/month in rent), two car loans, college loans, cell phone bills, gym memberships, credit cards etc. They want to eat right so they shop at farmer's markets in town or Wholefoods. They are educated, have a salary, commute an hour+ per day. Home insurance, property taxes, income taxes in high bracket etc. They pay for all car maintenance, home maintenance etc. since their interests are elsewhere.
Who is better off? Who's poor?
I'd take Curtain #1. In my way of seeing things and viewing life in general, the first lifestyle above is in no small measure desirable over the second. Again, for me, the second alternative is a squandered life.
(Editor's note: be aware, all, that I'm talking about my own life and my own aspirations. You may thoroughly get the warm fuzzies for Curtain #2. To each his/her own. My life is largely centered around--or at least toward--Simplicity and Serenity. That's essentially what floats my boat and matters most to me... the Two S's ... or three S's if you want to include Seclusion )
Hey Lordy, where in Fl did you live, if you don't mind saying so?
I was thinking of buying an acre or 2 in a rural area of Lake County. Then I noticed on the Backyard Chickens forum that some so-called rural areas don't allow chickens! Part of the reason I'm a vegan is because you can never tell where the eggs come from unless you get them yourself. So perhaps even thinking of this makes me a non-vegan lol vegan
Apparently Lake County is starting to get strict about some things. So it would have to be in an agricultural area, I guess.
I would love to go off the grid. I even considered the Viking part near the Kissimmee Prairie--but apparently it's not a great idea due to wildfires and the off-the grid people who go out there to hide lol. It is quite remote and apparently full of illegal activity.
And I want to live where I can have a darn clothesline lol.
I have no debt, grow x% of my food and barter for y% leaving me with a small portion to purchase. I own my place outright and have x amount of $$ to pay in income taxes and what not. I make a small income doing something like selling excess veggies, making this or that and selling it to people online or at home.
Then there is someone who pulls in $100K per year, has a $3K/month mortgage (or paying $1500/month in rent), two car loans, college loans, cell phone bills, gym memberships, credit cards etc. They want to eat right so they shop at farmer's markets in town or Wholefoods. They are educated, have a salary, commute an hour+ per day. Home insurance, property taxes, income taxes in high bracket etc. They pay for all car maintenance, home maintenance etc. since their interests are elsewhere.
Who is better off? Who's poor?
Good post.
When the market crashed/burst we lost what remained of our portfolio. Fortunately for us, before it crashed, we had taken most of the equity out of it and used that cash to buy the farm. We were hoping to see our portfolio continue growing. Even though our portfolio is now gone completely, we were very fortunate. Others were hammered much worse.
An old highschool GF of mine, earns $100k+. So does her DH. Their home and mortgage is upside down. They make a lot, yet they spend every penny, and their Net Worth is negative.
We are the same age. I earn zip, she earns a heap.
I have no idea of what form the next society upheaval will take. Another market crash? So soon? hyper-inflation? For that we would need to be printing money without restraint.
Whatever happens, it should be interesting.
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