"Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."
-- George Washington

NOTE: I'm really just a poor mountain boy from the high up hills; we aren't filthy rich billionaires, but we aren't exactly poor neither. What I have done is read, studied, applied and practiced all of the methods we will be discussing and maybe learned a thing or two along the way. I am trying to keep these articles as basic as I can, as there is, in MHO such a misunderstanding and ignorance about true wealth, so bear with me. Each article will build upon the rest and if the interest is there we will get down into the nitty-gritty details of some ways that I use to increase our cash flow and reduce our expenses. Turning out a little bit longer than I planned, but I wanted to give you to have a firm grasp on the basic fundamentals.

Most people want a higher standard of living. It makes life easier, it gives us more freedom and it allows us to do and buy the things we personally value the most. And as a survivalist, this many times means increasing our basic preparations in one way or another.

In order to increase our standard of living it is necessary that we have a basic understanding of wealth.

What it is - Where it comes from - How to get it - and how to keep it.

And in order for us to really come to grips with this 'Wealth' concept, it will be necessary for us to understand . . .

Some Basic Economic Laws

1. What is Wealth?

For the purposes of this discussion, we are going to define wealth as

Tangible Products made by man that will help him survive, be more comfortable or increase his enjoyment.

(or in other words, something that will 'increase your standard of living' or wealth is 'things')

Things you can eat, wear, sleep in, read or use in one way or another.

Now some of you might have thought I was going to say that wealth is money. Not so. Money is only an instrument or tool that we use to ease the exchange of goods (or wealth) between one person and another.

We use money to make it easier for us to trade for 'things' or wealth which we need or want that somebody else has.

It makes it a lot easier than having to trade a bushel of apples you grew to someone for the cord of wood that they have.

2. Where does wealth come from or how is it created?

Wealth is created by human effort (or work).

It just doesn't magically appear! It takes work by human beings to produce wealth, as we are discussing it here.

It takes work (and many times other people and support systems and tools) to make things.

It blows my mind sometimes when I look around my living room and see the man-hours that went into producing all of the many products we take for granted.

For instance, if you have a small shelf of books, just think of the effort that went into creating the final product.

First we had to have some paper to put the words on. And this is a minor miracle of accomplishment in itself. First somebody had to go out and cut down some trees with his chain saw or axe. (and even to get these tools with which to cut the wood took many more hours of production). After the wood was cut it had to be transported to a mill where the trees are de-barked. The wood is then chipped into tinier pieces. It is then pressure-cooked with certain chemicals and made into a pulp.The water is drained off and the pulp is pressed flat to make a paper on which we can put some words.

Then we have the author of the book who has to use his brain, imagination and skill with words to write the book.

And then we have to mass produce it-market it-distribute it-sell it and you finally are able to place it on your shelf for your enjoyment.

You can follow this process for any product you have to see just how wealthy you really are!

Contrast this to a situation where you are alone, without tools or support systems and with only the clothes on your back. How are you going to get a book for yourself now. Charcoal on rock? Make yourself a hammer and chisel?

Yes, it truly does take work or human effort to produce wealth.

3. Why do humans desire to work to create wealth?

We work for the reward it will bring.

(or sometimes from the fear that if we don't work we will lose some form of wealth).

When we are hungry, we work to get food. When we are thirsty we work to get something to drink. When we are cold, we work to build shelter. We are willing to exchange our effort for the pleasure that food, drink and shelter will bring to us.

(And sometimes we are willing to work because we owe money to other people and don't want to lose the wealth we have acquired.)

And will it stop there? Usually not. Once these desires are met, more come up to take their place. We tire of walking so we tame an animal to ride. We tire of being uncomfortable riding so we train the animal to pull a wagon. We desire more speed, so we invent mechanical apparatus which will give us more speed. It is our biological nature to survive and to do so in as much comfort as we can. Our desires for rewards are infinite and so we exchange our effort in order to fulfill them.

We work because we have an incentive to work - We want something more than we don't want to work to get it.

4. In what ways can we produce wealth?

There are a few basic ways we can produce wealth, which we will discuss.

A. We can trade our time, energy and skills to someone else for something of value

B. We can use our time, energy and skills to create or harvest wealth for ourselves

C. We can acquire things and exchange them to others for a portion of their wealth

D. We can use money-making instruments to generate wealth for us

E. Someone can give it to us

5. How can we keep the wealth that we have?

We are being stolen from and sometimes we don't even know it

There are three basic ways through which our wealth if being siphoned from us in sneaky ways.

A. Taxes

B. Inflation

C. Consumer Debt

A definition:

"coercion by proxy"

-- instead of a terrocrat killing someone himself, he hires a hit man.

--Someone "votes" for a politician who'll give him some money (or more money) which was obtained through "taxing" someone else -- instead of this person robbing the other person, he uses the "political system" to do it for him. (Of course the politician and his fellow terrocrats take a large portion of the "tax"

Realize that taxes take a large portion of our income, in one way or another.

The ravages of inflation (and sometimes deflation) can make the money we do have worth less.

Consumer debt is a chain around many peoples necks.

As we progress through these articles we will discuss these concepts in more depth and see if there might be methods we can use to make and keep more of our wealth in order to Survive Tough Times.

A few more things to ponder:

People are too worried about money and they forget about 'little' issues like freedom.

“Are ‘We the People’ victims of Causality?”

In dating one of the first questions asked is, “What do you do for a living?”

Obviously the one asking the question wants to know how much money the other makes.

Why is this significant?

It shows that people's minds have been conditioned to put money above knowledge.

When one puts money above knowledge, the implication is Bondage.

A person's dependence ends when they acquire the knowledge that those whom they depend on possess.

In other words, Freedom comes with Knowledge

A paycheck does not return Freedom because Freedom's origin is knowledge.

Yet, the masses have been led to believe through various mind control tactics that if they have a job they are independent in supporting themselves.

Homesteader