Next in the US?

The blog, Surviving in Argentina, is written by a man who lives with his family in Buenos Aires, Argentina, a country that used to be the 8th richest in the world, but is now economically unstable. Wikipedia describes the Argentine economic crisis:

...many Argentines became enraged and took to the streets of important cities, especially Buenos Aires. They engaged in a form of popular protest that became known as cacerolazo (banging pots and pans). These protests occurred especially during the period of 2001 to 2002. At first the cacerolazos were simply noisy demonstrations, but soon they included property destruction, often directed at banks, foreign privatized companies, and especially big American and European companies. Many businesses installed metal barriers because windows and glass facades were being broken, and even fires being ignited at their doors. Billboards of such companies as Coca Cola and others were brought down by the masses of demonstrators.

Here's an example of what the situation is like in Argentina today, from the personal experience of the Argentinian blogger:

When I was 20 years old I lived in a 1st world country, 8 years later it’s a mixture of cheapo 3rd world tourist sites, a bit of tasteful 1900 architecture, surrounded by sights fitting either Ecuador, Colombia or some kind of war zone, and it all went to hell in a hand basket in less than a year. The change was amazing for anyone that cared to notice. Libraries, churches, town theaters, it all closed and later reopened having been replaced by bar-***** house joints, “All for 2$” shops, Bingos, casinos, self proclaimed churches, many with links to Umbanda Brazilian rituals. A perfect example of the decay in our society trough the last years.

We were wondering what is happening with your prisons in Argentina?

They are terribly overpopulated. sometiems [sic] 5X over their maximum capacity. Problems and revolts in prisons are common.

What happens when the power goes out or when the government can't afford to pay the officers to go to work?

Well, they don’t just let them go, that would be wrong, right? :) What they do, is pretend they are looking over them but granting them more liberal minded rights.
They don’t say “We can’t afford more prisoners so we let them go.” What they do is send them home with a bracelet that’s supposed to monitor the prisoner in his home.
Problem is these things don’t work, nor do cops care to control the system or the prisoner. So we end up having “prisoners” that are supposed to be under control, but they are just free to do whatever they want.


You must try by all means not to stay outside with the door opened for long periods of time. It has become clear by now that that’s when robbers attack the most. What I do. I have a front metal gate apart from the wooden garage door, both operated by remote control. I open the gate and garage door and right away start getting in , closing the gate behind me as soon as I have space. Most of the time I am armed, and I’m extra cautious at times like these just in case.


Instead of thinking of thinking about “The little house on the Prairie” scenario, a middle ages Feudal Lord-Vassal relation ship is much more accurate to depicture [sic] what small producers are going through in our own in my [sic] country, after the 2001 crisis.

So, if you are a producer with a few acres of land (less than 300/400), and you don’t have a critical mass of production , just being an extremely hard worker isn’t enough, and what is happening today to these people may happen in America in the future.

Find some market, some niche, be an entrepreneur because if you do what pretty much everyone else already knows how to do, you’ll end up working so that the middle man makes the profit, while you barely survive.