People won't spend money under an authoritarian regime

[peregrinus]

Gray clouds looming on the horizon. When citizens think the stock market may crash because there is a madman at the wheel they aren’t going to Pet Smart to by cat toys. They may have forgotten the pandemic when they pulled the voting lever this time around but when their wallets get tight that will be a reminder of the empty super market shelves we had under Trumps 1st Reich.

[Irish_Dem]

1. Trump and the oligarchs don't need people to buy worthless junk any more.

They have access to the US Treasury and all US resources and assets.

[peregrinus]

3. Corporate America

Put their eggs in the Trump basket, they thought they would get a good return on that for some reason. Me personally, I’m trying figure out a way to fortify my money and use it strategically.

[gab13by13]

7. The oligarchs will be just fine

They don't give a shit what happens to you or me.

[peregrinus]

9. Because nut jobs like Musk and Thiel

Aren’t doing it for the money. The CEOs at Home Depot are however heavily reliant on consumer confidence

[yardwork]

32. Are they? Or do they have other businesses too?

Maybe not the CEOs, but the owners.

Jeff Bezos doesn't care if WaPo goes belly up because he's got all his other businesses, many of which get federal contract dollars. That's one thing Trump won't cut - the spigot of dark money going to cronies.

I fear that the boards of most consumer businesses don't care if those businesses go under. They'll get their money other ways.

[Irish_Dem]

10. Yes world oligarchs have aligned with the global autocratic bloc.

Paying no taxes, no regulations, government boondoggles, ability to fleece and swindle consumers is right up their ally.
Also the corruption provides them direct access to national assets and resources.

Yes I think many of us are trying to think of ways to bring in more revenue right now and/or protect
what we do have. Think smart and strategically.

[gab13by13]

11. I agree,

My daughter is 49, many years ago she told me she is not planning on having Social Security, She has one son and she has already saved for his college education.

My daughter is the CFO of a small company, she has the means and the smarts to prepare for what is coming, most working people who live paycheck to paycheck will suffer. Retired people who only have Social Security and Medicare or Medicaid are going to suffer when they are privatized.

Musk said that people will have to go through some hardships before it gets better, just like Marie Antoinette said during the French revolution, "Let them eat cake,"

[Irish_Dem]

13. Yes people on the margin are the first to go down.

Yes we can see that the goal is for the billionaires and politicians to get their hands on the SS and medicare money.
"Privatizing" will be the way they do it. We saw this done with healthcare and there is a lot of money made
swindling the healthcare system.

[Blue Full Moon]

31. Privatization never works

I worked in an industry that was privatized. We went from making money and adding to the US Treasury to them getting huge handouts from the government. They ran the company into bankruptcy more than once. Every budget had all the employees write to their congressman begging for the company to get money so they could keep their jobs. The joke was that by privatizing, it would remove the politicians from being able to campaign about saving jobs.

[Think. Again.]

2. GOOD!!!

The strongest resistance to trump's dictatorship that we can do is to STOP SPENDING in anything that we don't actually need.

Want to see the free-market at work?

Stop giving the corporations their excessive profits and watch how fast they start pulling on trump's leash.

[Scrivener7]

5. I just cancelled my last Amazon connection,

a monthly order of my beloved Lavazza coffee.

I'm done now.

Replacement clothing will come only from ebay and second hand markets for the next 4 years. That's better for the environment anyway.

[Think. Again.]

12. I actually enjoy shopping at thrift, consignment, goodwill shops...

...it's more like a treasure hunt than a chore.

[Scrivener7]

15. Me too. I started after last New Years. My resolution was that the only new clothing I will buy from

now on has to be completely biodegradable. That is, completely natural fibers.

Anything with any synthetic fibers has to be second hand.

I can't believe the high quality, expensive stuff that's really brand new that people are selling for nothing!

Paradoxically, my wardrobe has taken a step up.

[NJCher]

25. Plastic in fabric

I heard a story on NPR about plastic in fabric. I mean,

If I have to shop at a thrift to do that, I'll do so happily. I would do it anyway; ours in NJ sell the high quality, expensive stuff, too.

[K Stephens]

18. Great minds ;)

I have been spreading this message too, come January hunker down & thrift shopping is better for the environment.

[BOSSHOG]

26. As Forrest Gump would say

It’s like a box of chocolates. Ya never know what you’re gonna get.

[Scrivener7]

28. But also, on ebay and poshmark and sites like

that, you can also just plug in exactly what you want and get it.

I had a very physical job. I had a pair of shoes years back that looked good and were Sooooo comfortable. They stopped making them. I recently found a brand new pair in my size when someone was cleaning out their closet. Paid a tenth of what I paid for that first pair.

[Lovie777]

6. You mean prices will go up higher......

oh my

[Norbert]

8. Not spending money under the next administration is a matter of self-preservation.

If there is a threat of Social Security and Medicare going the way of the buggy whip we need to put more money away for retirement and it must come from somewhere. The three days dining out becomes one or two. The coffee you get at Dunkin or Starbucks will be brewed at home. The extra shirts and pants you expect to buy to replace the ones destined for Goodwill, guess what, not gonna happen. We will wear the old ones until they get pitched.

[Farmer-Rick]

14. You know they want to get rid of the Federal Reserve banking system

They want to be rid of all those federal reserve banks and the board.

They want to institute a "Free Banking" system where the president and Congress make day to day decision on our monetary system instead of a board or the Federal Reserve.

They want gold to back the dollar again. But how that will all work isn't clear. It removes our Central banking system, which most every county uses today. Free banking was the system in place before the last Republican Great Depression. A central banking system was put into place in order to prevent another Great Depression.

So, when they start doing this, get your money out of the banks. Because when they have a run on the banks like they did in 2007, there will be nothing to stop the bleeding. And you will lose all the money you had in the bank.

[bucolic_frolic]

16. That's a tangible line of reasoning. They want crypto.

Could they destroy money? Worldwide? Banks are interconnected. Central banks fight crime, as a record of transactions. What if it's all crypto? No records. No transparency. No government. Would financial markets survive?

[peregrinus]

20. What about Swiss Banks?

You think money will be safe there? That’s my plan

[Farmer-Rick]

29. Look at banks that were affected by the 2007 crash

I know of no country, or their banks, that remained unaffected. UBS, Credit Suisse, Swiss Re, and other Swiss banks were affected.

Who would think that when banks in the US failed, the Greek people would be forced into austerity by the EU. But the filthy-rich who came and went from the Greek Islands on their fancy yachts did just fine.

You just have to be deemed too big to fail.

What a foreign bank may do for you is insure your deposits if the MAGAts destroy FDIC.

But frequently when the US banks do something foreign banks follow. Getting rid of the FDIC will save US banks some money because banks pay for that insurance.

[Blue Full Moon]

33. It will be worthless paper.

[Nasruddin]

17. deflation vs inflation

This sounds like you're expecting deflation (cash will be more valuable).
I'm more concerned about inflation, myself, budget-busting tax cuts, tariffs kicking off trade wars that raise prices, and loss of immigrant labor that accelerates wage competition (cash is less valuable).

Of course wiping out the federal bureaucracy could result in a surplus of labor. Where will all those people go?

[CrispyQ]

19. We were going to do a whole house update but put it off until after the election.

Now, I've whittled my list down to the necessities & will spend a fraction of what we were going to spend. That would have been a nice little chunk of change spent in my community, most of it to a local contractor. Instead, we'll just hang onto it. Oh well.

[Scrivener7]

30. I'm doing the same. I have a long list I was going to spruce up in my home.

Most can wait. Some I can do myself.

The list is a lot shorter now.

[bronxiteforever]

21. As a senior, I am curtailing spending for a simple reason.

I do not know what damage will be done to Social Security and Medicare. I am confident of massive damage. In other words, like a business, I can’t spend freely until I have a sense of my own income. I would be foolish to continue to spend in an economic environment where chaos will reign. Add to the budget cuts the imposition of tariffs (Trump has talked about his love of tariffs for decades so I don’t think this is all talk either). With Musk and the GOP oligarchy behind the GOP, I am pretty sure small boats like my family are in for a perilous 4 years.

I have no doubt the GOP will crash the economy on its own as it usually does. I don’t even get to spending on blue states solely because of the issues I previously mentioned. I do try to spend the food budget on blue state products or local vendors but I have immediately tightened our belt.

[surfered]

22. When wealth becomes concentrated in the hands of a few under an Oligarchy,

..there will be a smaller middle class. Think Mexico or Russia or America’s Gilded Age .

Time to “Bust the Trusts” again.

[Blue Full Moon]

34. Should have already been done

[PortTack]

23. You mentioned pet smart....FYI they gave big bucks to the gop. Chewy is a good replacement

[flying_wahini]

24. Get all those vaccines and load up on Toilet paper. Yeah really.

[LaMouffette]

27. The American Oligarchy's propaganda machine is so powerful they will likely still be able to blame the ensuing crises

on us Dems and have the ignorant masses believe them.

We need our own powerful counter-propaganda machine to flood the zone with truth!

Where's OUR angry white male leftwing AM radio stations?
Where's OUR leftwing Fox News with sexy blonde Barbie-doll female hosts wearing tiny skirts and with car-salesman-slick male hosts?
Where's OUR Joe Rogan–esque podcasters?

We need to adopt the rightwing's strategy of instilling fear, but when WE do it, we have legitimately terrifying things to tell the masses that we should all be frightened of: autocracy, demise of democracy, the climate crisis, domestic terrorism . . .

Seriously, the DNC needs to hire a damned marketing company to sell our messages because the messages are not reaching Repub voters.