Prepping is a very small industry in the United States, with annual spending specifically on “prepping” less than what government will spend in the time it took me to prepare this episode of the podcast.
The amount of spending is an interesting issue, so is the purpose and efficiency of prepping. However, the mainstream media demeans preppers as irrational and out of touch with reality. Note that, from a scientific point of view, however, prepping is rational, efficient, and very normal.
I am not an expert prepper or even an expert on the prepping industry. This is not a “how-to” episode, nor meant to be any form of advice. In this episode, I will focus solely on prepping for “natural disasters” and not on “artificial disasters.”
Artificial disasters come, not from society or nature, but from government. These would include things like war, hyperinflation, and economic collapse associated with runaway government spending, debt, and money-printing inflation. Even basic government interventions like forestry policy are known to increase natural disasters. Government-created disasters are worse and longer lasting than natural disasters and require additional preparations for issues like home production, self-protection, and alternative money and healthcare.
While each natural disaster seems completely random, sent from some malicious God, however, they actually follow patterns that are increasingly known to science, even if an individual event is extremely unlikely to happen, even in a lifetime. The increasing severity is probably completely attributable to increased reporting and larger populations living in dangerous areas.
Why do people prep? Well, the simple answer is because while the probabilities are low, the cost is also extremely low, and the benefits are extremely high.
The costs are extremely low because all of our emergency necessities are not perishable or are only semi-perishable. Water, food, medicines, paper goods, disposables, alternative lighting and cooking are all things we should already have on hand—in inventory. Prepping is just making sure you have all that, along with an emergency medical kit, flashlight, fire extinguisher, etc.
Stage II prepping is just adding to these inventories for the possibility of longer emergencies. You can do so by starting to buy some of the identified items in larger sizes in bulk every pay period and possibly save money. This preparation is made even more economical when dastardly government inflates the paper money supply and drives up prices over time. Everything you buy at the store today on sale is probably only going to go up in price. You can extend the savings by including goods like toiletries.
Now, how are the benefits of prepping extremely high? Well, the market economy is so good at providing all we need at stable prices that we often make the mistake of equating the market price of a good for the value of a good. When natural disasters hit, the supply of some goods might be stopped. Other goods might find a newfound importance, such as flashlight batteries. Some goods only seem to realize their value in an emergency, like a solar-powered radio, that otherwise only gets used when enjoying the outdoors. Preppers usually remember to have all these types of goods on hand.
I’m not saying that people don’t go overboard with prepping. What I’m saying is that preppers are actually just saving and investing smarter than non-preppers in terms of economic science.
It might also be, in part, a matter of taste. Preppers are probably more risk averse and less likely to locate in earthquake zones, river flood zones, etc. Preppers probably also have lower time preferences and are more likely to save and invest, providing the personal and social building blocks for a better society.
Of course, the capitalist process also makes good use of the risk-takers among us as entrepreneurs and even those with avant garde tastes for creativity.
Prepping, or being prepared is a highly rational activity. In a natural disaster, preppers are much more likely to contribute to solving the problems as the actual “first responders” and far less likely to increase the burden of the disaster itself as so-called victims.
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