Internet Tax Is Doing You A Favor, You Soft, Squishy Loser

Just in case you weren't paying attention, the FedGov is proposing a new Internet Tax.  Yeah, it's all in the name of freedom and fairness and, damn it, it's just good for America.

Yeah.

Of course, it's none of those things.  It is just another money grab.  Your money getting grabbed, of course.

The talking heads on TV talk about how it makes it fair to the little mom and pop physical store in your home town.  "They just can't compete with the Amazon.com's of the world.  It just ain't fair!"

Frankly, I don't give a damn about fairness.  And this is coming from a guy who owns a physical store - no Internet sales whatsoever - that has to compete against all of the massive (and I mean MASSIVE) online bullion stores.  APMEX.com, MONEX.com and the like.

They don't have to charge tax on any bullion they sell.  I, on the other hand, must charge 7.875% sales tax on all bullion orders under $1500 (it's California, so don't ask...).  On top of that, because they're so big, the online guys can sell their goods at a lower per-item cost.  Many times, WAY lower.

So how do I survive and thrive?

We don't compete purely on price.  It's a part of the sales component, but there are a lot more things we bring to the attention of our customers.

We make sure they add in the cost for insurance, shipping and wire or credit card fees.  Still, sometimes our price per unit is higher.

We educate the hell out of our customers.  Grab a cup of fresh brewed coffee (our machine grinds the beans and makes a cup, one cup at a time) or a cool bottle of water, plop your butt down, and let's talk bullion.  Why, how, when, where.... whatever you want to talk about.  We tell our customers what we believe, why we believe it, why we personally buy (and rarely sell), and that they need to go away and make their own decision based on their own research.

Try getting that from some guy with a script on the phone.

Next, we discuss delivery.  Give us money, walk out with gold or silver. It's a hell of  a thing looking at a stack of silver bullion, fingering it like a pirate's treasure, and then walking out empty handed for a couple of bucks.  It happens, but not often.  When the big guys tell you you can get your stuff in 4 to 10 weeks, well, some of the luster comes off the dollar per silver ounce you're saving.

I think the biggest benefit is one that actually draws most folks to physical stores like ours:  privacy.  No matter how you slice it, if you buy online, somehow, somewhere, your name is now in a database.  Entities buy those databases, including good old Uncle Sugar.

People don't like that.  I tell them that we suggest not giving us their name for their receipt when they buy bullion from us.  I ask them, "If you go into Walmart and buy underwear for cash, do you give the clerk your name?"  They get the point.  People are so used to giving away their privacy.


In short, we provide, "added value".  We work hard to define and sell the idea that value is more than just price.  It's the whole package.

It's hard, it's time consuming and it's costly.  But we've built a business around that philosophy.
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Sorry to those of you out there that are business owners and think this new tax will "level the playing field" and mean your business will be saved.  You're wrong.

If your business needs a Fair Share Law, ala Atlas Shrugged, it's already dead.  That business pulse you feel is just the last drop of business blood dripping out of your system.

If your business has significant online competition, you should have changed your business model over a decade ago.  And every year since.  If you get soft and fat, your market share gets gobbled up by the competition, regardless of how fair things may or may not be.

You need to look at the weaknesses of your competition, and bring those to the forefront of the mind of your customers.  What's important to your customers?  Why are they buying this product, regardless of the source?  Sell to those emotions, and convince them that they get more value by coming to your store.

Maybe you're going to have to get off your butt and actually add some value.  No one ever said business was easy.  Feast and famine are part of the game.

Maybe you need to diversify your business. 

Like with my "gun training business".  It's much more than that.  We do emergency prep (for individuals and businesses), safety awareness training, pepper spray and stun gun, introductory pistol, advanced pistol, private lesson pistol.  Common thread:  Personal responsibility and safety.

Going back to our bullion business, we actually have 4 markets we go after.  Bullion buyers and sellers, scrap gold and silver sellers, discount jewelry buyers and numismatic (collectible) coin buyers and sellers.  They're all related (precious metals) but have separate supply and sales markets. 

We're not trying to sell pool chemicals in an ice cream store!  We do what we know, and always look to expand or develop new, related markets.  We fail much more than we succeed, but we fail during tests, so our entire business is not placed at risk.  When we hit a homer, we hit it hard.

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated failures. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.
--Calvin Coolidge

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Back to the Universal National Patriotic God Bless America Sales Tax:  You know how this will be sold, right?

We're now seeing all of these small business owners on Fox and CNBC whining about how tough it will be to know the 10,000 different tax rates (a valid whine, in my eyes - but come on, Man Up).  So, Nanny McTaxYourAss will tell us, "No worries, children.  We're going to administer this new program.  Online sales will have a single tax rate (or just a couple), regardless of where the sale was made.  In the name of fairness and equality and fairness and pride and fairness, the money will come to DC, where we'll siphon off uh, take a few pennies and send the money out to all of you little towns and hollows on a fair and equitable basis."

Yeah, they'll fix your problem of having to figure out thousands local tax rates - a problem THEY created.

Ain't that big of them?


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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

Get Some, If Ya Can

Marinate in this for a second -

“Perhaps more to the point for TBTF [Too Big To Fail], if a SIFI [Systematically Important Financial Institution]  does fail, I have little doubt that private investors will in fact bear the losses [emphasis added.  ed.]–even if this leads to an outcome that is messier and more costly to society than we would ideally like,” Stein said in remarks prepared for a conference sponsored by the International Monetary Fund. “Dodd-Frank is very clear in saying that the Federal Reserve and other regulators cannot use their emergency authorities to bail out an individual failing institution. And as a member of the Board, I am committed to following both the letter and the spirit of the law.”

Ok, who is this Stein fella, and why should I give a damn what he thinks.  Well, he's a governor for the Federal Reserve Bank.  You know, that group of shot-callers when it comes to our financial well-being.

In non-banker speak, he's saying that if an large American bank goes teats-up, the depositors will be footing the bill for the bailout.

What?  You didn't know that when you make a deposit in your bank, you are an investor (creditor) of that bank?  Yep. Your deposit amount is an asset on your personal balance sheet, and it's a liability on the bank's balance sheet.  An unsecured liability, by the way.

So, when the National Bank of TooBigToFailville crashes and burns, you'll be the one holding the flaming bag of dog dung.  Rest assured, though, that the friends and family members of the banksters will have already pulled their cash from the collapsing hulk.

Just like what happened in Cypress.  Hmm.  Hey, it all kinda sounds like Cypress now that you mention it.  Who'd a-thunk it?

At least in Cypress, the Little People got to keep the government guaranteed portion of their money (the equivalent of our FDIC protection).  Are we going to get the same "protections" or is Mr. Stein giving us a heads-up to the contrary with his, "messier and more costly to society" comment?
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I've noted here in the recent past that there have been shortages of product to sell in our precious metals store.  For the past couple of months, getting our hands on silver, in particular, has been very difficult.

Now, it's damned near impossible.  Unless a customer comes in my store selling stuff, I've got no other avenues to obtain product for my buying customers.

Here's a screen print from a recent email from one of our regional wholesale suppliers.  These guys do half a billion dollars a year in business -

But wait, there's more!  Here's a screen print from an email I received from a national supplier we use, NTR metals.

The three products listed on top are for bars that they produce in-house!  They can't get enough raw materials to even make the stuff themselves.

At the bottom of the message, they list the other silver they're no longer making available.  Like Silver Eagle produced by our government, and Silver Maples produced by Canada.

Hey, no biggee.  It's just a blip in the market, right?

Not so much.

When this shortage first started showing its ugly head, the premium paid over the spot price for an ounce of silver stayed pretty constant.  Roughly $5 per ounce for Silver Eagles, $4 for Silver Maples, $2 for generic silver rounds (or bars) and $1.75 for junk silver (pre-1965 halves, quarters and dimes).

Folks figured this was just a market correction, and supply would re-emerge.  That's not happening.  This is a real, Honest-to-God, demand exceeding supply situation!  Premiums are going through the roof.  $9-$11 for Silver Eagles and Maples, $7-$8 for generic silver rounds, and (holy crap) upwards of $9 for junk silver and $22 for non-collectible Morgan Silver dollars (you're just buying these for their silver content).

[VERY brief tutorial on determining the equivalent spot price when buying Junk silver - which is sold by "per dollar face".  Each $1 in face amount - two halves, 4 quarters or 10 dimes, contains the same amount of silver.  0.715 of an ounce.  Mix and match any way you like - one half and two quarters, two quarters and five dimes - it doesn't matter, as long as it equals $1 face amount.

If you take the cost for $1 face, and divide it by 0.715, you'll get the dollar amount you're paying per full ounce of silver.  So, right this second, on APMEX.com, junk silver is selling for $23.32 per dollar face.  Divide that by 0.715 and you get $32.62.  That's what you're paying per ounce.  If you subtract the current spot price - $23.43 - you get a premium of $9.19 per ounce over spot.  You can do the same thing with the Morgan and Peace dollars, only divide by the 0.773 of pure silver per coin.

Back now, to our regularly scheduled rant.]

As you can see from the snippet taken from our regional supplier, this is now going into the gold market.  Right now, the only way I can get gold Eagles, Maples or Krugerrands is if they come through our door, or I pay retail prices from the large Internet sellers.  Not a lot of profit in that for the store!

Accept The Challenge

So, am I suggesting you go withdraw your life savings from your TBTF bank account and buy silver and gold at whatever price you can find it?

For goodness sake, no.  But open your eyes if they've been closed to what's going on.  It's REALLY time to maintain a defensive mindset with regards to money and finance.

What I AM saying is, if you've done your own personal family financial analysis, and you have a couple of bucks laying around that don't have a future purchase tied to them, get some gold and silver.  Stick it in a safe or in a can in the backyard, and don't plan on spending it for the next 5 years - minimum.

What I am saying is that if you've followed my advice and have developed new, multiple streams of income, put that money into gold and silver.

What I am saying is that if you've got some crap laying around the garage you might be able to convert into cash via a garage sale or Craigslist, put that money into gold and silver.

I probably should say that if you don't think our currency will be horribly debased by all of the Quantitative Easing good old Uncle Ben has been serving up, and by the mounds of debt being piled on by Republicans and Democrats alike, and that our government would never-ever take your money (say, via a Trading With The Enemy Act and the Emergency Banking Relief Act, Part II) then don't buy gold and silver.

But you should get that bump looked at, because clearly, you've fallen and hit your head....


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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

That Whole History Repeating Itself Thing

Today is, in my option, the most important and significant day in American history.  Not Independence Day.  Not Flag day, or Constitution Day, or Memorial Day.  No, I believe that April 19 in 1775 was the most important day.  It's the day our forefathers said, "Enough is enough" and shot back at the "powers that were" - in Lexington and Concord.   The famous, "Shot heard 'round the world."

Over gun control.

They had endured, "The Intolerable Acts" - a series of punishments put upon Massachusetts by their British overlords, primarily because of the Boston Tea Party.  They weren't happy about this series of acts, but they were still working "within the system" to get this fixed.

But when the British came for patriot's guns - at the militia weapons cache in Concord - the line had been crossed, and the Revolutionary War was on.
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It looks as though the idiotic, "feel good, accomplish nothing" universal background check bill that was shot down on Wednesday in DC has put some of this post-Sandy Hook hysteria to rest.  For now.

Obama, Feinstein, Schumer and all of the cohorts were apoplectic that their bill had gone down in flames.

"All in all, this was a pretty shameful day for Washington," Obama said, accusing the gun lobby of lying about the bill.

No, Barry, what is shameful is the way you paraded the parents of the dead Sandy Hook children around Capital Hill like so many circus animals.  Sit up.  Roll over.  Good booooooy!

"There were no coherent arguments as to why we couldn't do this. It came down to politics," he said.

Barry, Barry, Barry.  I got lots.

How about the fact that is wouldn't have done one damned thing to prevent another Sandy Hook, or Virginia Tech, or Phoenix, or ANY of the mass shootings?  That's what all of the circus animals were for, right?  To make sure that the grief visited upon them was never visited upon anyone else ever again.

Tell us, Oh Wise One, which of these shooting would have been stopped if the background check had been in place.

Not a one.  You can't legislate against law abiding citizens to prevent crazy citizens from acting crazy.

But that's not important to you, is it?  Your intent is to increase your control, and win political brownie points.  You know, those "politics" you so derisively dismissed.

I've heard others say that these background checks will keep guns out of bad guys hands.  Logic and emotion might say 'yes', but reality says 'no'.

So does your own ATF -

In fact, there are a number of sources that allow guns to fall into the wrong hands, with gun thefts at the bottom of the list. Wachtel says one of the most common ways criminals get guns is through straw purchase sales. A straw purchase occurs when someone who may not legally acquire a firearm, or who wants to do so anonymously, has a companion buy it on their behalf.

As you can see in the article by that right-wing, bible-thumpin', gun totin', tea party lovin' Public Broadcast System, the ATF agent doesn't once mention that bad guys go to gun shows or private parties to get their guns.

Strawman purchases.  Corrupt FFLs.  Illegal gun dealers.  Theft.

Not a single mention of criminals slipping through the system.  Know why?  BECAUSE THEY'RE CRIMINALS AND WORK OUTSIDE OF THE SYSTEM!  Why would they voluntarily participate in a system that could wind them in jail, when they have so many other, easier methods of obtaining their guns?

We've also had others like old soft-headed Joe Biden tell us not to be paranoid.  No one in the government is going to come grab your guns just because you're on some list somewhere.

Yeah.  Read it and weep -

For all of our more liberal leaning readers who continue to ask "what's so bad" about universal background checks before we've even seen the specifics, this is your answer. In New York, you can be placed on a "list"of people with no Second Amendment rights on the say so of any doctor who has questions. And it already happened to David Lewis. Thankfully, he's getting his guns back... for now. But what is the larger effect of this if we put it on a national scale?

Here in California, we have no law requiring guns be registered.  In fact, it's illegal to require it for purchased guns.  Yet any police officer in this state can pull up in front of any house in this state, punch in your name into his computer, and know the make, model and serial number of every gun you own.

How is that possible, when our guns aren't registered?  Because every gun purchaser in California must go through a background check for every gun they purchase.

Tidy, huh?

Oh, and if you're from out of state, have lost your mind, and decide you want to move here, don't think the list of guns you own will still be private information.  No, when you move here with handguns, the state considers you to be ... ready for this..... a firearms importer.  Seriously. 

Any person who moves into California and who brings any pistol, revolver, or other firearm capable of being concealed upon the person is considered to be a "Personal Handgun Importer"  ...

You have 60 days from your arrival date to get those nasty guns registered.  And if any of them don't pass muster with our list of authorized guns, they'll be seized and turned into plowshares.

You thought you were moving here for the sun and fun, and didn't realize you would be considered the same as an arms dealer by a totalitarian state.  Welcome, friend!

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What are our modern, "Intolerable Acts"?

The Boston Tea Party was about taxation without representation.  Yep, the Tea Act actually dropped the price of tea, but patriots held to their belief in liberty.  Let that sink in:  The wouldn't be bought off.  Liberty was more important than their pocketbooks.

We can't say the same.

ObamaCare.  Thrust upon us, but not upon those who wrote it.

The Federal Reserve Bank.  An unelected bureaucracy which taxes you via inflation because of their "printing" of insane amounts of fiat currency.

We have a couple of states, and a number of cities in which no part of the Second Amendment exists.

The USA PATRIOT Act.  The NDAA.  Obscene regulation at every level of national, state and local living. Asset forfeiture laws which defy common sense and common decency.  Roadside checkpoints - in the name of safety - which fully ignore the Fourth Amendment, yet are the law of the land.

A federal Leviathan which ignores the spirit of the Constitution, and the letter of the Tenth Amendment.

We have a surveillance state which would make Orwell shudder.  All legal.  All blessed by We The People.

Is there anything that could tip us over the edge?  Drones over American?  Or would it take a drone strike over America?

No.  None of them would move us as our forefathers were moved.  We're so soft and gooey, and such well-trained poodles, we don't dare nip at master's hand.

The only history we'll be repeating will be that of former great nations that declined into oblivion.  We'll no longer proclaim, "Live Free Or Die!", instead replacing it with, "Thank You Sir, May I Have Another?"
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One last thought:  The patriots were successful, in part, because they knew the British were coming to Concord, and they moved their weapons cache.

Oh, never mind.

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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

Rotting Our National Soul

I'm a dinosaur.  I'm a throw-back.  I'm an idealist.  And, as one of my bullion customers recently noted - only half jokingly - I'm a, "fucking idiot."

He may be right.

He recently became unemployed, and started drawing monthly UI payments.  I told him how a few years back, I had been drawing $2000 each month between unemployment insurance and "Barry Bucks" - additional money coming from the federal government.

Every day, I would send out resumes, and every day I would get no response.  No one was looking to hire a nearly 50 year old bank executive expecting a six-figure salary.  I knew I was going to have to go into business for myself if I was going to maintain my lifestyle.

The problem was, that $2000 a month made it too easy to put stuff off.  I got, "manana-itis" - why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?

I had been drawing the monthly $2000 for a year, dutifully completing the paperwork, listing the companies I had contacted for work.  It then struck me - hard - that this money was killing me.  It was sucking the work ethic right out of my being.  It was rotting my soul.

I had, at a minimum, 6 more months of payments coming - $12,000 - possibly more (I don't know if that 99 weeks of UI payments plan ever passed).  I stopped filling out the paperwork to the state, and the checks stopped coming.

THIS is what drew the comment from my bullion customer.  He was dumbstruck that anyone would voluntarily stop accepting free money from the state.

[BTW, this training business was up and booking students two months later, and the bullion business was up and running about a year after that,]
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My postings have been light of late because of this sense of helplessness to stop this madness.  And the sense of revulsion.  This obscene expansion of the Nanny State.  It's like pushing a string uphill.  Nothing will ever change until it all collapses.

Why bother fighting the inevitable?  Yet, here I go again!

I'm sure you've all heard the latest and greatest - we have 14 million Americans getting disability payments [link].

Fourteen million Americans get most (if not all) of their "livelihood" from the federal government.  That is mind boggling.  For God's sake, there are ONLY 12 million unemployed Americans.  Not one of those folks on disability is counted in the unemployment numbers.  WTF?  Do the math to figure out the real unemployment rate.

On top of that, nearly 50 million Americans are getting food stamps.  Holy shit.  That is more people than the entire population of Spain.

Still, food stamps are for chumps.  Grab the Disability Brass Ring, and get a check (and health insurance) each month.  Sweet!

Not a bad gig if you can get it, and apparently, you can get it pretty easily.
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From the NPR (shockingly) article link above on the rise in disabled persons -

"We talk about the pain and what it’s like," he says. "I always ask them, 'What grade did you finish?'" 

What grade did you finish, of course, is not really a medical question. But Dr. Timberlake believes he needs this information in disability cases because people who have only a high school education aren't going to be able to get a sit-down job. 

Dr. Timberlake is making a judgment call that if you have a particular back problem and a college degree, you're not disabled. Without the degree, you are.

Nice.  We have doctors out there playing God with MY MONEY - giving it away to you if you've made the choice NOT to get more than a high school education.  YOU'VE made the choice to limit your ability to earn a living, and are being rewarded with MY MONEY for doing so.

Think that's it?  Think again.  If you're a disabled kid - someone who has never worked before - you can get some Nanny Bucks as well.  From the same article -

When you are an adult applying for disability you have to prove you cannot function in a "work-like setting." When you are a kid, a disability can be anything that prevents you from progressing in school. Two-thirds of all kids on the program today have been diagnosed with mental or intellectual problems. 

Jahleel is a kid you can imagine doing very well for himself. He is delayed. But given the right circumstances and support, it's easy to believe that over the course of his schooling Jahleel could catch up. 

Let's imagine that happens. Jahleel starts doing better in school, overcomes some of his disabilities. He doesn't need the disability program anymore. That would seem to be great for everyone, except for one thing: It would threaten his family's livelihood. Jahleel's family primarily survives off the monthly $700 check they get for his disability.

Someone, PLEASE, tell me why his family gets $700 a month.  His disability has never prevented him from earning a living and contributing to the household income, BECAUSE HE'S A KID AND HAS NEVER WORKED.

If this is for special classes, or a tutor, why would the money go to the family?  Why wouldn't it go to the tutoring company directly?

Jahleel's mom wants him to do well in school. That is absolutely clear. But her livelihood depends on Jahleel struggling in school. This tension only increases as kids get older. One mother told me her teenage son wanted to work, but she didn't want him to get a job because if he did, the family would lose its disability check.

Finally, some truth.  Don't work.  Don't aspire to greatness.  Hell, don't aspire for self-sufficiency.  Just sit on your ass and collect a check.

Rotted soul and all.


Accept The Challenge

If you're a "fucking idiot" like me, the thought of living off the largess of the state makes you sick to your stomach.  You know if you're capable of working or not.  You can't lie to yourself.

If you were hurt on the job, that sucks.  Get re-trained and start back on the path to self-sufficiency.  Right now, only 1 percent of the folks that are deemed disabled get back to work.

Sorry, but that's just a pile of crap.  I am absolutely, positively certain that there are more folks on the disability rolls who aren't disabled, than there are folks with real needs.  But the takers, the bureaucrats and the politicians have no incentive whatsoever to reduce these rolls.  It's in all of their best interests to keep growing this boil, not lancing it.

When it does pop, though, it's gonna be messy.

Get off the crack pipe of government benefits before it rots your soul to the core.

For the rest of us, it becomes a defensive battle.  And honestly, probably a losing one, depending on how far down the line you are in the execution of your self-sufficiency plans.

Our taxes MUST go up.  This will be accomplished ala Cyprus by a bold cash grab, or as we do here in America, via the insidious silent tax of dollar devaluation.  We're looking at more or increased regular taxes as well.

Carbon taxes.  The IMF calling for a world gas tax.  I'm certain we will see a VAT (Value Added Tax) at some time in the not-so-distant future.

The way we combat this future money grab, is to earn and deploy more cash NOW.

If we're not buying grid electricity, then we're not paying excise taxes.  If we're not buying groceries, then we're not (going to be) paying for a VAT tax.  If we're not having to drive to a job, we're not paying oil and carbon taxes.

The road to our personal financial salvation is - as I've said a gajillion times before - to have multiple streams of income.

A new book I've been reading on the subject is, "The 4-hour Workweek".  It gives tons of practical ideas on how to build and run multiple businesses at the same time.  The key concept is, "I want to be the owner, not the boss."  You specifically design the product or service company to NOT need you managing every aspect of the business.

• Sell something you know, to a market you know - I'm not going to sell acne products targeted at teen-aged girls because I have never been a teen-aged girl and never had acne.
• Shrink your market, don't expand it - focus on a distinct segment of a larger market.  I'm not going to sell to all retiring Baby Boomers, I'm going to sell to, for instance, males that like guns and shooting.  This lets me focus my marketing dollars, and charge premium prices.
• Test first - assume nothing.  The book discusses a number of ways to float a trial balloon at your target market so see if it has any viability.
• Design it to not need you - you bust your butt building and testing the market - for a couple of months - and then step away.  You design it with outsourcing and delivery channels that don't include you running to the post office every day.
• Repeat - 

Think like the big boys.  Start a Corporation, LLC or partnership (warning!  warning!) via Legalzoom, move to low- or no-tax states to increase your net income.  Keep each bite of the business apple a small one.

I don't want to build the next Microsoft or Ford Motor Company.  That is a magnet for taxation and third-party interference in my life.  I want a bunch of small, inconspicuous companies, each trickling a steady stream of income my way.

The key is to then deploy your newly acquired assets in a manner that will reduce or eliminate your need for interaction with the taxed world.  Arable land and the tools and resources to work it.


Here are some ideas for businesses.  Just a thought:  My generation - the Baby Boomers - are retiring at the average rate of 10,000 people PER DAY.  There's got to be a niche or two you can exploit in a group that large -

http://www.komando.com/columns/index.aspx?id=13852&page=1

http://thevirtualattorney.com/blog/13-top-businesses-start-2013-under-30-crowd

Trends
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/224977

If you're approaching retirement age, read the Social Security rules for how much you can earn without being penalized.  Corporations have the ability to disburse dividends to owners.  The upside is that these "investment earnings" don't affect your Social Security payments.  The downside is that they are not a deductible expense for the corporation.  Do the math to see if there's a "sweet spot" where you can use the SSI rules to your advantage.

Trust me, the rich do it every day.

Lastly, if you're not good with numbers, fix that.  Seriously, take a community college accounting course.  If you don't know how much is coming in, where it's coming from, and how much it's costing you to make those dollars roll in, you're going to get slapped around silly.

Know your numbers.


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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

Collapse Preamble or Just More Straw On The Back of The Camel?

There are a number of economic signs or indicators popping up, seemingly unrelated - but I'm not so sure.  These could be nothing more than a string of mutually exclusive events which indicate nothing beyond the fact that they happened.

My gut says differently.  My gut says these are indications of further degradation of our economy, that a whole lot of folks smarter than me see ugliness in our future, and they're fortifying their positions.

The snowball is a-rollin' and growing with every turn.

For example -

Billionaire stock sales - focused in consumer goods and financial stocks.  Warren Buffet sold all or large portions of his positions in a number of consumer product companies.  Johnson and Johnson, Kraft and Proctor and Gamble.  John Paulson sold JP Morgan, Sara Lee and Family Dollar.  George Soros sold mostly financial stocks - JP Morgan, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs.

Massive numbers of Insider stock sales

Recently announced layoffs (100,000 total?) in the financial industry.

Eight major retail chains closing between 11% and 33% of their stores.

Economy shrinking or barely growing (depending upon when you read the government, eh, statistics)

None of this sound good.  Yet, you look over the other shoulder, and you've got the stock market toying with record highs.  WTF?

I believe the stock market, right now, is a game of Musical Chairs.  People are looking to earn more than they can get with a bank account or buying bonds.  I think the only reason folks are in stocks is because it's the only thing with any kind of decent returns.

But it's wicked risky.  If the aforementioned indicators are correct - everything signalling 'contraction' - we've got a pretty significant crash ahead of us.  If that happens, the last guy standing will be toast.  Timing is everything.  Is the "smart money" already out?  Or is this a false flag?

For some more head-scratching, look what's happening with precious metals.  Uncle Ben Bernanke confirmed that the Federal Reserve Bank will continue devaluing the dollar via QE3 through 2016.  PMs should be soaring as the dollar crumbles into oblivion.

Instead, the dollar strengthens and PMs are on life support.  Again, WTF?

One of the reasons the spot price of gold has been in a slide is because our friend and socialist, George Soros, sold a buttload of it - worth over $100 million.  But he didn't sell physical gold.  He sold paper gold - Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs).  This sale preceded, and perhaps lubricated, the current slide.  Everyone saw Soros dumping gold, and they decided to follow.

I've yet to figure out why the dollar is getting stronger.  I know it's not the dollar getting stronger on its own - that it's other world currencies getting weaker, but still... I have difficulty believing the rest of the world continues to get worse at such an alarming rate.

The bulk of the decline is due to selling.  There are tools available that show how a price drop or increase is affected by the dollar going up or down, and how much is due to buying or selling pressure.  For instance, if gold drops $10, it will show that $3 was due to the dollar strengthening, and $7 is due to selling pressure.

Here's where it gets a bit weird.

With all of this selling, we should be awash in silver and gold.  Yet the exact opposite is true.

In our PM store, we've seen a noticeable shortage of silver, initially, and now gold.  One of our biggest wholesalers has been out of most types of silver for the past couple of weeks.  Silver rounds and bars, American Silver Eagles, Canadian Maple leafs, Morgan and Peace dollars, 90% Junk silver, 100 ounce silver bars.

This isn't some Podunk outfit.  They do half a billion dollars in business a year.  Yet they're tapped out of much of the most popular types of silver.  Now, lots of common types of gold are coming up short, as well.

And premiums (the amount charged over spot prices) are rising, pretty significantly.  Our wholesalers have upped the ante by 10% to 25%, and that's being passed along to our customers.  There's IS a physical shortage, and the laws of supply and demand are kicking in.

What's that tell us?  That the paper PM and physical PM markets are separating.  People don't give a damn that PM spot prices are tanking.  They want tangibles in their hands.  Now.  Because they know that once the dust settles, the US dollar - already only worth 4% of its former self - will join the ranks of the German Reichsbanknote and the Zimbabwe Dollar in the dustbin of world currencies hyper-inflated out of existence.

Other than numismatic (collectible) varieties, I haven't been able to keep an American Silver Eagle in my store for over 12 hours.  They are usually sold to us, then they're out the door to a buying customer - all in the same day.

The only ones I can guarantee for delivery (right now) are customers that walk in with a cashier's check for the purchase of a monster box - 500 ounces in one fell swoop.
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So, is all of this madness a preamble to us going over the cliff to hyperinflation in the near future, or is it just another piece of straw being placed on the back of the camel?

I just don't know.  I guess no one really could know for sure.

What I DO know with certainty is that the dollar will fail.  Maybe next week, maybe next decade.  Lots of things can affect the timing.

Our debt will never be paid off with our 4-cent dollars.  It will either be defaulted upon, or our government will officially devalue the dollar as Germany and Zimbabwe (and LOTS of others) have done in the past.  Check out Argentina to see how it's working right now in real-time.

It ain't pretty.

Ferfal - the blogger who lived through the worst parts of the Argentinian crash said that the one common thread of folks in his (now former) country was that they wished they had more precious metals when it all crumbled.

Not dollars.  Not canned soup.  Not toiletries.

Precious metals.

Think on it.  It is unlikely you can store enough of everything you'll need during hard times.  While barter is a skill everyone must master, you will eventually need something that your barter goods won't "buy".  You're going to need money, and the only type that has maintained its purchasing power throughout time, is gold and silver.

Some scoff and say that you can't eat precious metals.  True dat.  But gold and silver have been currency for the past 5,000 years.  I'm guessing they will still be good in the near future.

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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

Mouth-Breathin' Dumbasses

 I'm losing my patience.

I am so friggin' tired of seeing story after story on issue after issue where no modicum of common sense is present.  It seems as though there is no attempt whatsoever to challenge a single word from this administration on virtually any subject.

If they say it, it's gospel, and common sense be damned, we're going to perpetuate the administration's position.  Worse yet, is that when our mouth-breathing population is polled on these subjects, they fall in line with the administration, with a compliant, "yup".

No questions.  No challenges.  No nothing.  "If David Gregory says it's so, well, it must be right."

There are a handful of us who write and read and bitch about what's going on, but most folks can't be bothered to even scratch the surface of these issues facing our country.

Reasonable gun control, drones being used on Americans, "Sequestering" shutting down the government, and just general economic common sense.

"Reasonable" guns control, for instance.  Barry took a pile of crap ideas, flung them against the wall, and it looks like Universal Background Checks and Large Capacity Magazines might be sticking to the wall.

Here is a grammar school-level conversation that every American should be having with themselves on the background checks:

Hey, doing a background check for people that want guns sounds very reasonable.

Why?  What will it accomplish?

Well, by closing the Gun Show Loophole and the Private Sale Loophole, guns won't end up in the hands of criminals.  That's a good thing.

Really?  Criminals, by definition, don't follow the rules.  If one were to be stupid enough to go through the check and be rejected, what do you think they'd do?

Uhm, they'd probably steal one or buy one from another criminal.

Correct.  So, how does performing background checks on law abiding citizens keep guns out of the hands of criminals?

Uhhh.  It wouldn't.

Correct, again.  Oh, and by the way, since this issue is being brought up because of the recent mass murders by insane criminals, how many of those mass murderers failed a background check?

I dunno.

Not one of them.  Placing restrictive laws that will only be followed by the law abiding citizen does nothing to stop criminals.  Still think the Universal Background Check will make anyone safer?

[Crickets chirping]

No matter.  The dumbasses in Congress will pass this law because it feels good.  Makes it look like they're tough on crime, and compassionate towards crime victims, all in one fell swoop.

In reality, they're just pandering mouth-breathin' dumbasses.

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All of these types of laws and statutes and regulations are ultimately for one thing, and one thing only:  Control.  Control of your actions, movement and earnings - reinforcing the idea that you must ask permission of the government to proceed with your life.

I need permission to drive.

I need permission to open a business.

I need permission to carry a concealed weapon.

I need permission to put an addition on my home.

I need permission to ingest certain drugs.

 Tell me how, if I were to ignore any of these laws, would society be harmed?

It wouldn't be.  If by my actions while doing one of these things, I infringed upon the rights of another citizen, THEN I would be justly punished by society.

To reinforce the supremacy of our supposed civil "servants",

I must subject myself to invasive physical searches by the government to fly on a supposedly private airline, though no probable cause warranting the search exists.

My vehicle may be stopped and I can be questioned at checkpoints when I have not exhibited any indications of illegal activity.

If their life is taken during the course of their employment, the penalty for their murder is more severe than the penalty for taking my life while I'm at my job.

The lives of their children are more valuable than the lives of my children, as many of their children attend schools with tax payer-funded armed protection.  My children are afforded no such protection. 

With the mere accusation - not conviction - of certain crimes, I can have my assets seized and sold, and the proceeds are given to The State. 

My home can be stormed by para-military tactical police squads for non-violent criminal accusations.

 And most people are A-OK with this egregious conduct.  They've swallowed the Koolaid administered at our Government Schools decade after decade.  "The government wouldn't do this if it wasn't the right thing to do!" bleat the sheep.

They've got their government cheese, or perhaps are just comfortable and don't want to rock the boat.  Either way, things aren't so bad.

"What's the big deal with a couple of extra rules?  As long as the government keeps us safe from the boogie man du jour, or keeps food in our bellies and a roof over our heads, complying is no great inconvenience."

And therein lies the problem for the rest of us.

Accept The Challenge

How do you prepare for your future when society has this mindset - this desire - to be compliant with unjust and unconstitutional laws and regulations?  The assets you've acquired from your labors are not yours if the government thinks otherwise.  "Fair Share" laws - frighteningly similar to those in Atlas Shrugged - require that all get an equal share of the pie, regardless of past and present effort or lifestyle choices.

If you've got more than the next guy, that's just not fair, and you need to give some of yours away.  By force, if necessary.  Our government has done it in the past with gold seizures, is doing it now with high taxation, and is eyeing your retirement accounts like a hyena ogles a newborn gazelle.

And know with every fiber of your being that "Whisleblower" laws will be extended to place a bounty on the head of folks that scoff at future Anti-hoarding, Anti-gold and Anti-gun laws.

So, what do you do?  The long and short of it is:  You've got to hide your shit.  And not all in one place.

For instance, if you're eligible (or will be) for SSI, you need to ensure your other "outside income" is below levels considered sufficient to survive.  SSI will be "means tested" in the future.  Guaranteed.  No other way for the government to even consider keeping up appearances.

Unless you really want to live in poverty, you need to have other easily disposed of assets available.  Long-term food stores, farmland, precious metals, skills with which you can barter for other goods and services, ammunition, weapons, quality tools.

Multiple caches in multiple locations.

You must also keep your head down and mouth shut.  Claiming poverty then buying a new car every other year is going to set off the BS meter with the authorities, and the jig will be up.  Chat up your hefty silver stash, and rest assured you'll soon be making a donation to the state.

Get out there right now and develop some productive skills.  If Nanny is able to take all of your stuff, you can re-build.  Learn how to brew, how to distill, how to forge metal, how to weld, how to repair engines, how to sew clothes, how to plant a garden, how to load ammo, how to split logs - whatever.

Assets can be seized, skills cannot.

And learn how to cut a deal.  Negotiating starts with information.  What does the other guy really want?  For instance, someone selling a home you want may not be willing to budge an inch on the price.  Most folks would assume that meant the seller didn't really want to sell.  If you asked him why he's selling, you may find that he's just tired of the upkeep and property taxes, and the money is just going into the bank so he can draw an income from the interest.

You can offer to pay him his full price, as long as he carries the loan and accepts a small down payment.  Win win.  He gets some cash in hand, interest income and no property headaches, and you get the property.

In the previous post about canning the grapefruit juice, my employee looked at the bushels of grapefruit on his property as a nuisance.  He was thankful for me to take them off his hands.  I sweetened the pot by giving him a pint of the juice as further thanks and so he'll think of me when he's got more fruit.  We both benefited from the transaction.

Be creative.  Be tenacious.  Be consistent in your efforts.

Now go on - get to work on your very private future - mouth-breathin' dumbasses be damned!

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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

Canning Fruit Juice

I've got an employee who has TONS (literally) of grapefruit.  This past summer, he gave me a grocery bag full of these massive fruits.  They had very thick peels, but even when the peel was removed, the fruit was still the size of a softball.  Big, juicy and sweet (for grapefruit).

I had been reading an e-book by Jackie Clay of Backwoods Home Magazine that contained instructions on how to home can fruit.  I was thinking I was going to have to wait until all of the U-Pick orchards in our area opened up to be able to can some fruit.  By luck, my employee noted that one of his grapefruit trees was ready to snap limbs with it "winter crop", as it was so heavily laden with fruit.

I said I'd take some off his hands.

Well, he shows up the following week with 3 garbage bags full of fruit!  The grapefruits were considerably smaller this time around.  Still as sweet and juicy, though.

The Jackie Clay recipe said that you had to section the grapefruit before canning.  Otherwise, the white membrane gives the fruit a bitter taste.  I jumped online and found a couple of videos on sectioning grapefruit.

Uh oh.  Looks quite laborious.

I took one grapefruit and started sectioning away.  The first one took me about 10 minutes, and left me with about a half cup of fruit sections!  This is not good.  I decided to do a test of how many I could section in a 15 minute period.  I'd go all Edward Scissorhands - blades a-flyin' - going for speed, not beauty.

I sectioned 4 fruit and ended up with perhaps a cup and a quarter of sections.  Crap.  I'm looking at 60 or 70 grape fruits, and it's going to take forever to get them prepared, let alone canned.

Time for Plan B:  Juice.

I cut each grapefruit in half across its horizon (grasp with thumb and middle finger on the stem and flower indentations on the fruit, and carefully slice between them).  This will give you a cross section of the sections, making juicing MUCH easier.

I used a wooden juice reamer.  The pitcher for the juice had a very fine strainer on top to catch the pulp.

The Jackie Clay book also had instructions for canning fruit juice with the water bath method.  In short, you juice your fruit, heat it to 180F, and pour it into your pint canning jars (also having been heated to 180F along with the rings and lids).  Ensure the water in the canner is at least 2 inches over the top of the jars, bring to a boil, THEN start a timer for 15 minutes (adjust if you're at altitudes over 1000 feet per your canner instructions).  When the time is up, pull them from the canner, let cool, then check for proper seal on the jars.

I got 8 pints of the best grapefruit juice I've ever had.  Seriously awesome stuff.
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I'm actually very anxious for his summer crop of grapefruit to come in.  Being much larger fruit, the sections should be big enough to justify the time needed to prep for canning.

If not, I'll have more juice in my future!


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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

So God Made A Liberal

An instant classic....






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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

Front Row Seats

We're getting a front row seat on how to wage a one-man, asymmetrical warfare campaign.

We've got a former sailor and  LAPD officer that's running amok in southern California.  It is his belief that he was wrongly discharged by the LAPD.  It is his desire to correct those wrong doings, and regain his good name.  It is his belief that he has taken every available avenue through the legal system, and the system has failed him because of lies from members of the LAPD.  You can read his "manifesto" here.

So, I'm guessing this guy figured he had two basic options on how to exact his revenge on LAPD.  Option 1 was to enter a police station or LAPD headquarters, guns a-blazin', and kill as many people as he could.  He would get a body count, but he would assuredly die in the attack in fairly quick fashion, and be forgotten almost as quickly.

Option 2 is to terrorize his enemy.  He understands that taking the LAPD head-on would accomplish little.  But pick them off slowly, individually, methodically, and publicly, well, you kill two birds with one stone.
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What tactics is he using?

• Pre-position supplies to allow your terror campaign to be extended
• Publish your intent - a general list of grievances and specific targets
• Kill some folks to show that you're serious

 So far, his plan is working like a charm.  Kill your enemies and humiliate them very publicly.

How much manpower and how many dollars are being sucked from all of these police agencies due to one man?  He is running them ragged.  Bleeding their coffers.

Perhaps more importantly, he's making them look inept.

Just like the NYPD cops that shot 9 civilians in Manhattan last August while trying to apprehend a bad guy, LAPD shot two old ladies in the town of Torrence because they were in a truck that looked like the one owned by the ex-cop.

 Holy crap.  No muzzle flash.  No defiant roars from an attacker.  Just a couple of old gals delivering newspapers.

Not as widely reported was another shooting by Torrence PD officers.  Same deal - the truck matched the description of the bad guy.  No one was hurt in that incident.

They look scared.
They look undisciplined.
They look untrained.
They look vulnerable.

As a study in what one determined, well-trained person can accomplish against a vastly superior force, it doesn't get much more vivid.  It will indeed be interesting seeing how this whole episode plays out.

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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com

The Mindset Of Taking A Life

There was a recent story here in the SF Bay Area where an undercover Oakland cop was shot by some gang members.  He was an unknown person in the wrong neighborhood, and was about to be executed.

The fact that this officer lived is amazing.  He was shot as the gang bangers heard the sirens of approaching police cars.  They knew the cops were almost there, but it didn't matter.  They still attempted to execute the stranger in their midst.

He moved, the shot hit him in the arm.  He's already been released from the hospital.

Four days later, a guy shot another Oakland PD officer in the leg.  This time, the bad guy knew he was shooting at a cop.

No matter.

The Chief of Police responded to these shootings with an almost comical statement:

"You cannot shoot at police officers when they are out there in the line of duty trying to protect the community," a visibly angry police Chief Howard Jordan said at the scene of Friday's shooting.

Apparently, the bad guys didn't get that memo.

Obviously, these scumbags don't care if you're a citizen or a cop.  If you get between them and their business, expect to be dealt with very quickly and very violently.  If you don't have the means and the mindset to protect yourself, you'll be dead.
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A scenario:  Three armed, masked bad guys enter a police station.  How do you think the cops should respond?

I think most people would say that the cops would start shooting at the bad buys until the threat was eliminated.  The bad guys would either be dead or would have surrendered.

I also think virtually every person in America would say that that was a proper response to the situation.

Another scenario:  Three armed, masked bad guys enter your home.  How do you think you should respond?

I made a horrible assumption.  I believed that everyone would answer the question the exact same way as they did with the police station scenario.  Your most primal instinct would kick in - self-preservation - and you'd do anything and everything possible to stop these bad guys and save your life.  If you had a gun - just like the police - you'd shoot until the threat was eliminated.

Apparently, not everyone shares that view.  With whom did I make this bad assumption?  My mom.

Just before Christmas, my brothers and I took her out to dinner.  We were chit-chatting about things and got on to the Sandy Hook School shooting.  I was saying how the only thing that could have been done to stop the slaughter at the instant the crazy bastard started shooting, was for an armed person to shoot and kill him.

My mom said she could never use a gun to take another life.

WTF?  No circumstance at all?

She then said that she could maybe do it if one of us or her grandchildren were being threatened, but only then.  If someone with a gun (or a bat, or knife) broke into her home, she would never defend herself with lethal force.

After I brought my blood pressure back from, "She's gonna blow, Captain!!" levels, I asked her why she felt that the life of this scum bag - this maggot who had entered her home with evil intent to do her harm - was worth more than her life.

She started crying, and my brothers gave me the, "Nice Christmas present, you asshole!" looks, so I stopped.  I can be a teeny-tiny bit intense about this subject....

So today, somehow, the subject came up again while we were talking on the phone.  We got to the point of her placing a higher value on the life of the scumbag over her own, and she just said, "Well, I guess I do value their life more than mine."  She obviously didn't want to continue with this discussion, and just cut it short.

But I'm still dumbfounded by her attitude.
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I get this once in a while when I teach one of my safety awareness classes.  Someone will state that they could never take the life of another - that all life is equally precious - and they won't be a party to such madness of having the God-like powers of determining which life is more valuable than the next.

If you've got people in your life with a similar naive, Pollyanna outlook on life, take them through these questions that I ask my hesitant students.

Part 1:

I'm not here to make you feel warm and fuzzy that you took a class on safety awareness or self-defense, then praise you with, "You go girl!" or a "You da man!"  I'm here to help you save your life.  And sometimes, that process is unpleasant.  Here goes....

Ma'am, do you have any children or grandchildren?

Yes.

What are their ages?

Two grandchildren, four and 6 years old.

Great.  Picture this:  You've taken them to the park, and one of those White Panel Vans pulls up.  They grab you and your two grandkids.  You are punched in the head, and knocked unconscious.

When you awake, you see your grandson being raped by one of the attackers.  The other one is readying himself to do the same to your granddaughter.

The badguys, believing you to be unconscious, have left their guns within your reach.  What are you going to do?  Are you going to grab the gun and shoot them, or are you going to tell yourself that their lives are just as valuable as the lives of your grandchildren and allow them to continue with their rape?


[If they say they'll shoot, I go on to part 2 below.  Some say they will point the gun at the bad guys, and hold them for the police.]

OK, being badguys, and having done this before, they don't believe you when you say you'll shoot if they don't stop.  The way you're shaking and crying, they know you won't do a thing.  They actually laugh out loud as they continue their rape.

What are you going to do?  Allow them to continue with the rape of your grandchildren, or shoot them?

[I have yet to have a student say they would allow the continuation of the rape.]

Part 2:

I'm very glad to hear you made the decision to place a higher value on the lives of your grandchildren over the lives of the rapists.  You've acknowledged that all human life is NOT of equal value.  It may make you very uncomfortable coming to that realization - and that's not a horrible thing in itself.

What's important is you recognizing that there are some horrible situations where the decision of life or death may be thrust upon you.  You've shown that, as unpleasant as it may be to your intellect, your ethics, your humanity or your morality, you do have the ability to place a higher value on one life over another.  That, at times, it is more moral to take a life in defense of another.

That extends to the defense of your own life.

What I want you to do is to acknowledge that your life is more valuable than the life of someone attempting to end it.  That this animal has no right to decide when your life should end.  That the world will NOT be a better place with them in it, and you in the ground.

Your life IS more valuable than the attacker's.
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I'm not so naive as to think that even after putting folks through that very emotional gauntlet, they all suddenly take up arms for self-defense.

What I AM very confident about, is that they are thinking about it.  Every one of them.  They're thinking about something they may have never considered before.  That's all someone in my position can do.  As the saying goes, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink."  True dat.

I can't force someone to defend themselves, I can only show them why they should do it.

I've clearly got some work to do on my mom.  You think I should do it just before her upcoming birthday? ;-)

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Copyright 2013 Bison Risk Management Associates. All rights reserved. Please note that in addition to owning Bison Risk Management, Chief Instructor is also a partner in a precious metals business. You are encouraged to repost this information so long as it is credited to Bison Risk Management Associates. www.BisonRMA.com