I was chatting to a friend earlier and we were discussing the obsession regarding hoarding gold. Both of us agreed that if we woke up one day and nothing electrical worked then there would be chaos and looting all over. I live in the UK, and certainly where I am I'd imagine the first few hours/day would be confusion as nobody (including emergency services) would know what is going on, then panic.

In normal circumstances I do not condone looting or other criminal behaviour, but if by say 10:30am I've figured out that the UK is down, no vehicles working, no electronics etc, and accepted my society has changed forever, then my friends and I will certainly take as much as we can in an attempt to survive.

We then discussed what we'd take, and quickly came to the conclusion that antibiotics, pain killers, alcohol, and tobacco products will be the new currency on top of food. So yes, while gold is nice n shiny n all, if you have a festering wound and want to stop the infection your shiny sovereign isn't gonna interest me or anyone else to trade for my medicine. I may consider alcohol or food, but gold? Nah, keep it.

So ATS, all you hoarding gold in the event of total societal collapse, what do you think anyone else will want it for? I can see no reason I would ever trade useful life saving items, or even alcohol or tobacco products for your shiny element.

Apologies in advance if I don't reply too much, this is purely a question and I'm just interested in why people think it's worth spending their money on gold instead of Morphine, Codeine, Antibiotics, alcohol, or tobacco. That, and food/water will be the new currency for many years if it ever all goes tits up.

Gold hoarders will be the last to be looted, well by anyone who wants to live of course.