I don't understand all these jokes about the zombie apocalypse. It would be pretty funny if it actually happened.

Here's an entertaining look at why a zombie apocalypse would quickly fail. As in not even get off the ground.

I don't understand all these jokes about the zombie apocalypse. It would be pretty funny if it actually happened. -- Patrick at October 31, 2013 3:22 PM

It is really a shorthand for what do you do and how to respond to the 25-50% of the population that may roam the countryside post-collapse.

As it stands now there is about a 47% portion of the population that is on government assistance and entitlements.

So if the dollar is now worthless there are going to be the SS generation that still knows how to garden and such. Many of them prepare for a few weeks to months of self sufficiency. Then there the is going to be the sub 40 crowd that have been living off the entitlements all (most) of their lives. As the cities collapse they will move across the countryside, like locusts, and devastate preppers, or even regular people who have bought the seeds to have gardens, animals, generators, or any creature comforts.

In the way back they would be the camp followers of the 1200-1600's. So you may have a bunch of gang-bangers that attack a small community. Then the camp-followers come in and act as the zombies. The zombies are the gang-bangers or the camp-followers.

So if you have a fenced or restricted location, several people and the proper weapons, you might be able to scare them off. But a bunch of the determined gang-banger types with fully automatic weapons are the "fast" zombies. The camp followers are the "slow" zombies. They would probably be scared off.

This is sort of casually explained towards the end of Atlas Shrugged.

But calling them zombies is the easy way of explaining them, and prepare for the concept.

Hubby and I prep a minor bit. We have the sort of guns that are good for defense at varying distances, ones good for hunting. He's fished since he was a wee lad, and I'm going to take a course on butchering game carcasses. We know how to garden and harvest water. We have 2 female and one male pet rabbits (kept separately now, but a quick breeding source of protein if needed). It doesn't encompass our whole lives, we generally see it as the adult version of the boy scouts "be prepared". Or, since I was a bio major, as "specialization leads to extinction".

SO when we're talking about whether we might need this or that, we generally use "when the zombies come" as a sort of shorthand for "when the shit hits the fan in any number of ways imaginable and not".

Re. prices on ammunition and gas... Since the existing stockplies will be of no use to the infected poplation, and the uninfected (in most scenarios)population will be about .01% to .05% of the infected, the amount of fuel and ammunition *per survivor* approaches infinite. Hence no inflation.
Also, shovels are unlikely to depreciate quickly enough for an end to shovel production to have any real impact on shovel value.

Since the existing stockplies will be of no use to the infected poplation, and the uninfected (in most scenarios)population will be about .01% to .05% of the infected, the amount of fuel and ammunition *per survivor* approaches infinite. Hence no inflation. -- Frank at November 1, 2013 4:47 PM

If it is a real zombie situation there is another factor that has to be counted in. Your general location. Since the country has, for the most part, gone to a just-in-time inventory system instead of the multiple pallets of whatever in the back room, you would have to hit every store in the area to find bullets if you don't have enough on hand.

As for fuel, the crap that is in the convenience store tanks has about a 6-8 month lifespan without adding in a mass amount of stabilizers.

So you have to figure that out as well.