We always hear stories about how the stock market could crash, about the alarming number of bankruptcies and home foreclosures, inflation, and the skyrocketing national debt that could all cause our extremely fragile economic system to simply collapse. Have you ever asked yourself what you will do if you wake up one ordinary day only to find out that the paper money in your wallet no longer holds any value to it? There are many people and reputable economists today who believe that such a day is soon coming. Regardless of whether you believe the economy will collapse soon or not, one thing is certain: if it does collapse, it will easily create the biggest havoc throughout our country that we have ever seen. People will riot in the streets of big cities and small towns alike, and the world as you know it will completely change. No longer will you drive off to work each morning to earn money, no longer will you be able to buy what you need in the local grocery or convenience store, and no longer will you be able to enjoy food at restaurants. What's worse, is that an economic collapse will most certainly NOT be a short term disaster scenario. Rather, it will last several months if not years. What this means for you is what while there are many different potential disasters that could come your way, an economic collapse will easily be one of the most critical ones to prepare for. Once paper money becomes worthless, the items that will suddenly skyrocket in value are the ordinary items that we use every day. These are the items that you need to store not only for yourself, but for bartering and trading purposes as well, and they are the items we are going to cover in this book. Most survivalists and preppers will recommend to you that you stockpile supplies for you and your family to live off to outlast a disaster. I'm not at all disagreeing with that, but I would say that you should make a separate smaller stockpile of ordinary items that you could use for bartering and trading in a post-economic collapse world as well. The logic here is simple: when paper money becomes worthless, the new currency will become simple items that we need to use every day (food, water, toilet paper, soap, medicines, etc.). The whole purpose of bartering is to trade something that you have but that isn't as valuable to you for something that is valuable to you but that you don't have. In a long term SHTF situation, bartering and trading is going to become a part of your everyday life. Since there will no longer be any stores where you can go to purchase whatever you want or need, you will be forced to negotiate with other people instead. If you are running low on a particular item that you need for your survival, you better have something valuable that you can give in return. This is why it's important to have trading commodities that are universally recognized for their value, and this book will go over fifty two of the most valuable commodities that you can barter in a post grid down world and the reasons for each.