I am investing heavily in solar in order to succeed in that critical recovery period on the tail end of a collapse where the economy is recovering, but those who can recover faster and operate more normally sooner will be a lot better off and be in a better position to help others, and thus gain more political credibility.

Also realize, that going into a collapse scenario gradually means that the guys who are more capable of making money going in can last longer before it gets bad for them. Just this last weekend I was using a lot of my survival gear and tools on a downtown city job working for an international corporation, and although I was working with people "worth more" than me, the thing is my resources became critical for the job, even when better workers were let go because those guys had been making good money in the past but not thinking forward to the point where they might have to strike forth on their own without a "boss" taking care of the contracts and deals. I came out of the deal far enough ahead that I am seriously considering adding another half KW worth of panels to my inventory by tomorrow afternoon.

You cannot economically compete these days in the contractor/handyman world without power tools. I have a few turn of the century manual type tools but they are entirely non-competitive on any jobsite I go to. Yes you can build a house with the old school stuff, just it will take forever. My solar powered pioneer trailer setup/mobile workshop is nearing the next stage as I now own pretty much most of it, just have to get everything put together and working, then tested and refined, then hopefully at some point duplicated or added to.

Thing is, I am making money NOW with no regular job, odd hours, spotty health and declining physical fitness with longer recovery times between workouts. I spent six months downtime this year with a bad back. I have been recovering, sort of, but the road to getting back in shape will be long, and hopefully I don't get another pulled muscle doing it which puts me down another few months.

In theory, and in the not-so distant future, I should be able to live and work on the road and employ a couple guys at a respectable wage at least part time and not be so useless myself. The key to all of that though is being able to get things accomplished with modern power tools quickly enough to be efficient and profitable, and with zero dependance on grid power. That saves me a lot of money in shop space rent alone. I am also able to open up markets for my work where regular contractors take a look at it and figure that it cannot be cost effective, mainly because they usually don't care to be set up for off grid jobsites without using a generator which will be burning around $20 in gas per day.

Again, for me, the game is to do this with no significant decline in standard of living. The modern standard of living means having power, temperature controlled running water, easy cooking, modern food storage, regular bathroom and a safe place to sleep. It means the full suite of electronic communication and efficient reliable self directed transportation (meaning vehicle ownership, not riding the bus or bumming).

I am also not aiming at "bugging out" but being able to fully do an orderly evacuation/relocation with all assets and economic sustainability intact on 28 days notice to or from anywhere in the country.

Being able to provide a comfortable level of electrical power, for me, is an important part of that plan, and the more power the more capable I will be, and the lower ongoing cost of that power means a lower variable expense rate range. Even with relatively high initial cost, once the stuff is bought, it is bought. That's $30-$50 per month in electricity I don't have to pay for, but more importantly, it opens up locations which otherwise would not be tenable. Those locations are what tend to be much lower cost.