I would like to throw in props for “When All Hell Breaks Loose”, by Cody Lundin.
Unfortunatly a great deal of the first part of it is written is rather hippy-dippy psychobabble, but once one gets through that it is really based on old school common sense. Know your neighbors, have a plan, ‘dig your well before you are thirsty”, as he puts it “stuff your grandparents would have regarded as common sense”. Sort of aimed to the urban hipster but really overall well focused on rational and economical approaches to being ready for a disaster of days to weeks.
He had a statistic that ‘40 percent of all Americans will have to deal with a natural disaster at some point in their lives’....
Don’t let his long hair and bandana and new age aphorisms fool you, he listened to grandparents, and Indians and other folks who knew about survival in the worst that this country can throw at you.
The nexus is really deciding on time frame: days? weeks? years? once you know how LONG the most economical and effective strategies are easier to figure out. Me, I find it past the point of diminishing returns to do what I would need to do for complete societal breakdown for years or decades, but no extrinsic water, power or social order for a week or two is well within my means to prep for....
The longer you are alive, the higher the odds are that you will make it in the long haul.
I am working on the premise that surviving several weeks will jack up my long term odds a huge amount. But I am shooting for preparations of 3-6 months on as many fronts as is realistically practical.
Food and medicine stores for the longer haul. Water for prep for long term is very tough. Gotta be realistic about that, unless I win the lottery.
Bugging out? Multiple storage areas and destinations? These are impractical for most of us. So we store what we can and plan to protect it as best we can.
I am old enough that the realistic attitude for me is to stand my ground. Either I hold my ground or I make those that take it pay a heavy price. I think I am sufficiently equipped to do one or the other.
One final thought. The really scary thing is that in the event of a SHTF, it is just as likely that the forces of our government will as much a threat to our individual survival as our fellow citizens.