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A central town market was indeed how it was done for millennia, but even that was done during a time when precious metals could fulfill much of what we consider essential in a modern currency. But therein lies my point too, compared to what we have today the velocity of exchange in a central marketplace is astronomically slow. Even back in ye oldyn days with a fraction of the people a central market and a universal medium of exchange (PM coinage) was barely able to maintain a sustenance level of trade for most of the population. How big a town square would we need to support dozens more times the people with no universal exchange medium I wonder? And once those markets get past a few acres in size how to you even begin to find stuff you are looking for? Even the largest historical examples we have (and some of them are still active to this day) are small compared to things like malls and outlet centers.
No, I think it far more likely in the event of a total collapse we quite rapidly see the creation of local solutions for fiat currency; local bank notes, or large local businesses banding together to issue a "voucher" type currency. Something, anything that gives a viable medium of exchange and a benchmark for value. I know a lot of people have romanticized ideas about being isolated and living nearly completely independently from the rest of society, but even in the worst collapses of history that basically never happens. Humans are a social creature, and when one form of governance collapses we very rapidly, basically instantly, build something else to replace it. Those replacements are not always good, but they are there to fill the void, and event the worst of them still fulfill the basic organizational needs of a civilization, including maintaining some level of trade.
A far better solution than to plan to go it alone is to work on building community connections. If the wider civilization collapses who is going to be your "in group" to start rebuilding locally? Who has the resources and equipment to handle logistics, who has the skills to handle basic maintenance, who has leadership capabilities to reach out and coordinate with neighboring settlements and reestablish necessary exchange with them? If you know who your local group is, are already plugged in and have a plan then it does not matter if the next "event" is a local disaster or the actual collapse of our entire western civilization, you will just roll through it and start reestablishing the necessary infrastructure to start over. Programs like CERT, local orgs like a farmer co-op or business association, these are going to be the seeds of future civilization, and they will be the defacto unit of self governance post-collapse. Which will really be not be so much a "post-collapse" scenario but a "what stage of the rebuild are we at?" situation.
} . The Mint investigated and determined that the fake bar was indeed fake, but was not minted or shipped by the Mint. I think the banks need somebody who knows what they're doing to verify any gold purchases they make.
