Gary North (economist) - Y2K Controversy

Y2K Controversy

North gained some notoriety for his prediction of a possible Y2K catastrophe in print and online, before 2000. Like economists Don McAlvany, Joel Skousen, Edward Yourdon Ed Yardeni, and many others, North suggested that a Y2K date-rollover failure of the global Information Technology (IT) infrastructure might precipitate severe disruption and perhaps even an economic collapse. North urged his readers to take "prudent" survivalist preparedness measures. In the event there were no significant problems (dispute continues on whether because of remediation efforts or because the danger had been overstated), but North later described Y2K as "a close call." His web site Gary North's Y2K Links and Forums has been preserved at a mirror site. North's Y2K forums were all moderated by volunteer subject matter experts. For example, the Securing Your Home Forum was moderated by survival retreat expert Joel Skousen, and the Inventory and Barter Items Forum was moderated by the survivalist novelist James Wesley Rawles, who later went on to be a survivalist blogger and preparedness guru. North's main Y2K web site was taken offline early in 2000.