The Ramsey Show - App - If There's a Wake-Up Call, Pick Up the Phone (Hour 2)

Episode Date: May 19, 2020

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life happens right here zach is with us in missouri hey zach welcome to the dave ramsey show hi dave and ken first off thank you very much for taking my call it's a blessing and i really appreciate the time thanks guys how can help? So I'm going through kind of a lot in my life right now. I'm 36 years old. I'm going through a separation with my wife. We're not sure if we're going to go through with the divorce yet. And I find myself sitting in a 2,600 square foot house by myself right now. So I was hoping you could kind of get a quick picture of my finances and just kind of give me some advice on what you think you would do. Wow. Well, you know, it's kind of a two-pronged

look on your finances. Obviously, if you're together, that's one picture. And if you're divorcing, it's another picture. A friend of mine that does divorce recovery help says that divorce turns a marriage into a business transaction. Well, luckily, my wife has been amazing through this. Let's say I caught her with a coworker behind my back, and it was said that nothing physical happened or anything like that. But I know myself well enough that right now trust is an issue. And living with her, I think I would put her through more misery than anything. So I just know myself enough right now that the best step is separation. So right now we are just, she's been very fair.

She's not going to try to take me for everything I have. Well, again, here's the thing you you can't ride both horses at once and so i wouldn't transfer to divorce planning until there's a divorce coming right understood right now right now what we have is separation and a broken heart and trust issues, all of which are valid. And then you take a breath and you try to breathe and get where we can start to work on this. And obviously you need to be seeing somebody, a good marriage counselor. Sit down with a good pastor and get some people around you in your life. Don't go this alone.

You can't navigate water that's rough by yourself. Absolutely. You need a good marriage counselor, a good pastor in your life, and you need a place where you can stand on the back porch and scream because you're hurting. And then what we're going to see is over the coming weeks or months, whether there's healing. And if you're moving towards healing and moving towards some trust that you can rebuild and you can find yourself there and, you know, she gives you some reasons to trust going forward. And then you, it takes time to heal, but you're moving forward.

Then we don't plan the divorce at that point. I agree. I agree. Because let me tell you, what you set your mind and your sights on is where you're going. Agreed. So if you have a very thorough divorce plan, you increase the likelihood you're going there. What I would do is spend all of my energy right now holding this together and working towards healing until it doesn't work.

And if that doesn't work and you hit the wall on that, then you take a step back and go, okay, now let's divvy this stuff up. Yeah. Your money questions need to be about what's good for us, assuming that there might be in us. And if there isn't, then you make your pivot. So what are your money questions in this time? Yeah.

And that's right now. So right now I'm in a half-million-dollar house. I was able to put $100,000 down on it at 33 and moved in the house. We love it. I love it. But I also find myself in the sales industry. I'm a rep. I supply glass office fronts and doors for offices. I build

offices out of glass walls. And right now I'm just really concerned with people building. I know certain people who've established, you know, contracts and already established the money for that. They're going to continue building because the money's already been secured. But anyone in the midst of design, I'm really worried is going to put things on hold, given the current economy. So I'm a little worried about my job being on the full commission sales rep. That doesn't change whether you're with her or not. No, it does not.

So you just say, it's premature to worry about that. It hasn't happened yet. And so you put those worries over to the side. Yeah, I want you to spend a lot of time with humans during this time because when you sit in an empty 200 square foot house uh the voices most of them are negative about your marriage about your your job about the economy about covid and you you can sit and just stir up a stew of garbage it's human nature i would do it too if i was sitting there because you know your your heart's broken covid's got you scared the economy's got you scared

i mean there's a lot that which makes you scared, the economy's got you scared. I mean, there's a lot, which makes you a human. It doesn't make you a weak person. It just says that's where you are right now. And I think being alone too much is probably not a good idea because you need some people around you. And get positive people around you, not Eeyore. Yeah. And to where you go, okay, under these circumstances,

get you some books to read about marriages that heal after situations like yours. And put this back together. I think you're going to save this marriage, and I think your job's going to be okay. And I think by this time next year, your relationship's going to have recovered and be stronger than it ever was, and the economy's going to be recovered and be stronger than it ever was. And that's not a guess. That's an old guy who's seen a lot of things come and go, and I kind of think that's where you're headed.

Do you sense anything else? He's not out of control. He's not. I think he's dealing with a tremendous amount of pain. He's felt betrayed. He feels rejected. Is this guy better than me? There's a lot of nasty stuff flying around in his head,

and I think there's two things you've got to do here, Zach. I think, number one, you've got to make decisions on the now. You called with this futuristic, well, we're separated and then all this is going to happen. You need to get healthy. Dave told you to see a counselor. I would do that. I would try to get your wife in marriage counseling. I'm telling you, you have to make those decisions now because that's going to give you all the best chance of making this. And then the financial decisions that you make, don't make it on what could happen. What's best for you all right now, period. And don't panic. Make good decisions because a healthy family is going to also have healthy finances. And right now, I'm with you, Dave. And Zach, I know you feel betrayed. I'm just going to tell you, having walked through some really tough

divorces with some buddies of mine, they would tell you if they could be on the show, fight with everything you've got. I know she hurt you, but fight, fight, fight, fight. It'll be worth it. If there's any way you can get, if you can reestablish trust, you know, and that's a decision. It's not going to be easy. It'll take some time, but it's worth it. Yeah, it's worth it. Ken Coleman is my co-host this hour. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. folks i love telling you about well-made well-thought-out products today i'm talking about grip six belts i don't know about you but I'm not a fan of traditional belts.

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manufacturing to learn more and get this month's dave ramsey special visit grip6.com that's grip6.com One of my favorite people in the world we get to talk to for a few minutes here, Dr. Art Laffer. His economic acumen and influence in triggering a worldwide tax-cutting movement in the 80s, caused him to have the moniker of the father of supply-side economics. He was a member of President Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board, and he served on President Trump's Economic Recovery Task Force and was recently awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom from the president. Dr. Art Laffer joining us to talk about the economy. I thought that would be very important.

How are you, Doc? Fine, Dave. How are you doing? Doing good. Ken Coleman's co-hosting with me today that you know well. Yes, I do. Hi, Ken. Dr. Laffer, always good to hear from you, sir. Great hearing your voice. So the study that you guys did at Laffer Associates

is predicting with the fast reopening of state economies that America's recession could end as early as late summer. Swift recovery in the fall. True. You know, the markets are telling us that things look really attractive. If you look at the stock market, it is down, that's true. But nothing like it was in 2008, 2009, or like in 74, or like it was in the Y2K problem. The market is telling us this is going to be a very quick downturn, but a quick upturn

back up, which looks very nice to me. It makes me very happy. I was worried there for a little bit that it was going to be a lot stronger and a lot deeper. I really don't think that's the case. I'm hearing Eeyore out there in the land. You know Eeyore. It's so bad, and the Great Depression is upon us.

So you don't think there's a Great Depression era coming? No, this is not going to be a Great Depression at all. I mean, a couple of things are very nice. Well, they're not nice. They're much less bad than they were. All the original forecasts of the deaths and the spread of the virus and how fatal it was, all of those were a little bit higher than it turned out to be the case, which is wonderful, which means the death toll is going to be a lot less.

It's a lot focused. So I think there's a lot of good news. And the latest news now is that we're well on our way towards a vaccine, which would be absolutely spectacular. Oh, absolutely. We can all agree on that. So you guys are advising not only the White House, and you're not only in the White House regularly with President Trump and with this task force,

but you're also talking a lot of governors across the country, right? I have been, yes. I've talked to a lot of them. Are you going to see the recovery be spotty based on their policies on how quickly they reopen? Yeah, there are two things that really hit here, Dave, that are really very, very important. Number one, the coronavirus was not even handed in its attacks on different states. New York just got hammered. I mean, I think the death toll for a million people was like 50% higher than the next highest. That would be New Jersey.

And the top five i think are i mean the seventh one down is like a fifth the type of mortality rate that hit new york so it was very selective in the states that hit and also these states have very different policies as to how to open up so these states that were hit hard also also happen to be the states that have the most top down dearest type of governments that really don't want allow people to be the states that have the most top-down, deer-as-yeast type of governments that really don't allow people to have the freedoms to reopen. So it's going to be a double whammy on those states. I mean, I look at New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

Those types of states are going to be hammered. States that are open, much more free, that have less impact of coronavirus, like Arizona, Washington, Texas, Utah, you know, South Carolina, Colorado, for example, is a really wonderful one. They're going to be coming back very quickly. Texas has a special problem, which is the hydrocarbon. The price of oil dropped very, very sharply. It will have a specific impact on Texas and Wyoming and West Virginia and Alaska and North Dakota. But those states are, generally speaking, are not going to do well, the oil states. But the ones that are low tax rates, pro-growth states with good governors, are going to come out really well, I think. Art, we heard this week from the Fed Chairman Powell that 40 percent of people

making $40,000 or less lost their jobs. Obviously, there's a tremendous amount of hourly wage earners in that number, and that's a devastating number. But I'm wondering if you see the positive side here, too, as these states open up and the service industry that was hit terrifically hard, that those jobs, many of those jobs are going to come back quickly because places are opening. I think that's true. But, you know, there's a little weird twist here that sort of, in this very bad CARES Act, the one thing that's really hurt the economy most, even worse, I think, than the coronavirus, is the CARES Act.

You know, that was a $3 trillion PPP program it raised. It gave unemployed people $600 per week extra above that. And what it's done is it's made being unemployed far more economically attractive than going back to your job. And, you know, that was just a disaster to do that. And a lot of these people you're talking about are now getting unemployment benefits, you know, their regular unemployment benefits, plus $31,000 a year extra for not working.

And so that makes it their incentive to go back and work a lot less than they should be. Yeah. And so and if they don't go back to work, that slows the recovery, right? Yeah. And now there was a very funny thing today, if any of you saw it on by Secretary of the Nation who said they're going to pass a rule that you don't get the $600 per week or the unemployment benefits if you get offered a job at your old salary. You've got to take it or else they'll withdraw the unemployment benefits.

You know, they're getting way too many rules and regulations here. They shouldn't have put the benefits in in the first place. We had unemployment insurance that was plenty large for temporarily taking care of people who were without a job, and then the federal government has to come in and try to mess around with all this stuff, and now they're trying to undo it with another regulation, and it's getting to be an awfully complicated process. Well, and it appears that July 25th, the dates are going to run through, that the federal $600 runs through is way too long. Yes, it is.

I mean, it's great. Don't they understand that if you pay people to do something, they'll do more of it? What's so surprising about that? If you pay people not to work, they will not work. Hello? Excuse me? But, you know, I've been involved in these processes now since I was in the White House with Nixon when he did the Camp David thing.

And, you know, whenever politicians make decisions, when they are either panicked or drunk, as you say, David, the consequences are rarely attractive. And that is exactly what you're seeing now. You're seeing unified politicians making very bad decisions that make the system a lot worse. Yeah. In some cases, they might have been both. Huh? In some cases, they might have been both, panicked and drunk.

They might be both. You and I have had lots of discussions over the dinner table and even on the microphone over the years of people, businesses that create jobs, government doesn't, and individuals leaving states with a high income tax. And that you've done plenty of studies, and I've read them and quoted them, that the states with no income tax have outperformed economically the states with an income tax. Do you think we're going to see that magnified, the migration out of the Californias and out of the New Yorks if they don't open up, like people are going to run out of there like a hurricane's coming at that place? Yeah, I think it's going to be much more the New Yorks, the Connecticut's, the Michigan's, the New Jersey's, those states. California is a story unto itself. Our friend Larry Gatlin said, if you haven't played in California, it's a brand new game.

But other than California, I think it's very true. I think the salt tax, the state and local tax deduction limitation also makes it much more expensive for high-income earners to stay in those states. So I think we're going to see a lot of migration out of those states. Dr. Art Laffer, father of Supplies Out Economics, serving on President Trump's Economic Recovery Task Force. Laffer Associates coming out with a study this week predicting a fast reopening in the states that have a fast reopening, that any recession that we're feeling would end in those areas by late summer.

Dr. Laffer, always honored to be with you, my friend. Thanks for hanging out with us. It's wonderful, sir. It's wonderful. I love hanging out with you, by the way. You and Sharon are my favorites, by the way, just so you know. Yeah, we believe you. You're our favorite as well, brother. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. We're all going through challenges, and our lives have been impacted in ways we've never anticipated.

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Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. Your timing is crucial, so please get this done. Thanks for joining us, America. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today on The Dave Ramsey Show. He is the host of The Ken Coleman Show, which, of course, is where you go to get your questions answered about career, about jobs, and that is a big, big deal right now. Casey is with us in Alabama. Hey, Casey, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.

Hi, thanks for taking my call. Sure, what's up? First of all, just a little background. My husband and I, we're doing great financially. We're in our late 30s. We have everything paid off at our house. We have a full emergency fund. background my husband and I were doing great financially we're in our late 30s we have everything paid off at our house we have a full emergency fund we're tithers so we're doing great like that in our careers I actually have a background in writing and journalism professionally

and a degree in that I have a freelance business I've been running since probably 2012, and I do well at that. But my real passion is writing books instead of just writing articles and editing for others. And I do graphic design as well. So I've started writing novels, and I'm to the point I've been shopping some out with agents, but I'm really trying to learn about the industries. And I have a lot of friends who make really good money doing self-publishing. And I kind of have all the tools to do it because I already do design work as well, whereas they would have to outsource that. So a lot of people are telling me to self-publish because I write very southern type books,

and they also have Christian elements, so it's not for everyone. But then the people who like it, like that niche market, they really like it. So I'm wondering, should I focus more on just plowing through and keep refining my manuscripts and get an agent or in hoping that they market it well or should i focus more on branding because i do have a blog i have i'm big on social media that type stuff and just find my own market since i already have you know i can do the books myself technically i'm looking long term i want to focus more on I guess 10 years from now I want to be mainly writing books that's where I want my career to go

you have a real clear plan and there's really three you know them there's really three avenues you can go one of them is an absolute no but one of the spectrum is a traditional publisher. Get an

agent, get the publisher to publish the book. They take care of the printing, the billing, supposedly take care of the marketing. They seldom do. A little bit of marketing, it pretty much depends on the author to do the lift, but they will get the book out. In some cases, if you have established yourself enough you might get an advance um but that obviously you know you don't get any more royalties out of the book until the advances are earned through you know that's out of the business the second thing is vanity publishers where you pay them to do all this for you uh you i hope know to stay away from them uh especially with someone with your skill set.

You would never pay someone $10,000 to take your book and, quote, publish it. Right. Because publishing basically consists of, as you've already figured out, writing, editing, typesetting, putting a cover on a book, getting a printer, having the book printed, creating a distribution deal, who's going to distribute the book for you, and everyone has to have that, if you're going to get into brick and mortar anyway, and then marketing. And so you create the book, and then you have to put it on the bookshelves or put it on a website or a series of websites, and then you have to run around out into the market and pull the books off the shelves because bookstores don't sell shelves or don't sell books, and neither does Amazon.

They don't sell them. You're going to sell these books or they're not going to get sold. And so I think you've got the skills to do self-publishing. We transferred all the Ramsey assets to all of our books are published here for that reason, because we have the marketing arm, obviously, and we have the in-house ability to create the actual product like you do. So you need to develop a very clear marketing strategy. You'll make more per book on the book if you self-publish it. Look at the Amazon on Demand model. That way you don't have to print many at the start

if you don't want to order 10,000 in a lick, which you probably shouldn't do. I was going to do print on demand and e-book. Print on demand e-books and then go prove it and prove your concept in the market by doing all your social media marketing and get the books sold. And then as you make more, you can print more and you can worry more about distribution deals. But you can be highly successful and never be in a Barnes & Noble and never be in an airport bookstore with the niche the way you're talking about.

You can sell it off your website and off of Amazon and in a few bookstores in your area and sell. You know, you probably sell 50 or 100,000 books if you keep pushing, and, you know, you can be very, very successful. I personally self-publish it the way you're disclosing this. Ken, you've had a best-selling book that we published here. As a Ramsey personality, your thoughts? Yeah, I think what you said is absolutely right. You know, you mentioned that you have a couple of manuscripts. I'd pick one, and I'd put the first one out and really learn from this process.

You know, as you launch your first one, you'll do it better the second time. And I would also really focus on influencers in your space. You know, if you think about I'm doing some Southern-style novels. They've got a Christian theme to them. So think about who are the people that, if you've got that book in front of them, through some relationships. See, this is what even publishers can't do. But you can make some great connections, get people to read that book and review it

or post something about it on social media. And all of a sudden, you've got some real traction. But a good novel will sell itself if you put it in the right hands. So I think absolutely self-publish, sit back and watch what happens. And here's the thing. Even if it's true in the self-improvement space that we're in, it's also true in the fiction space that you're in. It's not unusual for an author's big book to be their second or third.

It's highly unusual for it to be their first one right it statistically just almost never happens and if it does they almost never have a big follow-up yeah um so uh it's not unusual at all for an author to put one out that's why i can't say and get one out there let's get this stirred up, and then let that following take your second book immediately and give it a bump, and you've got to push out there that way. And that's a wonderful, wonderful way to do it because you don't have the kind of a marketing machine. But the thing that a lot of authors make the mistake on is they think that publishers and

bookstores will do all the work and sell the book. Typical publisher put out 800 to 1,000 books a year, and the amount of attention they're going to give your particular baby and rock your baby is generally fairly low. In some cases, it's a great idea to use a publisher, even in that setting, but don't be under any illusion that they're going to give it nearly the attention you do. They're pretty much counting on you to use your platform to get that book lifted and get it going anyway. So you might as well make the money. Good exercise for authors or first-time authors. Just go to a big bookstore and just go look in the non-big bestseller area.

Just look at how many books are on the shelf of just one title that's the ones that made it onto the shelf that made it and so all of a sudden you realize wait a second you'd have to go on a scavenger hunt to find my book and that's the point you're making you're gonna have to sell an example all right total money makeover book is sold it's coming up on eight million copies wow okay and you walk in a lot of bookstores is not in there yeah or if you walk in you might find one yeah there's no okay and you walk in a lot of bookstores is not in there yeah or if you walk in you might find one yeah there's no indication visually you walk in a bookstore that that book is that big or successful and so you walk around looking at all those books you're

going there could be a whole bunch of books in there that sold eight or ten or twenty million copies and there's one copy sitting there looking at you that you don't you don't see a stack of them even if they've got them in the back they don't stack them out front that's right you know so it's visually distressing when you write a book and you walk in there and you go i'm lost in the sea of other paperwork oh my gosh one thing i wanted to mention her doing an audiobook is also something she should pursue too audiobooks are exploding and she's got that southern she's got that great oh yeah that would be good you know yeah audiobooks are going big they're following the podcast world by the way they're both people are consuming audiobooks on their phones like they're consuming podcasts

very very strong market our audiobook sales are through the roof. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Folks, since you're spending more time at home these days, why not make the most of it? Now, I know not everyone has the means to do a full renovation, but thanks to our friends at Blinds.com, there are some small changes you can make to help improve your home. Blinds.com makes it incredibly simple to shop top-quality blinds, shades, and interior shutters from home with easy online ordering and free shipping right to your door. Listen, window treatments are a simple project that you can do that really benefits the look and feel of your home. And if you're nervous about doing it yourself, well, don't be. Blinds.com has helped millions of homeowners through the process with

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host of The Ken Coleman Show, answering your questions about career and jobs. And we talk about life, we talk about money here on The Dave Ramsey Show, and right now it certainly entails both of those. Nothing like a global pandemic to kick your butt and set your priority straight right perfect time to refocus your goals perfect time to reset you know i always think ken about my grandpa when i was a kid i remember taking a deck apart with him and i was pulling nails out of the boards and he made me straighten them and save them and put them in a coffee can. His life was changed by the Great Depression. He had an event in his life that was culture-wide.

It wasn't individual to him, but it was culture-wide, like this COVID thing has been, that left him in a place where he said, no matter what, we're never going to be back here again. Never again. Never again. And so for the rest of his life he saved money he was frugal uh he was you know a ramsey so he was cheap but he uh uh you know he he we're known for that i guess but, you know, some of the folks out there have, this was their wake-up call. This was their never-again moment. And, you know, here's the thing. If you take your never-again moment and you use it well, you never again will be there.

That's really true. You'll be in a place where you say, I'm going to prosper because of this. I'm going to become wealthy because of this. I'm convinced today the wealth that Sharon and I, that God has blessed us with, is because of what we went through when we went through a bankruptcy, losing everything, and what we learned from that, and the fact that we drove a stake in the ground and we said never again. It changes everything, doesn't it?

It really does. If you think about your grandfather. Now, let's just talk about the Great Depression, folks. I mean, some of you are young enough to not even really know much about it. We're talking about they had nothing. They had to make everything count. And that's why years later, as you're a youngster, he's going, Dave, let's straighten those nails out. We're going to save him because this was a man whose life and his family was changed forever when there was nothing.

They had to make everything last. So now let's fast forward to this moment. We're not going through depression, not even close. and his family was changed forever when there was nothing. They had to make everything last. So now let's fast forward to this moment. We're not going through depression, not even close. I don't care what you hear. But the reality is that some of you are still dealing with fear, panic maybe, because your livelihood was taken from you just like that. So that's your moment.

And so what are you looking for? You don't ever want to have that feeling of panic. You want peace. If there's a wake-up call, you need to answer the phone. Yes. So peace is what you're longing for, those of you who have faced panic. That's what you're longing for, to know that, wait a second, the economy can take a massive jolt, and we're going to be fine. That's the lesson that we've got to take from this.

Yep, that's exactly right. And so here's what you can do. Because everyone was locked down about a month and a half ago, we launched something we've never done in 30 years, and we're continuing to do it right now, which is a 14-day free trial to Financial Peace. There it is again. Financial Peace University. And you get all of our digital content,

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and you've got to track your progress, and you've got to track your progress because it keeps you inspired. And it's all free for the 14 days, for the two weeks. Reset your priorities. Have your never-again moment. Go to DaveRamsey.com slash hope or DaveRamsey.com slash FPU for Financial Peace University. Patrick is with us. Patrick's in Ohio. Hi, Patrick.

How can we help today? Yeah, I was just wondering. I'm now my dad's age. Forty years ago, what my dad was. Say in 1981, this is going for older people. It seems like we only have the stock market to fall back on as far as returns. Back in 1981, we had a lot of same things that we have going on now.

High unemployment. But I remember him saying it was a good time to, he could make money if you didn't buy anything. You had 16% CDs. You did have a stock market to invest in. He did have some rental property, but it seemed like there was municipal

bonds I remember he was in and other things, but now with all these, with everything at 0%, or you know the car loans are low. I mean, I realized that a car loan in 81 was 15%. I get it but if you didn't buy anything you could make some money yeah money markets money markets were 15 it was crazy

and the bond the bond market was going zoom zoom so it was a different it was a different financial situation or economic situation than we have right now. Right. And that's where, that's where my concern is, is it seems like there's no place for a saver or a person that's actually trying to do the right thing with this money. Because, you know, you can, you know, these companies are all getting zero percent bailouts and things of that nature or bonds and stuff or companies that are, you know, let's face it, there's probably going to be two airlines that are probably going to go out or going to have issues. So I'm just saying that they're given all this.

So what's your question? Companies. Well, I'm wondering is where can an older person that needs to make some money to have a return on to live? Well, you're 60 and I'm 60. I'll tell you what I'm doing. Okay? Mm-hmm.

For money that I have for savings, for emergency funds, is sitting in a money market making nothing. Same thing it's been doing for about the past 10 years, actually. It's not been making anything for 10 years. It's been making 1%. And then for investing for the long term, I'm 60. I buy real estate that makes an income that I pay cash for, and I buy good growth stock mutual funds with long-term track records. And they've done very, very well since 1981, for sure. And so, you know,

what are they, what's the, you what's the best and brightest companies in America? What are they going to be worth as a group 20 years from now when you're 80? And I'm convinced that if you listed out top brands and top companies that are traded on the stock market, if you said, you know, McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Apple, Dell, General Motors, Ford, go down the list, okay? And, you know, Exxon, you start listing companies that are household names that you think of when you think of the stock market, that some of them will go belly up, some of them will be mediocre, but as a group, the American economy will grow in the next 20 years, and I will profit from that by being in mutual funds.

And so, Patrick, what you've got to be careful of, and, Ken, people face this all the time, is you have to be careful of, you know, what you're afraid of or what you're upset about, tainting your view of where you really think everything is going to go long term. Yeah. This is a classic situation of what you focus on is what you see everywhere. We actually know this from multiple psychology studies, that the brain is very powerful. And so it's why many people who've bought a car, they could all recount the experience of driving home with that car and someone in the family or everybody in the family saying over the next two or three days, hey, there's our car and there's our car and there's our car. We see it everywhere. Well, the car didn't increase all of a sudden on the roadways. What happened is, is you got excited about this purchase and now you focused on it intently, and now you see it everywhere. So if you've got the victim mentality, you're going to feel like everything you encounter in the world is against you. If you're fearful, you're going to feel like you're under attack from everything.

So the idea here is you've got to have a mindset that, wait a second, there are opportunities for me to make money. There are opportunities for me to progress. And when I focus on how I can progress, then I will see opportunities to do that. So it is a focus thing. I think, you know, comparing this time to 1981, very, very different time. Extremely different. Yeah, but both came out. This is yet to be proven, but both came out in prosperity.

Well, the Reagan administration, that was an unbelievable boom of prosperity. Yeah, following Carter in 81. Yeah. I was there. Yes. Gas lines, I'm told. Man. Yeah.

Yeah, they were. Oh, that puts us out of the Dave Ramsey Show in the books. Our thanks to James Childs, our producer, Kelly Daniel, our associate producer, Ken Coleman, my co-host. We'll be back. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer and phone screener for The Dave Ramsey Show. This episode is over, but if you heard about an event, product, or service and didn't have a chance to write it down, don't worry. We list everything you've heard about during this episode in the podcast show notes or head to DaveRamsey.com. Thanks for listening.