The Ramsey Show - App - We Need Perspective Right Now, Not Panic (Hour 2)

Episode Date: March 18, 2020

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is done, cash is king, and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. You jump in, we'll talk about your life and your money. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Up first this hour is going to be Moshe in Florida.

Hi, Moshe. How are you? Hi. How are you doing, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up? Well, my wife's here with me, too. You're right. First of all, thank you so much for taking our call. Secondly, we just want to mention that we are also very thankful. When we came to visit in August, we caught you in the hallway after the show,

and you gave us some marriage tips for like six or seven minutes, and it's been great. Our marriage is going thank you very much yeah okay so our question is right now we are in contract on a what we believe is a good deal on a house two-bedroom townhouse and there's a about seven days left of the inspection period. And with everything going on now, and like hearing today that Trump has, you know, banned the foreclosures and evictions until the end of April, and with the things that may happen with the real estate market, we are wondering if it's a good idea to stick with this deal now or get out of this and wait as the values may drop for us to find

something better yeah or renegotiate well the best decisions are made if you pan back and have a long-term perspective so i'm not worried about for between now and the end of april on you whether or not you should buy this house if you shouldn't have bought this house between now and the end of April on whether or not you should buy this house. If you shouldn't have bought this house between now and the end of April, you shouldn't have bought the house, right? I mean, but I'm guessing you're in good financial shape. You've done everything correctly. You've got your emergency fund. You're out of debt, right?

Yep, we got that all. Good. And then a good strong down payment. Is your employment stable? Yep, a little. I'm sorry? Is your employment stable i'm sorry is your employment stable we are both nurses working for a long-term care insurance company so as far as we know it should be pretty good for a while yeah okay all right that's good news are you both working for the same company

yep okay yeah same office okay right now home office but in, same office. Okay. Right now, home office, but in general, same office. Gotcha. Okay. So the way you answer the question is, five years from now, which would have been the better decision? And would it have mattered much? I don't think it's going to change. I don't think the real estate market is going to change enough that five years from now that this would have been a horrible decision. Okay.

I think five years from now it's going to be a, we look back and remember the great toilet paper shortage of the spring of 2020. You know, I mean, it's a horrible thing we're going through that's very real. It's not as bad as everybody's emotions have turned it into, but it's compounded in a self-fulfilling prophecy into the economy now. And so, you know, that's making it very real. When people are losing their jobs and the president's worried about people losing their homes. And so I'm not sure how you get foreclosed on in one month in any universe, but I guess it sounds good politically to guard against that.

So because foreclosures don't occur until you're behind a minimum of three months in any state, usually six to ten months before a foreclosure actually occurs. And so if you get foreclosed on in April, you had problems before there was a coronavirus. And so I'm not sure how this exactly helps, but maybe it helps. Maybe it calms people down a little bit, and God knows we need that. So anyway, if I'm in your shoes, I'm closing on the deal. What did you say? If I'm in your shoes, I'm going to buy this house now as agreed.

I would not walk away from this house deal because five years from now, I don't think it's going to matter one way or the other. Okay, yeah, we entered into it before this whole, you know, this whole thing happened. Yeah. And the only way it's a horrible decision is if this is virtually the end of our economy, and I just don't believe that. Okay.

So I think real estate in Florida is going to continue to be an absolutely incredible, incredible investment. What's the next 30 days bring? Oh, I don't know. I have no idea. I'm not sure. I've got a guess or two, but they'd be just that. They'd be the same thing you've got.

It's a guess. So, hey, thank you for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. At the bottom of the hour, Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, joins us to talk about your career in times of crisis job changes job problems career issues maybe these crazy times have been maybe these crazy times have been your wake-up call on your career or where you work maybe you don't want to work there anymore.

You know, there may be people that don't want to work here after this. There may be people that really do want to work here more than anything after this. You know, that kind of thing is real. So we're going to talk about that at the bottom of the hour. Ken Coleman joins us. Our question, get your calls in right now if you want to talk career. We'll clean a couple lines off for Ken. The phone number is 888-825-5225.

Blinds.com gives us our question of the day with a 100% satisfaction guarantee that means even if you mismeasure or you pick the wrong color, they will remake your window blinds for free. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run every month, you'll save even more. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best possible deal marks in massachusetts can you run through the logic of choosing roth over tax deferred iras is there a benefit to choosing deferred over roth for tax purposes i want to understand the logic well if you if you put $500 a month into an IRA, and you put it into a Roth, and that's $6,000 for, and you did that for, I don't know, 30 years. You'd have $180,000 in there if you did that for 30 years that you put in.

That would have grown to over a million dollars in a good growth stock mutual funds. Okay? So if you put $180,000 in and it grows to $1,180,000, if it is in a traditional IRA, you will pay taxes on $1,180,000. But you did not pay taxes yet on the $180,000. Or you could have already paid the taxes on the $180,000, which would be a Roth IRA. And then the $1,180,000 is 100% tax-free. So the difference between the two is taxes on a million dollars in that example.

So it's a $250,000, $350 250 350 000 swing that's what it comes down to wow roth always is the best way to go unless you've just got a couple of years to invest and your growth is not going to be big at all which case you might even not want to be fooling with it at all so um you know at the end of your life, maybe you do traditional, but otherwise you do a Roth because most of what's in your account will be growth. And for it to be tax free is always mathematically superior. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. I love talking about companies that know how to do business right. You've heard of Grip6 belts, right?

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Check out this month's special offers for my listeners at Grip6.com. Thank you for joining us, America. Right now, the people you love, a lot of them are experiencing unprecedented levels of fear, anxiety. They're worried about their jobs. They're worried about their health. They're worried about what to do in an emergency. One paycheck could turn their world upside down, and some of them are out that paycheck. If you want to help with that, you actually can provide hope by providing a Financial Peace University class to your community. You can even lead it online with a virtual group.

A lot of people are working from home, doing things from home, and feel more comfortable doing that. That's fine. Run a virtual group right now. There's a lot of people with some time on their hands, and they've also had this realization because of the stress point that they need to change some things, because as Warren Buffett said, when the tide goes out, you can tell it was skinny dipping. The things you were doing weren't working, and these times pointed out to you with a highlighter. So no better time to be a light in your community and even with your family, even online with a virtual group, Financial Peace University.

If you want to lead a class, text the words LEADFPU, LEADFPU to 33789. That's LEADFPU, all one word, no spaces. LEADFPU to 33789. The truth is this. I've watched it for 30 years and people do not get their stress down because they got out of debt as much as they do as much as they get their stress down than when they have a plan when you are in a crisis when you can just say I have a plan it lowers the stress if you know the people you're working with have a plan it lowers the stress. If you know the people you're working with, have a plan.

It lowers the stress. That's why leadership needs to over-communicate to their teams at times like this. Those of you that are leading in businesses or other organizations, you need to over-communicate. Give too much information. And make your decisions based on your value system, based on the principles, not based on social pressures or social media or the media. And so all of that weaves in together here, folks.

It's a big deal. Ken Coleman joins us at the bottom of the hour. If you want to talk about your career or a question about a job in these crazy uncertain times, we're going to take your calls. Open phones at 888-825-5225. To do that, we're opening up some phone lines for Ken. Bill is with us. Bill's in Pennsylvania. Hi, Bill. How can I help?

Hey, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? I'm a fairly new listener, so new to the baby steps. I kind of did these out of order. So basically, you know, I have the three to six month emergency fund saving for retirement, saving for my two-year-old son's college fund.

Probably have, you know, 40 to,000 to $45,000 of equity in our home, but currently have, you know, $35,000 to $40,000 in student loan debt. How much is in your emergency fund? $6,500. Okay, good. And what's your household income? $120,000. Oh, that's great news. Good. good. And what's your household income? $120,000. Oh, that's great news. Good. Okay. And what's your question? So my question is, given the mortgage interest rates right now, do you think it would be smart to do a cash out refi and pay off the student loan debt? Nope. Never. That's a bad idea. If you die,

the student loan debt is forgiven. Your mortgage is not. If you become disabled, the student loan debt is forgiven. The mortgage is not. And you need to get it paid off anyway. So instead, all you said was you just discovered the baby steps, which is fine. That's cool. And so you had skipped some, not knowing. And if you skip some, you have to go back and start where they are, which means that we would temporarily stop your retirement funding, temporarily stop your two-year-old's college funding. That's baby steps four and five. I would clean out $5,500 out of your emergency fund and put it on your student loan debt. And then I would attack that student loan debt with a vengeance, and you should have that paid off inside of a year.

Okay, perfect. Now, is your employment stable right now in the corona crazy? It is, yes. Okay. As long as your employment is stable and we don't have any trouble with that, then that's exactly what I would do. Now, any of you out there that are worried about, you know, you have a real legitimate hurricane coming at you from a financial standpoint,

then you would stop your baby steps and pile up cash. And so in your case, I would just not do anything right now except stop the 401K and the kids' college temporarily. And that's, you know, that's the route that I'm going to go. But if, in your case, you're solid, then that leaves you $30,000, $29,000 in debt, and you make $120,000. Dude, you can do that in a year. You're 100% debt-free.

We didn't increase your mortgage. Now, if your mortgage interest rate is high, you may want to refinance that anyway because these rates have dropped a bunch this week, and it is a great time to refinance a house. It's a wonderful time to refinance, but I would not roll your student loans into it. Ryan is with us in Ohio. Hi, Ryan. How are you?

I'm doing well. How are you doing, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up? So with this crisis going on, my hours are getting cut. I am completely debt-free except for my mortgage. I owe about 60 grand left. Good. I have an emergency fund of 15,000. Just at the end of the last year, I sold a rental property and now I have $70,000 in taxes.

What do you make a year? Me and my wife make about $90,000. Okay. And what's your worst-case scenario on your income through the corona crazy? I really don't know. Well, I mean, realistically, what do you think is going to happen to your job? I think it will get cut in half. Cut in half?

I think it would take a lot for us to close. And how much of the 90 is you? Most of it. I make 60. Okay. So you could go from 90 down to60 if we lost half of your $60. What about her job? I think she's doing pretty good.

She's in a nonprofit. You think she's stable? Yeah. She's in a nonprofit? Yeah. Why would that be stable? I would guess that charitable giving will dry up to nothing for a little while. I just think their budget's already set, so they're funded for the entire year.

Okay. All right. So that'll keep that pretty calm. Okay. So if you went, so pretty much you think realistically our worst-case scenario is your household income goes from $90,000 to $60,000. You have $15,000 in the bank, and you have $70,000 in the bank, and you have a $60,000 mortgage. So if we paid off your mortgage, you'd have $25,000 in the bank and no mortgage.

Yep. And you can make it easily on $60,000 if your hours get cut that far. Yeah. Okay. I would do that, yeah. Okay. get cut that far yeah okay i would do that yeah okay you know the cash doesn't give you the cash doesn't carry you up any place that you're going to have to go and you got 25 000 bucks laying there still which is a nice you know that's a nice chunk that's like six months of income for if you lost all your income from off the 60 anyway so yeah i mean the math seems to make sense to me

and that's what we're doing so good question thanks for joining us so that exercise is a good one for a bunch of you that are facing crap out there right now okay what is the probability what's the percentage chance in your mind that this is that something's going to happen i'm not talking about vague worrying because you're panicking and you're hysterical because you've been watching the news i'm talking about really where you work, what is going to be the problem that you're going to face. And start projecting, you know, this is like I think the worst thing could happen. This is probably what's going to happen somewhere in there. And start building out your budget based on that and deciding whether you're going to stop your baby steps and build up cash because you've got a storm coming.

Some of you don't have much of a storm coming. Some of you got a hurricane coming. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. When it comes to dealing with ID theft, most people still think that credit monitoring or prevention plans offer the best protection. Wrong. ID theft is much more than just financial fraud, folks. There's medical ID theft, employment fraud, criminal ID theft, account takeover, title fraud, and tax fraud. These risks account for 50% of ID theft events, yet they're not even detected by those pricey

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host of The Ken Coleman Show, a live radio show on SiriusXM on about 40 radio stations as well as a very popular podcast. He talks careers and your jobs. And if you've lost your job or you're worried about work when all this is over, Ken's on the air every day right before me providing practical tips and hope in this area if you've got questions about your career or jobs in the middle of all of this ken is here with us the phone number is 888-825-5225 so we've nicknamed you around here mr good news thank you i appreciate that that's a good moniker it's nice i'll take it it's a good thing so uh i'm just uh i'm just yelling

calm down but you've actually got uh some things you've been pulling up that are actually good news yeah let me start by saying go to my twitter account at ken coleman i've done three tweets in the last two hours where you can actually read these articles so i'll give you some summaries but we're beginning to see major media outlets let's take time magazine for one uh and they're beginning to say that the the mortality rates that have been projected and that you're seeing splashed all over Sludge Report and everything else, they're not necessarily going to be that high. And we're seeing great news out of China.

We're seeing great news out of South Korea. Let's look at Germany. Folks, go check me on this stuff. This isn't my opinion. But you've got to be careful what you read, and you've got to form an opinion based on facts, not opinion, and projections. Because projections won't get you a whole lot of places, and perspective is what we need right now, not panic. And so to give you an example, Germany's mortality rates on this thing, very, very low uh there is a nobel peace prize uh laureate uh from israel who who correctly projected the slow of the virus in china and he's now come out saying look there is a huge portion

of the population that may get infected but never have any symptom and it has little to do with social isolation and he cites the princess cruise. So again, I've tweeted these articles. The reason I'm doing this, folks, is very simple. Because what we've got going on right now is a lot of projections that's leading to panic. People are being laid off because people aren't out spending money. And once we get the facts, and we realize that with testing over the next two, three weeks, Dave, we will see a rise in the amount of cases. But we want to be looking at the mortality rate. Time magazine article, this laureate, people are saying this is going to start to feel more like the flu. You're going to hear all this stuff back and forth.

Please do the research. Get out and look at it. Don't read headlines and freak out. He said social isolation is not helping? No, he said it's not the only thing that's going to fix it. He said it can help. He said don't hug people. But what he said is he actually cites, and I've tweeted this article,

he cites that Prince's Cruise, where you had people in close, close proximity to each other, I mean, ideal opportunity for it to spread, way more so than even a highly populated city in China, Dave. And what he said was that 20% of the people on that boat got it or showed symptoms. opportunity for it to spread way more so than even a highly populated city in china dave and what he said was is that 20 of the people on that boat got it yeah or showed symptoms here's the point people are going to lose their lives italy the reason that they have a higher mortality rate it's been documented this is all over the internet go read it folks higher population of older people and people with pre-existing conditions.

This is a dangerous thing for those folks, and we've got to be responsible. But I'm afraid that what we have done is we have panicked. No. And we have put the economy in a very, very tenuous situation. Now, let me say one other thing. I haven't said this to you, so if you disagree with me, that's fine. Well, why are you? That's okay. We're hearing words like recession being thrown around, and think it's irresponsible i'll tell you why we're only

about two three weeks into this deal february had a record jobs report we had a fundamentally strong economy day before this thing made its way over to us and here's what's happened i think we're in a compression when you and i you got me into that marathon two years ago and i had to start wearing compression sleeves on my legs and stuff. And what compression is, is it tightens everything. Everybody gets tight. Everybody's up tight right now. And we're freaking out.

And what small business owners will do, or restaurant owners will do, when they're told they have to close, is they're going to have to lay people off. But is that an economic pattern we're going to see throughout the rest of this year? No, because once things return to normal, we're seeing in Korea, we're seeing in China that their baseball leagues are opening back up. You know, it's reasonable to believe that we're going to see some sense of normalcy over the next, I think, six to eight weeks. And when we do, people are going to be sick of hanging around with their family. They're going to want to go get a burrito. And then restaurants are going to need what? they're going to need waiters yeah they're

going to need bus boys so i'm not trying to oversimplify dave but i i guess i'm sitting here and i'm looking at the realities of an economy and how an economy works and when we see things like recession and depression in the headlines it'll scare anybody i am not belittling your emotions i'm saying be calm let's's just understand. All a recession is. That's right. Is two quarters. Two. That the GDP did not grow. That's exactly right. It receded rather than grow. The gross domestic product, the total output of goods and services. So will we have one quarter of that? Oh, no doubt.

No question. No doubt. Could we have two? Maybe. Maybe. Three in a two? Maybe. Maybe. Three in a row? Nope. Not starting right now. The fourth quarter of this year and the first quarter of this year will likely be growth quarters, which would be the end to a two-quarter recession, one of the shortest recessions in the history of the United States if that occurred.

So that's what a recession is. It's a great emotional word, but all it means is two consecutive quarters of a GDP receding gross domestic product. What's driving this right now? Consumer confidence is low. Well, of course it's low. What's driving it is there's nobody out of their house. That's the point, because they said you have to isolate. And if they are working, they're not working much because they're working from home, and they're certainly not outspending. That's the issue. Consumers are scared. What's the next two, three months going to look like so I'm going to conserve cash?

Not a bad idea. We espouse that. But the minute that people realize, wait a second, we're going to cycle through this, then you're going to see consumers begin to spend again. And, again, I hate it for restaurant workers. I hate it for the tourism industry. But people are going to go back to theme parks. They're going to go back to restaurants. That cash that's on the sidelines is going to come roaring back in our everyday economy.

And Dave, you know this better than I do. The cash that's sitting on the sidelines with investors, it's going to come roaring back. In both cases, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. That's exactly right. The hysteria created the problem, and when the hysteria leaves, the problem will go back, and people will be just sick of it. You know, I just finished this book by Eric Larson on Churchill during the time of the London bombings, when the Nazis were bombing London, and for the first year of his prime

ministership. And it's a, you know, it goes through, it's a wonderful, big, thick book, it's a great read over the weekend, but the, and you and I are both Churchill fans, so, but the, there's been several studies done of the English people became known for having a stiff upper lip, a tough constitution during that time. And there's been some people that would argue that it really wasn't that necessarily they were tough. They just got tired of being scared. That's right. And so, you know, the bombs would fall at night.

During the day, they'd go on a picnic in the park. And some of them, by the time it was ended, 17,000 people died in those bombings. Tens of millions of pounds of bombs dropped on London over the period of a year, and people by the end of it were having picnics on their roof during the bombing raids. Why is that? Let's talk. I'm glad you brought this up. They get tired of being scared. That, but also Churchill was known for riding on the trains in that very same time. He was in a bunker all day, but he would get out and take walks. It's well documented. During the war, during the lives, Churchill would be on trains in public transportation. He would do walk-arounds, walkabouts, whatever you want to call it.

This was a man who decided to lead. And I'm, listen, I think the best, here's some more good news. I'm not thrilled with how some of our leaders have handled this. They've allowed the media to drive clicks and to drive eyeballs because that's what the media does. But I'll tell you that the best and brightest in the world haven't decided to sit this out. And what I love to see is that the CEO of Target and Walmart and Walgreens were joining the president in the White House. I do like seeing bipartisan legislation. I'm not a fan of sending checks to everybody. I don't believe in socialism. I think that's a little nervous.

That's a new different talk show. We don't do that around here. But I will say that I think the best and brightest of America are going to pull up their sleeves. They're going to lock arms. We're going to do it at Ramsey Solutions. We're going to keep dispensing facts and hope. Yeah. And not panic.

No. No one makes good decisions when they're drunk or when they're panicked, or whatever it says. Love that quote. Yeah. And so you just got to calm down. We're going to say that a lot around here. A couple of career questions coming in,

questions of what to do with your job in the middle of this crisis mode that is out there, because we are in crisis mode. Regardless of how we got there and regardless of how long it is, we can argue about that, but we are there. All this for Ken Coleman right here on the dave ramsey show Ramsey Personality number one best-selling author Ken Coleman joins us this hour. His book is The Proximity Principle. His show is The Ken Coleman Show, and you need to listen to it. He's been the Mr. Good News around here lately.

Gave us a little update on that in the last segment, but we're going to take some questions for him about your career, your jobs in times of crisis. If you're worried, if you're scared, if you're not and you've still got questions, he's here for you. Justin is in Florida. Hi, Justin. Question for Ken.

Hey, Ken and Dave. Justin here. I just want to tell you guys I really appreciate y'all's ministry. Very encouraging in the area that you don't necessarily handle in church, but everybody thinks about. So I really appreciate the way you guys serve us out there. Thank you, sir. I'm a defense contractor, military reservist.

I'm a major in the Air National Guard. Last year I came home from active duty, back to my job, and found out my job was moving from Florida to Colorado. And it was a good thing, right? We got a raise out of it and those kind of things. But it required what would be a subsequent move for my family that has, quite frankly, my lovely wife has moved all over the country with me multiple times.

And you're just tired of moving, and I get it. And I am now, when I came back and we worked it out, I went and tried the job for a little while, but we just weren't, it just wasn't going to work for us. And it quite frankly, get put a toxic question, kind of a toxic environment between me and my employer. So subsequently after that I had to leave and I just walked away. We did have some savings and I put 400 applications out there. Cause I'm I'm a big believer in trying hard and putting in effort.

And funny enough, ironically enough, the only people that have been calling have been people that, again, require a move. And I just, as a believer and as a Christian, my wife and I, we pray every time I interview and that kind of thing. I mean, she's quite an awesome person. My main question is, what is the criteria for staying put? Um, when you talk about your career, um, I personally can live anywhere and the military has kind of taught me that, but my wife, my lovely wife, she just wants roots so bad. And, um, I don't blame her for that. Well, I just want to know where to put that. Well, you have to look at the big picture. So we need to place this move in the big picture, and the big picture includes her,

it includes your family, what you two as a married couple sit down and say what we want for our future. So this opportunity that you have or multiple opportunities that are coming to you that require a move, I think you have to look at it and say, does this move me up the ladder? Does this put me on a ladder that will allow me to move up to where I ultimately want to go? And I think you have to look at that individually first. What is the work you really want to do? Where do you want to be in 10, 15 years? And you've got to look big picture.

And if these opportunities are clear yeses, Justin, that they're going to put you on the ladder or they move you up the ladder significantly, then it's a conversation with her to say, okay, the reason that I think I need to do this and that we need to do this as a family is because of this opportunity professionally and what it does for us personally. What's your career field? So I'm a cybersecurity architect in the aerospace sector. Okay. So let me ask you this. Could you get an interview or a job as a result of an interview that you could become, through the process of talking with them, very comfortable that when you move there, it will be the last time you ever moved? So I would love to say that.

And quite frankly, our intent of moving here to Florida was that attempt. This was where one of the – Yeah, but I mean, I don't want you climbing the ladder and you've got to move cities every three years. Your wife's done with that. Yeah. Yeah, she is. Regardless of how much money you make, you're done with that.

That's off the table is what you described. So you need to decide, okay, what city are you in in Florida? Outside of Orlando. Okay. Well, you're in a big enough city that cybersecurity, you shouldn't have any trouble at all landing something there. You may take a little less than you would have taken in L.A. It hasn't been that way.

Quite frankly, of the 400 applications I've put out, I think what people are seeing in my application is they're seeing they don't want to hire their next boss, right, because I have 20-plus years of experience. That's just not right. That's just not right. You just haven't found the right fit. Yeah. And applications are useless without relationships. Well, that's right.

And I think, again, Dave's right. You're going to have to take the next move, and it's going to have to be the final move. And that's what I'm getting at. And I think if you make that case to your wife where you say, okay, I know you don't want to move, but this is a really great opportunity. I promise it's the last move. That's the only way. And I'm not going to take a position that's going to move me. Now, talk about 400 applications.

400 applications are useless. Yeah, I love the – It's a hustle, but it's not a grind. Yeah, and not pick it on him, but this is what a lot of people do, and you hear this, you go, okay, I sent out 400 applications, Ken, how come I haven't got anything? Because you don't know anybody at 400 different places. If you don't have a relationship attached to that resume, there's a long shot that you're going to get pulled out of the pile, and the world's different now, Dave. Hiring managers aren't going to send you a note going,

hey, sorry. They're just not going to reply. And so then you get discouraged. And what you've got to do is it's not about 400, it's about four quality connections that you have to somebody in that company that you want to apply for. And you start looking at how I can reduce

the amount of resumes I send out and applications, and I start focusing on how I can reduce the amount of resumes I send out and applications, and I start focusing on how I can find connections, if it's two degrees, three degrees, four degrees, to a company where I want to be. We've seen this happen all the time here at Ramsey Solutions. So, yeah, you need to hold on. We're going to give you a copy of Ken's book, Proximity Principle. But the other thing is he needs to download the PDF.

He needs to download the resume guide because now, Dave, we have an actual template where you plug in your information. It's free. It's absolutely free. And we're seeing more and more people, over 115,000 people have used it. And it's unbelievable the results that people are getting because it looks different,

but it forces you to put who I know at the top of the resume. That's right. You've got to know somebody in that company. And the connection won't get you anything except a discussion, but you don't even get the discussion with just a blind application. You won't get pulled out of the pile unless you know somebody. And then you get a phone call.

Then it's up to you. But we have this happen all the time here. It's one of the few ways you actually get on here. I think it's the best way. It's very difficult to get on here. Dustin is in Nevada. Hi, Dustin. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.

Your question for Ken Coleman. Hello, Mr. Ramsey. Hello, Mr. Coleman. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? I am an EMT, and the company that I work for is offering EMTs the possibility to become a paramedic. They'll sponsor us.

They'll pay for everything. And I don't know if I actually want to become a paramedic. I love being a first responder. I love helping people. But having that kind of responsibility, it honestly kind of scares me. And I don't really know if I should pursue it. I've thought about it, but I don't really know. And I was hoping you could offer maybe some advice or some guidance on how to figure that out.

Well, I think you just laid out what you need to be thinking about right now. You love being the ENT, but the paramedic thing, there's some question marks there, but your brain's kind of telling you, go at this because they're going to pay for it, but your heart's going, whoa. And you've got to, what's the go and the whoa and where's the tension? So what are you most concerned about? What is that true fear you have? Because that's what you've identified, a fear of being a paramedic.

You're not sure, I want to handle that. What is it? What are you afraid of? I'm being a paramedic. You're in charge of everything. You are the person in charge of the call. You have this person's life literally in your hands. And for me, that's a little nerve wracking.

It's scary. Don't get me wrong. I think it's exciting and it's fun, but. Okay. Hold on. Hold on. Pause. Yeah. I love that answer. You're just worried that you're going to blow it and that you don't have what it takes. Isn't that what you're really afraid of? That you can't pull this off? All that responsibility? It's life and death type stuff. And you're scared. What happens if I can't do it? Isn't that what you're afraid of? Yeah. But here's the deal.

You said it's exciting. It would make you come alive if you knew you made the difference on a team, leading a team of people that are responding. I think it comes down to this. Do you believe if you train, do you believe if you're committed that you get mentored by other good paramedics, and you do everything it takes to do the job, do you think you could pull it off? I do. Then do it. to do the job do you think you could pull it off i do then do it i do then do it by the way first the first time you get behind the wheel of a car

and you're 14 or 12 or 16 or whatever it's the exact same thing i think i'm going to wreck the car but with a little bit of help a little bit of training and some patience maybe maybe some patience from your father you might get through and get down the street and then you might learn to drive i was terrified first time we did the Ken Coleman show, helping callers in real life. Yeah. But I sure was excited about it, and I stayed with it. I think he needs to jump into it. Amen.

He's going to be a great paramedic. Yeah. Ken Coleman, thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me. That puts us out of 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.