This Past Weekend - E556 Caleb Hammer

Episode Date: January 22, 2025

Caleb Hammer is a financial advisor and content creator known for his popular show “Financial Audit” where he interviews real people about their spending habits.  Caleb Hammer joins Theo to talk ...about the origins of his show “Financial Audit” (and how it sprung from his own money issues), the number one thing Gen-Z is going into debt over, and his advice for finding your own financial security. Caleb Hammer: https://www.instagram.com/calebhammercomposer/ ------------------------------------------------ Tour Dates! https://theovon.com/tour New Merch: https://www.theovonstore.com ------------------------------------------------- Sponsored By: Celsius: Go to the Celsius Amazon store to check out all of their flavors. #CELSIUSBrandPartner #CELSIUSLiveFit  https://amzn.to/3HbAtPJ  BetterHelp: This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp — go to http://betterhelp.com/theo to get 10% your first month.  Shopify: Go to http://shopify.com/theo to sign up for your $1-per-month trial period. Liquid IV: Go to http://liquidiv.com/theo at checkout 20% off your first order.  Factor: Go to http://factormeals.com/theo50off and use code theo50off to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. ------------------------------------------------- Music: “Shine” by Bishop Gunn Bishop Gunn - Shine ------------------------------------------------ Submit your funny videos, TikToks, questions and topics you'd like to hear on the podcast to: tpwproducer@gmail.com Hit the Hotline: 985-664-9503 Video Hotline for Theo Upload here: https://www.theovon.com/fan-upload Send mail to: This Past Weekend 1906 Glen Echo Rd PO Box #159359 Nashville, TN 37215 ------------------------------------------------ Find Theo: Website: https://theovon.com Instagram: https://instagram.com/theovon Facebook: https://facebook.com/theovon Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/thispastweekend Twitter: https://twitter.com/theovon YouTube: https://youtube.com/theovon Clips Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheoVonClips Shorts Channel: https://bit.ly/3ClUj8z ------------------------------------------------ Producer: Zach https://www.instagram.com/zachdpowers Producer: Nick https://www.instagram.com/realnickdavis/ Producer: Cam https://www.instagram.com/cam__george/  Producer: Colin https://instagram.com/colin_reiner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 AirTransat presents two friends traveling in Europe for the first time and feeling some pretty big emotions. This coffee is so good! How do they make it so rich and tasty? Those paintings we saw today weren't prints. They were the actual paintings. I have never seen tomatoes like this. How are they so red? With flight deals starting at just $589, it's time for you to see what Europe has to offer. Don't worry, you can handle it. Visit airtransat.com for details, conditions apply Europe has to offer. Don't worry. You can handle it Visit air trends at calm for details conditions apply air trends at travel moves us We have added a second show in Nashville baby on May 3rd It's an early show 4 p.m. At the Bridgestone Arena
Starting point is 00:00:39 And I can't even believe that and thank you guys so much for all the love and support and honored to be performing here in Nashville. We also have tickets remaining for East Lansing, Michigan, Victoria, BC in the Canada, College Station, Texas, Belton, Texas, Oxford, Mississippi, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Winnipeg in the Canada and Calgary in the Canada. Get all your tickets at theovon.com slash T-O-U-R. Today's guest is a financial advisor for Generations Z and Millennials. He's a YouTuber, he's a businessman and he's based in Austin, Texas, which is where we're taping today.
Starting point is 00:01:28 You may have seen his popular show, Financial Audit, where he takes people to task over their spending habits. I had a great time learning about him and his world. Today's guest is Caleb Hammer. And I will find a song I've been singing I'm off the stage. Just for you Caleb Hammer, man, thanks for catching up, dude. Yeah, what's up, buddy? Nice to meet you.
Starting point is 00:01:58 Not much, yeah. Nice to meet you too, man. Hammer. Caleb Hammer. That's a good name. Yeah, it's powerful. It is. Is that Russian hammer? I think a British native. Oh yeah? So a little conquering of the United States a little.
Starting point is 00:02:12 Oh wow. Yeah, so no matter what side of the bed you wake up on, you're gonna draw a weapon probably. That's right, yeah. That's wild. Native American? Yeah, like 25%. Oh, that's great.
Starting point is 00:02:24 That's a good amount. Yeah, not too heavy, but yeah, but enough to feel a little tan. A little minority. Oh, enough to know how to make a good fry bread too, I bet. Yeah. I noticed
Starting point is 00:02:40 that you kind of this financial guy or financial liaison even, to like Gen Z or millennials. I mean, it could be anyone, but I feel like that's kind of like, it seems to me like that's kind of like the world that you work with.
Starting point is 00:02:57 Yeah, that's who got attached to it. We age range in that like 18 to 35. That's our big group. That's where our metrics are right now. And you're helping people with their finances like what kind of qualifies you to become sort of this this like person who's offering suggestions to others? Yeah I mean since the stuff I talk about is so basic, I was a dumbass enough, like back in the day, to overcome all that debt, get control of my spending, learning how to budget, get
Starting point is 00:03:32 kind of obsessed with the personal finance space, build a pretty successful net worth before I started YouTube, and just sitting down and talking to the people in the worst of the worst, since I was there, felt like those are the people I could talk to. Not talking to the Theo Vons, not helping you with your investments, but we're talking about the lady who has tens of thousands of dollars of credit card debt, some car she can't afford,
Starting point is 00:03:56 and getting repo'd left and right. Right, yeah. I mean, I feel like you kind of have this Jerry Springer meets finances kind of energy, which is, it's awesome. We call it Caleb Springer, that's our, that's what we call it. Really? Yeah. Oh, I energy, you know, which is, it's awesome. We call it Caleb Springer. That's our, that's what we call it. Oh, really?
Starting point is 00:04:07 Yeah. Oh, I didn't even know that. Yeah. Oh, that's great, man. Yeah, it's, it's, it's super fascinating. But like, so what was your financial problem? Just so I know, like, where did you start where you're like, oh, okay, I'm in a bad spot. College was, I was so dumb in college, man man just starting to go into it
Starting point is 00:04:25 I was going into a major that wasn't gonna make any money I wanted to go into music and of course if you're gonna go into music you have to have like a $50,000 computer or whatever is some nice beautiful iMac so max out a credit card with that gotta have an electric piano You gotta be cool. You know it gotta be like the other music majors max out a credit card with that Why cook when you're tired from school go to McDonald's every day and that's before I was even a fat fuck like, you know the House is able to consume those and still be skinny but max out a credit card with that got to get around so I Maxed out I got like a ten eleven thousand dollar car loan, but I couldn't afford the down payment
Starting point is 00:05:03 Of course, I didn't know anything about money So I borrowed like five thousand dollars from the grandparents just to get a down payment on a car It's the same stuff we're seeing on the show So you were in a bad spot bad spot private student loans to man. It was rough And did we had you been getting advice from anybody or do you were just no this was generational my parents Even though they are better now. I'll give them credit there No, this was generational. My parents, even though they are better now, I'll give them credit there. We grew up definitely lower middle class foreclosure notices, that kind of stuff.
Starting point is 00:05:31 And at that point when the people who would teach you about that kind of stuff, because our school system really doesn't, at least in Michigan and I don't think Texas either, at that point you rely on them to teach you, but they didn't know anything. So I was just continuing that cycle. Every time you see people coming from a lower middle class background or a poverty background, it's just that endless cycle because you can't learn from anywhere.
Starting point is 00:05:53 And you have to get that drive somehow. Right, that's a great point. Yeah, I was always kind of amazed that they didn't teach us in school. Like if you didn't have a strategy, like they would have people come for, like parents would come or people with, like people in our community that had jobs
Starting point is 00:06:09 would come and talk to us, but they never had like people that had really fucked up. You know, they never had like a crack at it come and talk to the class for 20 minutes and be like, this is how this happened, right? Or they never had anybody that was selling leg or selling cooter or whatever on the street, tell you know, like, hey, this is how things fell apart. Like they never had anybody that was selling leg or selling cooter or whatever on the street tell you, like, hey, this is how things fell apart.
Starting point is 00:06:26 Like they never had that other side of somebody who was like in a second bankruptcy or somebody who'd been abused in a marriage. It's like you never really got, you always just got the like, I'm a fireman, and the kids would be like, awesome, and the guy would let you play with his ax or whatever it was like,
Starting point is 00:06:43 but you never got like the other side of it. It's kind of crazy that they don't have that Just in like kind of elementary education, you know, dude, it's crazy I think it's like a one-week subject and the class where they also spent like two weeks showing you birthing videos Yeah, you know, this is something that passes over real quick Okay, so you were bad off real bad bad. And how did you get unbad off? I just started becoming obsessed with, well I was always interested in the world of real estate. So like, HGTV, I ate that shit up. I don't know why. This is that weird kid who loved HGTV.
Starting point is 00:07:17 So, you know, all the different home shows, I was interested in real estate. And that's kind of just a decent connection and segue over to personal finances So eventually once I started realizing yo can't afford rent I started just googling some things and I found some other creators some other Podcasts like bigger pockets podcast is really good. I think I started your pockets. It's called. Yeah, it's really good those in real estate Now do you know Graham Stefan? Finance youtuber, uh, let's see a picture of him. Yeah, little short dude. Graham Stephan?
Starting point is 00:07:48 Nope, I don't know him. He's one of the OG finance YouTubers, and I think I started watching him when he was up and coming, and I was like, wow, I can't believe how absolutely stupid I am with finances. I didn't even know there was this other world. And then to accomplish the things I dream of accomplishing,
Starting point is 00:08:04 it's gonna take actually marking the goals I wanna to get to in the different steps that are required to get there. And that's where I started to actually focus on building the income, not just the hobby stuff. You know, I was doing music composition and I was making like 30,000 hours a year off of that in college and dropped out of college. But from there, I just knew I had to go get stronger income, actually build myself a budget. And that's when I started looking to move in different areas and I got a connection down in Austin. And that's when I actually started putting the focus in pointing my money in the right direction, building a budget for the first time. And it's been good since then.
Starting point is 00:08:41 Yeah. Okay, so you started to put your money back together. you started I mean did you pay off some of the things you did? You get rid of the car. You said you dropped out of school So yeah, I'm assuming that you just realized it wasn't for you or okay It's gonna sound like the most arrogant country thing ever and but like I was actually making more on my music Compositions than my own professors did on their own composition So I was like why am I spending more money to go in school? Okay, so that's when I dropped out Okay
Starting point is 00:09:04 You already felt like you kind of been able to learn what they were going to teach you over a course of a long time. Kind of, I mean I like the lessons and stuff but then I still had to go to all these other classes that don't matter and I had to spend money on that. Right. Or at least things that were going for the degree. But at that point I still knew nothing about personal finances. Once I moved to Austin, I wanted to get a job that focused on me being my own business
Starting point is 00:09:26 essentially. That's what I was doing with Music Composition and one of the best jobs that just like you and I could go get today if we wanted to were your own business is sales. You are your business. You're out there building the client base and that's what I ended up doing and with that I reached the top of the sales team immediately. Selling? Yeah. Selling? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:09:45 Selling, it was trading education, you know, like stock trading and some memberships and stuff like that. Okay, so no, I'm not familiar with what you're talking about. Okay, like stock market. Okay, so you became an investor? No, I was selling classes that taught people how to become day traders and stuff. Okay, so day trading courses. Really bad products, I'll be honest. But, you know, I just had to, you know,
Starting point is 00:10:06 I was taking the job that would hire. Okay, so the actual product wasn't a good product or just you thought it was? It was fine, just people shouldn't be day traders. That's the thing. Oh, I see. It's like 90% lose money. It's not that the people that were teaching it were bad
Starting point is 00:10:21 or the education itself was bad. It's just like, that's probably too risky for your average person to get into. So it's just a risky thing to get into? Risky to get into, but luckily the people I was selling to, they were with people with too much money, too much time. Oh, they were? Yeah, it wasn't like the-
Starting point is 00:10:34 You weren't selling to children or whatever? No. Okay. No. Especially since, I mean, I think you have to be 18 to open a brokerage fund, or at least to open those kinds of accounts, if I'm not mistaken. But actually being able to build that, like personal business, business personal brands and getting to the top of the sales team eventually getting the place You know bringing in six figures Wow grind in for a couple years. I focused on paying off the
Starting point is 00:10:57 my grandparents first Because it was family debt. It's a little emotional That's probably not what I would necessarily suggest today to people that I'm talking to, but that's what felt right in that moment. And then the credit cards. Is it about paying off your grandparents, you mean? Absolutely.
Starting point is 00:11:11 Well, yeah, because you have to see them, you still have to answer their calls, and you have to hear the timbre in your grandmother's voice, knowing that they're concerned about their future because they're missing a little bit of their nest egg. Exactly, exactly. And they were nice enough to give me that money in a hard time.
Starting point is 00:11:25 I got to be nice enough to prioritize paying it back. Right. And then the 30% couple, 30% credit cards I had from there, about $10,000 total on credit card debt. And then Sally Mae, you know that bitch? Oh, yeah, the loan specialist? Yeah, no, she's not great. So I had some like 12% interest, private student loan debt, maybe 15%.
Starting point is 00:11:43 It just kept ballooning. So I focused on paying that off after that. But those are private ones, right? So there's ones you get from the state that are lower percentage? Mm-hmm. Okay. Yep. I had federal-backed student loans. I still do, because I'm not going to pay them off, because they're only 4%. No, actually, mine are like 3%, so I'd rather invest instead.
Starting point is 00:11:58 Right. So I'm just doing my minimum monthlies there. But yeah, so because Sally and her 15% were just so crappy, I focused on paying those off next. And then eventually my car died as well, because that was also like 11% for a Nissan Altima 2013. I don't know if you're a Nissan Altima girlie, but their transmissions, they all die immediately. So it was like 60,000 miles and the transmission was dying.
Starting point is 00:12:22 So, and I already owed dead on it. Oh yeah, Altima is definitely a lot of Latinos, It was like 60,000 miles and the transmission was dying. So, and I already owed debt on it. Oh yeah, Altima's definitely, a lot of Latinos would drive them, I know. And then my ex-girlfriend drove one. Okay, so you started to get out of debt, you got some money going, you found out that, okay, you realized maybe the direction you were going in
Starting point is 00:12:42 in school wasn't for you. It sounded like you started to make some kind of like severe choices, right? Yeah, big life choices. Moving across the country, packing up the sedan, going from Michigan to Texas, I guess, it's not across the country. But it was a big move for me.
Starting point is 00:12:54 And focused on paying off that debt. And once I got my emergency fund, which is what we prioritize after paying off high interest debt, that's where I was like, I can finally start accomplishing the dreams I wanted to, and I was putting 10% down on a house here in Austin. And that was my big goal. And were you still doing sales at that point?
Starting point is 00:13:11 Yes, yes, I was still doing sales, and I started moving in the world of product management and the tech world. What does that mean? So it was kind of like fake product manager, I'll be honest, for all those that know product managing out there, but I was overseeing memberships at that company that I was talking
Starting point is 00:13:29 about and trying to improve their products. And I was just kind of overseeing that, working with different teams. But I was transitioning to that world because again, I just like the, I like running some things. That's why I like building out the company that we have now and having management over products and just making a better experience for the clients Okay, and is the product you sell now to people is that a more? Helpful product you think than the first one the other oh absolutely day trading stuff
Starting point is 00:13:54 Yeah Because what we're doing now like our simpler budget app like that is an app that people can use and actually Follow a budget hit the goals that they're trying to do It's things that actually help people instead of like, hey, there's a 10% chance you might be successful in this field, good luck. That was kind of the products back then. But yeah, so people can actually finally take control
Starting point is 00:14:17 over their destiny. Okay, what is, you talk a lot, okay, so I feel like I have a decent understanding now of how you kinda got to where you are, right? Like a lot of it sounds like you're like, okay, college isn't for me, I need to change that. These are the high interest things that I need to get a job or find a field, you found sales, it's working well for me.
Starting point is 00:14:36 And then I need to find out the specific, the higher interest things I need to get out of those first, the lower interest things I can keep, because if I can invest at a slightly higher interest rate, then I'm gonna be hypothetically, invest at a slightly higher interest rate, then I'm gonna be hypothetically, or hopefully paying those off over time, assuming I can make more than the three or 4%.
Starting point is 00:14:51 Exactly. Okay, so now you have a YouTube channel where you kinda talk, it seems like to a lot of like Gen Z. Is that kinda safe to say, Gen Z Millennials? Yeah, Gen Z Millennials. Okay, what is the number one thing that they are going into dead over now in America cars man Cars everything is drivable infrastructure here
Starting point is 00:15:10 So you have no choice but to get a car you need a car to get a job to pay for the car But they kind of locked us into that huh yeah, what's that is there a theory that? They that they did that on purpose that a lot of that's done on purpose you think That we had that they created that on purpose, that a lot of that's done on purpose, you think? That we had, that they created like this car economy? Can you look up, just see what you find on that? Well, I know in the 1950s, right? That's where they start passing like the highway infrastructure bill. And that it's a lot of it for inner, intercontinental connection,
Starting point is 00:15:38 especially for military safety, being able to move things back and forth across cities. But with that, they came into the cities like Dallas and Houston and LA and they bulldozed massive communities and just built highways throughout. Then he had white flight from the cities to the suburbs and then in order to get to the city where the jobs are, got to drive on the highway and it's a cycle from there. Yeah, I think you pretty much just answered it.
Starting point is 00:15:58 That's what it seems like a lot of that is. It was like, yeah, people wanted to also live in the suburbs. They didn't want to be in the place, right you know in a around a bunch of building stuff You want to have a yard you want to have a little bit more space and cities went to shit after that, too It really did yeah, whether it's funding or just the job opportunities like they went to shit like New York in the 80s What's a shithole right so that's yeah? Yeah And then I think you have a lot of people like if people want to have a yard and want to have an environment
Starting point is 00:16:23 They take care of then they kind of if they take that energy out of the city Then that's not in the city anymore people want to live in the city now though people are giving up their car and in my age Range, you know, and the audience is age range. They want to live in those more walkable communities And I move into a walkable community. I love to not have to drive Yeah, it's a nightmare. Yeah kind of like my parents It was the thing where they wanted to drive into work and drive home. That was part of like the commute, you know,
Starting point is 00:16:48 it was almost part of their lifestyle. Yeah. You know, I think that was like a big part of the lifestyle then. Let me see, commuting as we know it today with people regularly traveling significant distance between home and work became prominent during the mid 19th century,
Starting point is 00:17:03 primarily due to the industrial revolution, which led to large population shifts towards urban areas and the development of suburban communities accessible by newly established rail systems, allowing people to live further from their workplace and commute into work regularly. The term commute itself originates from this era of early rail travel, where people paid a commuted fare
Starting point is 00:17:23 for regular travel to the city. Oh,, so I guess if you were one, like a person that came every day for their job into like, you know, rural New York, into the New York, into New York City, then you paid a commuted fare. Yeah, and I'm honestly not against like the driving if you want to or living with more space. I'm not against that at all.
Starting point is 00:17:43 Like I actually like that. The community'm moving to is kind of like that. It's a hybrid, but what I don't like, dude, I don't know how much you know about zoning in the U S but it's crazy. You know, we're supposed to be like this capitalist bastion of freedom, but we don't let anyone build what they want on their property. So you live in a neighborhood and in order to get a coffee, you have to drive 10 minutes because no one can build a coffee shop in the neighborhood. Right.
Starting point is 00:18:07 Because we tell people what they have to build instead of letting the people determine the market and the market determining what gets built in places. That's what I want to see, a more freedom-esque living situation where people can build their communities. Yeah, I think that that's fair. But then I guess what, if you had a,
Starting point is 00:18:22 you have a place you finally call home, you love it, and then somebody next door builds like a neon light shop or something. Yeah. And they're just huge and they're put billboards up in their yard. Like that kind of thing I feel like would lead to war. Yeah, that's more like HOA, you know?
Starting point is 00:18:37 So like I'm okay with like small communities coming together and deciding what's good for their community, but a whole state or a city saying, no, you're 40 minutes from city hall, you can't build a bakery there. Sorry, a highway has to go there. Yeah. Yeah, I guess sometimes you don't know what a city's overall strategies are too.
Starting point is 00:18:55 It's like sometimes just as a regular citizen, even though you may think that we do, maybe we wouldn't know sometimes what their overall strategies are. There's this crazy concept where Austin, we built housing, we just allowed developers and capitalism to crazy concept where Austin we built housing, you know We just allowed developers and capitalism to take place So we built housing guess what's been the largest rent decrease in the nation Austin who would have thought the largest rent decrease?
Starting point is 00:19:14 Why because it's extra housing. Yeah, we built so much housing. Yeah, cuz we just let capitalism happen But so you saying that's the bad side of it Well, it sucks for people I guess property values or values or landlords, but it's good for people. But it's also a blessing for people that can live. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, well, one of the worst things that happens in a lot of places is the artists and stuff are the first to have to leave an area because they're the ones who can't afford to live
Starting point is 00:19:35 there anymore. You know, I think that happens in a lot of cities where, you know, rent prices start to go up and then the guy who's like just doing his best to make ends meet, who plays a saxophone or, you know, who runs an an art studio they can't afford to keep their you know they're kind of the first to go a lot of times. Yeah gentrification is weird because like honestly you kind of go in there you do get better restaurants you get better amenities things do become nicer and safer but then there is like that dude who gets pushed out so there's like there's positive gentrification is a bad word, kind of a swear word, you know?
Starting point is 00:20:07 Cause what is gentrification? You mean it means white people moving in and moving people out? I think it's more just money and development, but people do associate it with that. And like, so yeah, so gentrification is the process whereby characters of a poor urban area is changed by wealthier people moving in, improving housing and attracting new businesses, typically displacing current inhabitants of the process. Right, so they're kind of, you lose a lot of culture because you.
Starting point is 00:20:30 Well, you develop new culture too, but you lose like the old culture, right? That's where I want more access to like home ownership because if someone owns a home in that area and gentrification happens, they can make a lot of money. So I want the people who are already there to have access to be able to get into the home and buy it. It's the renters that get pushed out. Like the saxophone guy. He'd be the one that gets pushed out and that sucks.
Starting point is 00:20:49 Yeah, you lose a lot of authenticity there too. You lose people who know the lore of the neighborhood. And then everything just starts to be a Panera Bread too. It really starts to suck. Yeah, they chain it up. That's one thing that starts to happen in a lot of places is you just run a lot of the same. And a lot of cities start to look the same. Yes. And then you don't have any, there's no reason to even go to another city. places is you just run a lot of the same and a lot of cities start to look the same. Yes. And then you don't have any, there's no reason to even go to another city.
Starting point is 00:21:08 You're like, why do I want to go there if it's just going to be another restaurant that's just next door to me? It's the same. I think they're called like five by ones, like all the buildings that you see everywhere where they're like five story apartment complexes with the same chains on every floor. This is the cheapest to build. That's usually what the, again, the city messes it up
Starting point is 00:21:25 by only zoning for that because everything has to be one size fits all. Yeah, Nashville's ruined. They have a great area there called 12 South and it has all these like great little shops and stores. And then now it's just been, it has like a rag and bone. Just like it had like quaint vibes. You could walk down, it just felt like you were in
Starting point is 00:21:44 like a neat pocket. And then now it just felt like you were in like a neat pocket and Then now it just feels like you you can barely tell the difference between there And if you're walking down like South Congress in a way, yeah, so you're still in Nashville You ever gonna move to Austin I might I'm thinking about it You know I'm thinking about if I could afford to get a home here and keep a home here You know oh you could then I would be able to go back and forth, you know? Oh, if I financially audited your statements, I know you could get a home here. This show is sponsored by Liquid IV.
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Starting point is 00:24:57 so one of the major things you're saying that Gen Z faces is? Well, car debt for sure. That's what every American faces. Is car debt. It's, yeah. Again, you have the car so you can get to work to get the paycheck right that's the first thing my mom said she's like okay you're gonna get a car to get to work to pay for your car yeah and it really was the truth kind of it really
Starting point is 00:25:16 is but also having that freedom was great you know yes and I want to like just kind of correct what I said like I'm totally for driving anywhere if you want to just wish there's more options It's kind of you're forced to drive. Yeah, that's so that's pretty much it. Oh, yeah, they won't even let you um Take a scooter or a lime on the interstate Yeah, you know which is crazy like there might be one state allows it what state allows scooters on the interstate Can you bring that up? What state is allowing you to scooter on a highway? It might be New Hampshire or something. They don't give a fuck. As long as you're an organ donor, they'll let you do whatever you want, bro.
Starting point is 00:25:56 As long as you are donating plant-based organs back to society. That's wild. So when I was a kid they had, you felt like you had to have a job, right? And my mom or my, you know, I was raised by my mom, she always had a job. She had a job like, I don't think she only had like, she just, it was always work, you know? And parents would have been ashamed if they didn't have a job. Do the younger generations feel that same way, like people that you're talking to, do they have that same feeling about work? No, there's something really interesting happening in our culture right now that I cannot define super well. I always mess up with the words, infantilization.
Starting point is 00:26:40 Infantilization. Infantilization, yes. Okay. Thank you. A lot of people, I don't know, everyone's like I'm 19, I'm still a child. There's a lot of that conversations that I'm having on my show and honestly I didn't notice it too much until I started my Doing my show and then you know being a little active on reddit or Twitter
Starting point is 00:26:56 It's like everyone's really acting like they're a kid until they're like 25 now I don't really know what's happening. Like tall baby syndrome kind of. I was so excited to be 18 and have my freedom and just go make money, do what I want, go to college, figure it out. And there's so many learning lessons you get during that time period, but now it's like I'm a child. Not everyone, but it definitely feels like a cultural shift.
Starting point is 00:27:20 You know those predator like beating videos online? Oh yeah, there's so many of them now. Yeah, one thing that's, I just saw yesterday on Twitter, or X, that was just kind of demonstrating what happens when Gen Z meets with those predator beating videos. They lured someone, you know, as usual, to meet an underage person to beat the crap out of the person. But the Gen Z people lured a 21 year old to meet an 18 year old and beat the shit out of the 21 year old for meeting an 18 year old because it's a huge, crazy, underage 18 year old who's a child.
Starting point is 00:27:59 So we must beat the crap out of the 21. It's really weird. Like what are you saying? Like that was just, like they they can't even do that right, you're saying? Like, or, uh, uh, no, it's just, it's, it's thinking that, oh, I see. It says five Worcester Worcester Worcester. Oh, Brandon's on it. Students charged after mob beats up falsely accused child predator. And that's in Worcester. Oh, I'm sorry. I know this place, Worcester Mass.
Starting point is 00:28:25 Five students from Assumption University in Worcester are facing charges of kidnapping and assaulting a man for a TikTok inspired to catch a predator. Police are saying that the man did nothing wrong. As court documents state, the man went to meet a woman who was listed as 18 years old online. So, what are we saying here? Are we saying here?
Starting point is 00:28:45 Are we saying the school would not say what disciplinary action if any may take? First of all, the math department should take action against these fucking predators. Because you have to at least be a predator. You can't just, I mean, it's so hard to meet people now. And this guy finally comes out of his house to meet somebody and he gets jumped. That's crazy
Starting point is 00:29:05 But no you're seeing it all over social media right now, but what are you saying about this? I'm saying that they think you're still a child at 18 and 19 and oh I see you're saying so that you think part of that Was this yeah? I mean they're talking about age gaps if you're dating with someone two years like over two years People are freaking out now online. It's crazy. The Pearl clutching is wild online right now. Lots of just like over sensationalize.
Starting point is 00:29:31 Right. Everything right now. But I'm seeing that in these conversations where people are like 20 and they think they're still a child. They don't have to. There's no responsibility yet. They can just lean on everyone around them, their family, and they just don't have to take care of anything yet.
Starting point is 00:29:48 And that it's kind of hard to see, but that case that we just saw is further demonstrating that impacting other parts of the culture as well. Like we're seeing it across the board. There's also this on TikTok, especially there's like this victim Olympic stuff going on where people are trying to over Victimize like I'm more of a victim than you from this thing and it's like it's just it's an always Over just stepping over each other on who's the biggest victim. I it's so funny You say that I saw something like this. I love I love where you're at man
Starting point is 00:30:19 Because even some of the things you're saying it's like things that I couldn't You're just at this really unique intersection, I think. I just wanted to say that, I'm just realizing that more as I talk to you. But yeah, I'll see things, it's like, yeah, the fires are really bad, but realizing that it's been 11 days since your boyfriend texted you back, right?
Starting point is 00:30:39 And you're like, and someone will be walking down the street with flames in the back, but they're making it about them and their boyfriend or something, you know? Or, hope my door-dashers okay. It looks dangerous out here today. And they'll be from their balcony looking for their taco order, and there's buildings on fire.
Starting point is 00:30:58 Like, what are we fucking... I don't know, man. Turn on your stove! And also, leave and go rescue yourself. You're gonna risk it all for some raviolis Yeah It's just it's almost like people don't even feel like they're gonna die. It's almost like Yes Before we get far off on it too much of a tangent whose fault
Starting point is 00:31:23 Do you think that is that there's some of that mentality? Right, is it the parents or is it just society? Who's where are you finding the fault of that? You know, I haven't seen parents like talk about it. So I don't see them doing I'm sure there's always an impact, right? but I Think a lot of the tick tock vacation of things and I love TikTok, I mean, we got a billion views on TikTok last year, you know, I'm happy. Well, thank you. But like even still there's, I've seen videos of examples of people talking about a story from their past and they're just sharing a story about something that was just, you know,
Starting point is 00:31:58 slightly inconvenient. And then people go in their comment sections and say, no, actually you're a victim. You're a victim of all this that this that like There was some tick-tock. I was watching I don't know I think I was watching a reaction to it someone was talking about how they had an awkward Handholding experience when they were in high school and people were going through the comments like no you were raped and it's like Fuck me. Yeah, and they're just I don't know it's just a thumb raped or knuckle rape shit like stuff like that. You're like, that's
Starting point is 00:32:29 What are you gonna do a swab kit now on my hand, you know, it's very interesting So people it's it's just kind of this reoccurring thing We're just everyone's trying to one-up each other on the victim scale, but also trying to tell other people that they're victims It's really interesting, but we're also starting to see a little bit of a cultural shift in it, I feel like, where everyone's respected immediately who comes out of the gate and just tries to act like this big victim all the time, especially other creators that try to come out
Starting point is 00:32:56 and be like, I'm a big victim from this other creator who said something bad about me. And then you can clearly see when you look at their Soulful Blade and that video they made was their most popular video of all time. And like, oh, wonder why they did that. Right, so now they're, oh, if somebody gets views off of victimhood.
Starting point is 00:33:11 Yeah, in some ways. I mean, but I think you saw, go ahead. Little shitty part is that actually diminishes like real victims. Oh, for sure. Well, I think you saw, I saw this with Mark Zuckerberg the other day, he was on Joe Rogan's show and he was talking about,
Starting point is 00:33:26 bring up some of the clips he was talking about, how Mark Zuckerberg tells Joe Rogan podcast, Biden administration tried to censor memes in surprise episode. Basically, these people from the Biden administration would call up our team and like scream at them and curse. And it's like these documents are, it's all kind of out there.
Starting point is 00:33:49 And record any of those phone calls. I don't know. I don't think, I don't think we were, but, but I think, I want to listen. I mean, there are emails, the emails are published. It's all, it's all kind of out there. And, and they're like, and basically it just got to this point where we were like, no, we're not going to take down things that are true.
Starting point is 00:34:07 That's ridiculous. They wanted us to take down this meme of Leonardo DiCaprio looking at a TV talking about how 10 years from now or something, you're going to see an ad that says, okay, if you took a COVID vaccine, you're eligible for this kind of payment, this sort of like class action lawsuit type meme. And they're like, no, you have to take that down. We said, no, we're not gonna take down humor and satire. Okay, that's good.
Starting point is 00:34:34 And first of all, I believe you will probably see things like that, because it's a lot how drug companies work, right? But I think this is exactly what he's doing. He's, because they had, like, there was, they admitted before to like, only putting certain stuff up during, like, deciding, them deciding what it was misinformation or not, right?
Starting point is 00:34:58 Which is just, it's awkward for a platform to decide, right? Kind of. Like, unless something is, you know, sexual violence, things like that, I don awkward for a platform to decide, right? Kind of. Like unless something is sexual violence, things like that I don't think that should be on. But for them to decide, for them to decide what was misinformation. But I feel like that's what he's doing here now. He's playing the victim here.
Starting point is 00:35:19 He's trying to say that, oh, we didn't, they were telling us to do stuff instead of him saying we were doing these things. They're calling and swearing. Oh no, not swearing. Right. Oh no.
Starting point is 00:35:32 Right. He's just trying to say, oh, we were a victim of all this. And you're almost playing, now you're pointing fingers at a sinking ship since Biden is, first of all, you know, he's not, it's not fair to communicate with him, I don't think, and probably hasn't been for a bit because he's just not mentally well, right? And no judgment against his party, but just to me, I've always felt like they were taking advantage of a senior citizen, right?
Starting point is 00:35:54 Like if that were my father or grandfather, I'd be kind of upset, you know, that people are marching him out every day, because he believes what you're telling him, right? He believes that he's fully capable and competent, right? But yeah, in this instance, that's exactly, you say that there's creators doing that. I think this is one of the biggest creators doing exactly what you're saying. Well, I mean, we had a prime example.
Starting point is 00:36:16 We called the episode, our titles are wild, but someone finally walks off financial audit. I guess that's actually not that. Someone finally what you said? Walks off financial audit. I guess that's actually not that. Someone finally what you said, walks off financial audit. Okay. And, uh, one of her big, like she was a perpetual victim throughout her life. Uh, one of her big things is she sat down and we were talking about creating a better income for her.
Starting point is 00:36:37 And she said, my therapist told me I can't have a boss. So she can't work ever because she's not able to have any kind of authority around her because it would make her feel too... Triggered or something. Yeah. Right. So she just couldn't have a boss ever. Also she can't do any physical activity or labor or anything. So has to sit down and do her veterinary stuff from her house but won't get hired.
Starting point is 00:37:02 And half of her resume, by by the way was like activist stuff anyway So like someone you'd be a little afraid of hiring because you don't know what they're gonna gonna do to the culture The company so it's not gonna get hired, but she also can't have a boss, right? But she kind of low-key does have a boss if she's listening or a therapist because in the therapist is like well You're gonna pay me and you're you almost become an employee of your therapist in some ways I'm not saying that's exactly what happened But sometimes that will happen to people and then yeah people are like I can't lift anything heavy because like in a past life I was a weightlifter or something who was injured and you're like well fucking we got to get the boxes on the shelves
Starting point is 00:37:36 Okay, like it is difficult. Yeah, and she may have had a physical disability with that But we're not having not have not being able to have a boss like you can't just but then complain about how everything's bad and I let's be honest there's no way her therapist told her she shouldn't have a boss yeah a therapist wouldn't say that yeah well that's um you'll pay and then you you'll but that book that kind of becomes a um like an emotional race card in a way sometimes where people are like yeah my, yeah, my therapist said that. You know? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, she was lost all over the place, so I'm not surprised, but again, she was also another victim kind of in her relationship. She was dating a dude for eight years. They got married, but she decided two weeks into her marriage, she wants to try titties,
Starting point is 00:38:21 you know, just on the other side. Date women, you mean? Yeah. Okay. Just go over the other side, hang out a little bit. He didn't want to, so he's a bad person for leaving her because she wanted to, you know, date women two weeks into marriage. Right, you can't just be funding lesbianism if you don't wanna be, yeah, it's like, you can support it, but if your wife leaves you,
Starting point is 00:38:39 you shouldn't still have to be the guy funding it. Yeah, or if you don't wanna be open, especially, yeah. Yeah, yeah, you wanna commit a relationship. So he if you don't want to be open especially, yeah. Yeah, you want to commit a relationship. So he's the bad guy because he didn't want, yeah, two weeks into marriage. What do you think is the number one thing that's preventing Gen Zers from working, or do you think we already talked about that?
Starting point is 00:38:59 Let me see where we're at right now. Well, I mean, honestly, 60 to 70% of Americans say that they're, you know, they report feeling stress about money. 60 to 65 say they are living paycheck to paycheck. 50 to 60% can't cover a $1,000 emergency. One in four have no retirement savings. Median 401K balance is $30,000.
Starting point is 00:39:22 Like, I mean, there's a lot of things that people gotta catch up on. And the big thing that kinda sucks, and this is where I do feel bad for any younger generation, where college is getting more expensive, life gets more expensive. I mean that's what happens. You need to start saving as early as you can because like income's not your biggest wealth building tool as Dave Ramsey says. I'd say that time is. Because you need time in the market to let it grow.
Starting point is 00:39:45 If you put a dollar in at 20, it's worth so much more than a dollar in at 30. But the more expensive things are and the more we treat you like a child who doesn't have to work and it's okay to take your time after college and it's okay to go into debt and it's okay to do all this stuff, the further you are from not only putting money towards retirement but covering the $1,000 emergency or paying off the debt that's eating 30% interest by year. Yeah, the more you have that, the more that that mentality is accepted and nurtured
Starting point is 00:40:16 and becomes like a habit, then surely the further you are from, if you're not even taking care of your responsibilities or, you know, hitting like a bottom line or breaking even, then yeah, you're certainly not going to be investing. Exactly. Do you see that nepotism is an issue? Because, you know, there's a lot of like, there was always this idea of like Reaganomics where like the top so percent will have the money and there'll be this trickle down, right? Yeah. But that's never really kind of happened, it felt like.
Starting point is 00:40:42 Right. Do you- It's interesting, yeah. Do you think nepotism, just how big of an issue is nepotism, do you feel like, you hear a lot about these days about nepo babies, right? Yeah. I just wonder if you hear a lot about that in the financial world, like, oh, you're just
Starting point is 00:40:58 a trust fund baby or something like that, you know? Honestly, you don't see too much of that in my world. We've seen people that get like a big sum of money. I just talked to someone the other day. She got almost a quarter million dollars from a pass away relative, but she went into that pile of money without any behavior, knowledge of how to utilize money.
Starting point is 00:41:19 She's only been in debt throughout her entire life, only just blows all her money, more than she makes. So the moment she got that, well, of course, does it get saved or invested or pay off debt? No, it's gone in five years, just blowing it on fun stuff. So there is, I'm okay if someone can prove themselves, that they have the talent to be known. And of course, we all, do you have any kids?
Starting point is 00:41:40 I don't have any children, I would like to have some. Yeah, I mean, you probably want the best future for them. Right, you do want the best future for your children Yeah, you'd probably be willing to utilize some of your connections to help if you can yeah And I'm okay with that, but it should also be based on skill so give them the opportunity But if they fuck up the opportunity you know okay like good luck Yeah, so I'm good with a nepo as long as they're proving it a little but you got a Teach that behavior yeah, it's a little, but you gotta teach that behavior.
Starting point is 00:42:05 Teach that behavior so they don't just blow through what you give them. Oh yeah, I was talking to little Boosie one time. He's a rapper, if you're not familiar with him, and he was talking about how the hardest thing to teach is your hustle to your children, right? Your same energy for, like if you didn't have certain things growing up,
Starting point is 00:42:24 he's like, it is so hard to transfer that energy to your children. And at the same time, want to give them just, you know, the basic needs even, you know, and the basic needs sometimes will be fancier because you have more money to spend. Take me through a couple of examples, if you can, Caleb, of like Gen Zers or millennials and some of the issues,
Starting point is 00:42:43 like just specific things that they showed up with on your show. Um, okay. Yeah. Um, we had, uh, this is a couple we just talked about. Cause it's so entertaining. Like this is what one thing that's so great. It's like, it's really is. It's just like, yeah, it's a financial Jerry Springer and it's so funny that you had already coined that term for you, for you guys cells. Well people use it as an insult but it's not so I just accepted it. I don't think so at all. I think as long as people are actually getting help and we
Starting point is 00:43:10 connect them with resources and they a million percent know what they're getting into I think it's just like the most fun thing ever and then they have fun then the audience has fun and what's crazy is like we could sit down and we could just like do the most boring finance content ever and 50,000 people watch it or something and some people learn something or we could do this like true real show that is also just also really entertaining hundreds of thousands millions of people watch it and then we've calculated about 20,000 people at least have which is based on comments and things have gotten out of
Starting point is 00:43:39 debt save for an emergency fund I've actually changed their life just because of watching this show that has gotten to them that they're interested in. Yeah, and I think it's almost, I can almost see this happening where we will get to like to catch a predator videos of like you pulling up on somebody, or not even you, just the way society is, right? Because you're kind of at this perfect section
Starting point is 00:43:59 of like capitalism and like voyeurism, right? Okay. Where I could see there almost being like a to catch a predator of somebody like buying something that they can't afford Yeah, pull up on them on the spot You know, it's almost like you're catching them in a transaction. Yeah, and it's like, you know, you can't afford this man What are you doing? You know chop up their credit card on the spot? Yeah, totally Like I just I feel like that that's where we're headed, you know Some people could use it.
Starting point is 00:44:27 Oh, for sure. Oh, for sure. There's someone walking around a mall right now that should not be in there, that is pretending, you know, to probably have empty bags in their hands with weights in them, some very light weights or old clothes, and is just pretending this illusion of like living in some fantasy You know honestly like cities like Austin and I you know Nashville is kind of similar in Austin So I wouldn't be surprised if Nashville as well It's like the richer someone looks likely the poorer they are because they're really compensating you know driving a slightly nicer car nicer clothes They're usually in mountains of debt where you just have a dude like Zuckerberg Well now he looks a little you know he's gone carrot head and everything or broccoli head
Starting point is 00:45:07 But you know before he looked like he was like poverty, but he's a billionaire so yeah, that's a compensation Yeah, he kind of has that autism billionaire vibe. You know yeah, which I think is like kind of the new a lot of billionaires are autistic now You know it's like the new thing you know So who knows what they're gonna do, some of them. He looks like he doesn't even eat or anything. Could you imagine him eating a meal? I couldn't. Yeah, so he's gaining, man.
Starting point is 00:45:34 He's getting those gains. I know, I'm not saying he's not healthy or something. I just think it's very, he gives off a computer energy to me sometimes. I mean, look at that surfing photo. I mean, dude has a dump truck. You know, you don't get that not eaten. There it is, look at that thing.
Starting point is 00:45:53 Good for him. And he's in white face there, so obviously they were reprogramming him or something. You know, they had to put his face in the shop for a week or something. No, certainly an amazing creator, but I do think there's this very strong link between autism and technological advancement
Starting point is 00:46:13 that I think we'll figure out in the future. But- That'd be nice. I think I have a bit of tism, but probably not enough tism to get to the three comic club. Yeah. Yeah. It's a bummer.
Starting point is 00:46:23 Yeah, it's okay. But still you get grace with a little. Yeah, the two comic club. Yeah. Oh, I beat it. I barely beat it, yeah. It's a bummer. Yeah, it's okay. But still you get grace with a little. Yeah, the two comic club. Yeah Oh, I beat it. I barely beat it You know and they said it was very close in our area Can you take me through a couple of examples? Just so my listeners can know like some of the stuff that's on your show, right? Yeah, I mean do you want them to pull up some shorts even? Um, yeah, I mean, I know we have a couple. Um, oh sure
Starting point is 00:46:45 We were just talking to this couple. They're both, okay, try not to get canceled, I guess, lesbian couple. Oh no, we know what lesbians are. Yeah. They're obsessed with Disney. Lots of Disney adults are. And they're Gen Z and they are obsessed with birthday months Lots of Disney adults are and they're Gen Z
Starting point is 00:47:05 and they are obsessed with birthday months. I hear birthday months so much with Gen Z and Girl Math. And they're- What is your birthday month, that thing? Birthday month, so you have to celebrate. So for their birthday month, they spent $2,000 on Disney exclusive passes and then went to Disney World,
Starting point is 00:47:21 spent a lot of money on that. Then they're going to Disney World two times next month and then one time in the summer for different birthdays, different birthday months. And they spent, what did I have, $21,000. No way. In one month, when they make $7,000 a month. And what is it, it's not like on like,
Starting point is 00:47:36 is it like lessons to talk like characters? Like how far, like what are they getting into? I don't know, they live in Arizona and they drive to LA to just have their little special birthday, this is their birthday. I can go into debt and fuck't know, they live in Arizona and they drive to LA to just have their little special birthday. This is their birthday! I can go into debt and fuck my life, it's my birthday. Oh I see, so something as simple as your birthday they can go 20 grand in a day.
Starting point is 00:47:52 Yeah, the whole month. Let's see this right here and this is some of it. Two Disney's in these last couple months, two Disney's next month? You guys are literally poor. We only went for one day in November. You still traveled there Gwilyen dollars of food If I hear one more thing out about lesbians and their nephew, you know
Starting point is 00:48:22 Are you guys getting there from Mesa getting one? It's in LA so it costs money to get there. Yeah, we drive. We drive there. So you're getting places to live. Does it cover the place to live when you're there? Nope. So you're spending money to spend more money. Yes.
Starting point is 00:48:35 Do you get the free food while you're in there and free drinks? No, we pay for that too, separate. What the fuck are you talking about? We do get like 10% off Mert. Got it. This is not fucking crazy. So yeah, it's like, you would think especially, you can find deals nowadays where they probably could have got some free food vouchers
Starting point is 00:48:48 Or something like that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, or just stayed off campus and you know when I'm okay if they go like once Once a year they're good. They have like five planned trips already for Disney and what does that give them? I think um strippers and Lesbians love Disneyland, right? I noticed that. Lesbians also love this, it's our nephew's birthday, right? Because for a lot of lesbians, it's probably as close as they'll get to having a child, right, just because of science, math or whatever.
Starting point is 00:49:14 And nowadays that's changing some, but for a long time, a lot of lesbians are like, we gotta get our nephew, you know? That's like the biggest, craziest thing, you know? So I think there's a lot of nephew obsession in the lesbian community as well, you know, our nephew, you know, it was like, that's like the biggest, craziest thing, you know? So there's a lot of nephew obsession in the lesbian community as well, you know? Yeah. But that's a lot of money on Disney.
Starting point is 00:49:32 Yeah, it is. And not much return, you get a return, but you're an adult also. Yeah, but unlike most lesbians, I think they're gonna last forever though, because they're on the same page. And usually couples that aren't on the same page about money, that's where they divorce, but them, they're on the same page and usually couples that aren't on the same page about money That's where they divorce them. They're on the same page about wanting to ruin their lives for Disney. So it's okay. They'll be fine
Starting point is 00:49:53 Yeah, they need to have a Disney now. I wish Disney had a hostel or kind of like a Section 8 area. Yeah, they should because that would would be very magical if you ended up in the trenches. Yeah, instead of the monorail you get a little spray painted one. Just a little sketchy. Someone tweaking out in there. Yeah, but it has somebody who's put like Elsa on the side or something. You know? Or just spray painted some wild shit on it.
Starting point is 00:50:18 That thing, that could be kind of interesting. Okay, so you're talking to people that are wasting too much money. Usually. Lots of debt. Okay, a lot of debt. What are some other ones so you're talking to people that are wasting too much money. Usually, lots of debt. Okay, a lot of debt. What are some other ones that you're seeing? Well, lots, we had this dude, we, Frustrated In-Cell Buys Women Instead of Dating was the title.
Starting point is 00:50:36 He went into 8,000 hours of credit card debt just so he could go to strip clubs. He sacrificed eating so he had more money to go to strip clubs. Wow. Two thousand hours a week on strip clubs and his quote was, I'm a Sigma male, I can just go to the strip club and get some booty that way. Hmm.
Starting point is 00:50:54 I guess it's easier for him. He was a little disappointed though that he couldn't lick or bite them though. That was his one complaint. Okay, so he's not, he didn't get the fluid pass or whatever, I don't know what. That was another one of our guests that got the fluid pass. Wow.
Starting point is 00:51:10 Yeah. Well, strippers is that age old kind of bait and switch. It's the illusion, you know? That's why they always catch men like masturbating in their cars outside of strip clubs because they're, you know, they've built up this whole illusion. That's a lot of money to spend on stripping. Now I do, I respect the fact that he was going without eating though.
Starting point is 00:51:30 Yeah, he was giving it up. Because a lot of people are just like, yeah, I'm going to snack and whatever and still waste this money. Yeah, he picked it up in the military. I guess that's what they were all doing overseas. Visiting strippers and stuff. I guess, that's how they made it through. Dieting and visiting strippers, yeah. I could see that. There was another one you had. What was the one?
Starting point is 00:51:47 Um, bring up one of the ones that we had pulled up. The guy in the red suit was an interesting guy. Oh yeah. I took the loan out to fund my emergency fund. Where's this emergency fund? Okay. I saw about a thousand dollars. Stop it real quick.
Starting point is 00:52:04 So this guy took a loan out to fund his emergency fund. Yeah, like 20% interest too. By the way, dropped from 2,500. I spent some of it. On what emergency? Learning how to do hair extensions. Okay. That's an emergency?
Starting point is 00:52:18 I wouldn't say it's emergency. I just- What do you think an emergency fund is for? I took the money out of the emergency fund to buy a class for extension. The interest rate on this is 28.64%. Yes. Wow. Okay, so originally it wasn't for the emergency fund. I just thought that that would be a good idea.
Starting point is 00:52:34 Okay, so let's stop it there. So this is the kind of stuff that you're running into. Absolutely, all the time. And this is a young man. He took money out at 28.64% interest to learn hair extension lessons, and that was considered an emergency. Well, first the fund is emergency fund, so he takes out 28%, even though the best thing you get in a high-yield savings is 4% right now,
Starting point is 00:52:56 something like that, so you're losing a net 23%. But even so, then he just drains it from the emergency fund to learn hair extensions, which invest invest in yourself invest in your skills We like that right at 30% I don't know no one would say go get a degree for 30% interest So learning hair extensions of that doesn't make sense, but he wants to move to Thailand to escape it though So I think that that's his out to escape the debt you mean to escape capitalism is what he specifically said. Do you see a lot of that? I'm gonna fly away to another country.
Starting point is 00:53:28 That seems like a very fairy tale type of energy. Honestly, no, surprisingly. A lot of people, when they just get overwhelmed by their finances, they really just put their head in the sand. They just forget about it until it all comes and bites them in the ass. That's usually when they come on our show. They realize they've had too much and they watch one of our episodes like oh shit I got to apply and that that's when we usually see them is when they've realized it's too much And they're in the most dire situation, but they haven't fully awakened to why so they're still defensive on things
Starting point is 00:53:58 I'm sure they're nervous on camera They're just normal people off the street But that's why they're still defensive and they're trying to understand like what is going on. And there's lots of cope talk, lots of cope talk across the table for me. And what does cope talk mean when you use that term? Yeah, just like I was allowed to do it. It was my birthday month. It's okay. Excuses. Yeah, it was okay to go to school for 12 years and take out private student loans to pay
Starting point is 00:54:23 for an expensive apartment. I was just trying to survive. So a lot of people trying to, it seems like, deflect the reality of the world. Like, what can I do, what class can I take, what school can I stay in longer, what can I do to not have to face the fact every day that I have to be the one to survive myself. Absolutely, and I was there too.
Starting point is 00:54:47 It just takes that moment. Takes that moment for everything. I haven't hit it for going to the gym or dieting, but it takes that moment for plunging into the deep end. There's usually something. For me, it might be a heart attack, but for my finances, it was, you know, shit, I can't pay this month's rent.
Starting point is 00:55:03 I'm continuing the cycle of foreclosure notices So they usually find their moment, but they just don't know why things are bad But that's when they come on we meet them at the bottom usually some need a little further to go and that sucks to see Yeah, that's a see but people that have come on our show though the median Guest pays off ten thousand hours in 10 months. So it does work. Like, it works really well. They just need that wake-up call, a little of that adult moment where the... It's the first time someone's given them, like, the real shit without just trying to skate around.
Starting point is 00:55:37 Yeah, because then also after you have a piece of reality that's really like a moment. Like, these are real moments with people who've made some mistakes or we've all been there I mean, I remember I had a cell phone. I was like, I'm not paying Verizon. They don't know me. That was my thought These fuckers don't know me right and I was on a bicycle at the time. Mm-hmm You know, I was on my bike on the cell phone You know just eating up minutes or whatever just running up a tab Mm-hmm, and I was like these motherfuckers don't know who I am You know, just eating up minutes or whatever, just running up a tab. And I was like, these motherfuckers don't know who I am.
Starting point is 00:56:08 You know what I'm saying? I'd like to see them come get this fucking money, right? And my friend's house who I was living at, his dad was like, get fucked, pay the shit. You know? And then I think that's when it started hitting me like, oh shit, it hit my credit, right? I didn't even know I had credit.
Starting point is 00:56:23 I didn't even know I had credit until they called like, hey, your credit's bad. I'm like, what is it? Yeah. And like, your credit? And I was like, yeah. Dude. Put him on.
Starting point is 00:56:31 And they're like, no, your credit's bad. And they're like, you owe $1,100 to Verizon. I thought you could just run away from it, and you can't. But that was like kind of a bottom for me. I was like, oh, shit is really real, right? So I think moments like this are really real to people. And then you have a gentleman here who seems to be kind of fluid, sexually fluid,
Starting point is 00:56:48 I'll say maybe, I have no idea. He's dressing up like, he kind of has a look of, he's like the arch nemesis of like the monopoly guy or whatever, right? Or kind of like a Christmas sort of, like a, like kind of like a- Carmen Sandiego. Yes, yes.
Starting point is 00:57:04 Yes, like, hey, like, like kind of like Carl Sand um, Carmen San Diego. Yes. Like, Hey, like, like kind of like Carl San Diego. Right. So I feel like he has this like, and it's a good energy. I like it. So obviously he's, he's brave to do, to have his own vibe. Right. You can tell that right. He's confident, confident.
Starting point is 00:57:18 He's a business owner of this guy. He is. Wow. Want to be business owner. Uh, want to be business owner, but then he also has this emergency fund and I think a lot of people sometimes when they They'll create an emergency fund a lot of fluid people would be very like, you know, like oh you're this jacket doesn't fit It's an emergency. No, yeah emergencies can be very it's like is that a real emergency type of thing? They see it as a pile of money. Yeah, and that pile of money needs to be spent, of course.
Starting point is 00:57:46 Yeah, yeah. Honestly though, that's still a better mindset than where a lot of people come to. A lot of people will come on the show and they really haven't heard of emergency funds, and they say their credit card is their emergency fund. Oh. And that's... I mean, well, again, he took a high interest loan for it, so I guess that's pretty similar. But at least he understood he needed an emergency fund some people think if anything happens
Starting point is 00:58:07 You put it on a credit card now a lot of people don't have an option So they do do that, but then you know we try to help them pay off the credit card as quick as possible. Yeah What do you see a lot of is there a lot of flexing still like I know that's a thing where people like I'm gonna Appear this way right is that a big thing you're seeing still with millennials and Gen Z is the appearance of things? Or are some people more going to the emo hole of I don't have anything, I have nothing, I live in a Chipotle deep inside of a Chipotle type of vibe?
Starting point is 00:58:39 No, there's still lots of flexing and lots of cop spending too. The flexing, I mean, we have people come on with you know that outfit I think was a couple thousand bucks. No way. Yeah, it was very so I didn't think it was but even he had red sunglasses, too They're like a few hundred bucks. It was crazy hats like that. Those hats are kind of costly. I know yeah I mean we've had a dude come on with you know crazy rings on every single finger, but he had nothing to his name If I remember he had kids and they're basically growing up in poverty, but at least he has the rings. So there's there's always lots of flexing. People care about
Starting point is 00:59:10 what the person next to them at the stoplight thinks about their car. Yeah. You know, even though that person will never remember them 30 seconds from then. Yeah. I've had lots of people that I talked to where I tried to get them out of a $40,000 car loan when they make $30,000 that they can can't afford and I'm like let's just try to get you into a $10,000 car and then they scoffed a $10,000 car like I'm gonna be seen in a $10,000 car and that mindset's kind of gross honestly, right? Because you're it's not even a react because you're not living in your own reality then it's like Yeah, I think that was a blessing about having a shitty car when I was a kid. I could buy, I earned the money, I bought the car, it was a piece of shit.
Starting point is 00:59:48 Someone stole the passenger seat. But I drove it, you know, people would get in and just had to get in immediately, you know, the back seat. Yeah. You know, but it was like I drove, but it was. Well, you learn the value of it. Oh, yeah. And that's the important part. So many people that can just lean on others and especially those get it name
Starting point is 01:00:05 We see so much enablement where they get into a hard time, but then their parents bail them out There's nothing wrong with the heart of wanting to help someone out But they never learn their lesson and then they never understand the value of a thousand dollars even or just a dollar just a dollar But like there's so many instances where I'm talking about $300 that they're spending on something and that means nothing nothing to them Like $300 isn't a lot of money when it could be make a break for these people just making a necessary payment Avoiding a repo, but then $300 is nothing to them They just don't understand the value of a dollar because they never had to right because you had that car
Starting point is 01:00:41 You had to put money into fixing that car probably multiple times or being terrified of it just bottoming on the street. You understood the value of it, so you're not just like being disrespectful with your car purchases going forward. You understand it. Yeah. Are you ready to optimize your nutrition this year? Well, factor has chef made, yes chef, gourmet meals that make eating, well, easy. They're dietitian approved and ready to heat and eat in two minutes. That's quick.
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Starting point is 01:03:14 That's better help, H-E-L-P dot com slash T-H-E-O. And if you've been struggling, man, we've all been there or woman, we've all been there and this too shall pass. Are there a lot of, um, get rich now type of energy out there? Oh, yes. Is there? And that kind of goes back to Tik Tok and YouTube. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:03:38 Take me to some of that. What do you think? Um, what is some of that? What is, yeah, what is some of that get rich? And yeah, so many pyramid schemes. What is that? Pyramid schemes people are falling into. I had someone going into a ball python pyramid scheme
Starting point is 01:03:50 that I just talked to. No way. Yeah, so he buys 10 baby ball pythons from his friend, but how do you make money off of these ball pythons that are supposed to breed? Okay, so hold on. You get 10 baby ball pythons, and then you pay somebody, you get the 10 baby ball pythons that are supposed to breed. Okay, so hold on. You get 10 baby ball pythons, and then you pay somebody,
Starting point is 01:04:06 you get the 10 baby ball pythons. Okay. And now what do I do with these baby ball pythons? How do I get pyramid in? Well, how do you make money? What would you do to make money off of baby ball pythons? I think you'd have to mate them and then sell 10 to somebody else.
Starting point is 01:04:19 Yeah, now who's buying them? People you know. No, people that wanna buy them so that they can breed them to sell them to people who breed them. Okay. Because people aren't buying them for pets. You go to a pet smart for that. No one's buying from these guys.
Starting point is 01:04:34 Right. You buy the baby pulp pythons hoping they make kids so that you can sell them to others who wanna make kids and sell to others. And he got sucked into that, tens of thousands of dollars. And his 90 day fiance wife from somewhere in Central America is like freaking out about this She moved here sacrificed everything and this dudes blowing all his money on this and also like a million other side hustles He's trying to do the power wash and he's trying to do the car detailing anything that is a tick-tock get rich quick
Starting point is 01:05:01 Type of thing or even just a side hustle things that some people do make work He is just falling into it and the Python says this is most recent example But the pythons he bought have gone down 50% in value because apparently you can day trade You can day trade the ball pythons on like a little market app. There's a market app for day trading ball pot Yeah, so so not only has somebody created a pyramid scheme of ball pythoning, right? So you're ball pythoning, you're selling a few grams of ball python here, you know, an eight ball python here. And then you, but then the whole time somebody's also,
Starting point is 01:05:39 whoever engineered this fucking thing, also created an app where there's like almost a ball python coin market. So that's going up and down as well. Yeah. So you're basically driving around town with a backseat full of BallPythons, waiting for the market to go up enough.
Starting point is 01:05:56 Yeah. So you can pull over and put a couple BallPythons on somebody's tab. Yeah. Wow. That's my access strategy. Bring that up What the fuck?
Starting point is 01:06:14 What the fuck is happening man? That's Hawk 2's next pump and dump. I know huh where's she been at? She went to bed Somebody said she went to Barbados or something and she moved out of the country Okay, but so that's a new thing that's going on. Apparently. What's another one that's going on? Any other pyramid schemes? Lots of people getting into the knives pyramid schemes. They're buying, you know, I don't even know what they're called. I've never joined them, but they buy knives to sell to other people. So lots of those, lots of people getting into the day trading life, crypto life. We had some old guy with no retirement, poor dude.
Starting point is 01:06:49 I felt so bad. He actually, he like blew through a million bucks somehow. I filmed it a couple years ago and super nice dude, but he fell into this pyramid scheme of you like buy these nutrients that people can take and then, but you hope they come to a storefront to step in a body scanner that tells them how healthy they are, then they buy your nutrients, but I asked if we could come by and tour his business like a couple months after that. He kind of fell off the face of the earth. I feel like his shop doesn't exist anywhere on Google Maps, so I think that pyramid scheme collapsed. Ah.
Starting point is 01:07:22 Well, the reality is though, Yeah, the reality is in retirement again We already talked about 15 to 25 20 percent are actually Able to or actually 15 to 20 percent of people take early withdraws before even 60 And that the median 401k bounces 30,000, but it's low and slow. That's all it is You know, you're cooking a nice piece of meat. It's low and slow That's what your term if I needs be. You're just hoping it doubles like every seven years or so in the market. It just got to be investing like 20% a year, 20% a year.
Starting point is 01:07:54 20% a year is a lot. It's a lot, but if you accurately budget, it can be relatively decent. I believe $5 a week is a great amount. Yeah, starting anywhere is great. Starting anywhere. I mean, that's why you focus on getting out of debt first so that you have more to invest right? You know out of the high interest debt But what a lot of people suggest is 50 30 20 50 percent on needs 30 percent on wants because you want to be able to Live what's the point of being here for not having fun and then 20 percent to investing so it's still the smallest percentage Okay, but say if you have a debt right now, and you could save five dollars every week
Starting point is 01:08:25 What's the debt you could save $5 every week. What's the debt? You could save, say you have, say you're $10,000 in debt. Okay. And you're 25 years old. Okay. And you could save $20 a week, right? Would you rather you put that $20 a week towards paying off the debt, or is it better to take that 20
Starting point is 01:08:39 and put it towards just like a long-term investment? Well, a couple qualifications. Like, what would you say the interest rate of the debt is? And what is the debt? That's a good point. I would say the interest rate of the debt is probably going to be about 14% or something. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Debt immediately.
Starting point is 01:08:51 Because one, it's probably not even an asset. Like, at least a car is an asset, even if it's a depreciating one. But let's just say it's a credit card or a private student loan. You know, that's not going to benefit anything at that point. Got it. So pay that off. And then the other question is, there's also the third category. Do you have an emergency fund? If you don't have an emergency fund, then at that point. Got it. So pay that off. And then the other question is, there's also the third category, do you have an emergency fund? If you don't have an emergency fund, then at that
Starting point is 01:09:08 point, we're still funding the emergency fund over investing because you need to protect yourself in case of the rainy day and the rainy day always comes. Because there's this mentality, I think sometimes like, oh, I'm not going to pay off that credit card. I'm going to invest, I'm going to save this money and invest. You know, I'm saying like I'm going to invest in instead. But you're really just reverse engineering a nightmare kind of. Best thing you're going to get if you're just buying into the overall US stock market is an 8% return averaged out. Because that's what it's been all up years down years since the beginning.
Starting point is 01:09:32 It's been 8%. So if you have 15% that you're just not making the difference. Is college still considered a normal path for a lot of Gen Z? Yeah, it can be. People just do college in a really stupid way though. People go to the dream school that has the sports team they want for the major that doesn't make money. So it's not that college is the bad thing. You can do it the right way.
Starting point is 01:09:58 Get your gen eds out of the way at a community college. Something you know, ACC here is super cheap. You can go over a couple hundred bucks a semester and get some credits. A lot of diversity too at those colleges. You want to meet some, you know what I'm saying, an Asian girl or guy or something? Yeah. Do it. And larger class sizes as well.
Starting point is 01:10:14 So there's a benefit. Instead of a big hall that you get in university, so you get more one-on-one time with professors at community college. It's actually usually just kind of better education. Also statistically, the people that are going to community college are also more likely to drop kind of better education, just also statistically the people that are going to community college are also more likely to drop out. So that's why some of the metrics are a little bit skewed.
Starting point is 01:10:29 I see, and if you're gonna drop out, then you're dropping out there at a cheaper rate. But then you don't have to go out of state, you don't have to go to the private college, you don't have to go to the college that has your favorite sports team that's gonna go and the, you know, gonna win a national championship in football.
Starting point is 01:10:42 You don't need that. And then also when you're going to college, is it gonna have a return on the investment for the degree? You're actually trying to get to and if you don't know what you want to do There's nothing wrong with taking a year off between high school and college to figure some things out Maybe do a trade look or look at her trades if you're interested in that take a career trade you mean yeah Yeah, just look and see if that's something you're interested in and then then you can go to trade school in a smart and dumb way as well. There's expensive ones out there and there's just average ones. And I don't want you to focus all your money and time on something you don't even want to do
Starting point is 01:11:12 just because, like, oh, Plumber, they make great money these days, you know, the mediums, whatever it is, but it's like pretty good. If you don't have any interest in getting on your hands and knees and doing that shit, you know, maybe we're not doing that. Right. Yeah, you want to have some interest in what you're doing, for sure. And you want to find something. I mean, that's one nice thing. Something about going to a community college
Starting point is 01:11:30 or going to a college is taking on some different courses and seeing, like, well, what might I be interested in? You know, I know I like something about this, but I don't know what it is yet. Let me get at least into that realm of classes. Absolutely. I mean, you have to remember, people that go to college, 40% drop out.
Starting point is 01:11:47 So this is not a guaranteed thing. People think just because they're going to go to college, OK, my life is set now. 40% who take out student loans drop out of college. Wow. I was one of them. I dropped out $40,000 of federal student loans and $12,000 private. Wow, really? Yeah.
Starting point is 01:12:01 Yeah, it took me, I think, 11 years or something, or 10 and a half, or 10 and 6 half or 10 and 6 5 6 years almost. Yeah, like 11 years I think to do college. Yeah happens and it costs money dude I took a couple classes like you already took this class and all those I remember being like yeah, I know I'm good at it I'm gonna fucking take it again Really? Yeah, okay Doubling up the degree. Yeah, and just like, and I remember one time this teacher gave me a B, I went and took her class again
Starting point is 01:12:27 to fucking prove to her I could get an A in that bitch. Did you prove to her? I think she got laid off. She was dealing with like addiction, pill addiction. But I did a good, you know, I did my best, that's for sure. What are, what are some things, say somebody's, they don't know what they're doing right now, right? They don't know.
Starting point is 01:12:47 What are some, let's go over some like blue collar and then non blue collar jobs that people could do. You could start at home. I've always said pressure washing. I grew up in a neighborhood where if you wanted to get a leg up, you could get a pressure washer, a couple hundred dollars. You can get a nice one for like five, 600 bucks. Now you have to get a leg up, you could get a pressure washer, a couple hundred dollars. Sure. You can get a nice one for like five, six hundred bucks.
Starting point is 01:13:07 Now you have to get that money first, but... Yes. It's realistic. And then you can start pressure, you can go to a wealthy person's area and be like, hey, I'll pressure wash it and you can do a good job. What are some other jobs like that that you recommend to people to get started if they don't really have anything? Yeah, I mean, there's nothing wrong with dropping some McFries, you know, just to try to pay the bills. People look down on that. There's nothing wrong with these extra, you know, for the fast food jobs even,
Starting point is 01:13:35 just while you're trying to pay your way through school. I mean, Summer Moon, coffee shop, I like, you know, their moon milk creamer, I basically lactate that shit. Summermoon it's called? Yeah. I just went to a place called Two Hands. Okay, also good, I think. Yeah, they have nice people that work there.
Starting point is 01:13:51 Yeah, but they were hiring just a barista, the manager was talking to me, he was like, dude, get someone on your show to come work for me. I need to hire people, 18 bucks an hour, you know, that's not bad. Austin's pretty expensive, but 18 bucks an hour is not bad. that's a great place to just start get your foot in the door There's nothing wrong with the side hustles either kind of like the power washing a lot of people view that as like a side hustle Hopefully turning into a full hustle at some point what I caution a lot of people though is a lot of people go into that And they're like okay now. I need the pressure washer Wait I need the truck to be able to move it around that That was the guy that we just, the ball python guy,
Starting point is 01:14:26 he had to buy a truck so that he could move his pressure washer around. So that's- Yeah, I don't want to show up with ten snakes in a fucking Ford Festiva or a Dodge Neon. Right. You know? Like these snakes deserve a classy automobile. It's like, what the fuck are you talking about, dude? Yeah, people get more excited about the actual job,
Starting point is 01:14:45 the journey, the out of the blue, the newer shit more than the actual grind. Oh yeah. That is a huge trap, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah, I'm gonna look the part so much, but you still have to do the part. Yeah, there's nothing with just get into a bank as well.
Starting point is 01:14:57 Get into a bank, work as a teller, sit down and just talk different loans to people as well. I mean, there's lots of jobs that don't necessarily require a degree that you can get into. I remember when I first moved to Los Angeles, we put up flyers everywhere. We would do refrigerator cleaning, right? Nobody wants to clean their refrigerator. Yeah. And for $200, we'd come and clean your refrigerator.
Starting point is 01:15:19 And we'd just take everything, just clean, I mean, clean it good. Yeah. And bro, I was shocked at how many people were like, I will in a heartbeat come clean this bitch. A lot of perverts too, trying to fucking touch your back or whatever while you were cleaning. But you fucking chalk it up to the 200, have somebody on watch while you clean back and forth.
Starting point is 01:15:41 Dog walking, that was another thing, something you could do. Car cleaning, I remember if you liked cleaning cars, you liked cleaning your car, if you do something well, somebody will pay you to do that well for them, right? That's one thing that I always think. We used to have a on the street audit show that we did just back in the day
Starting point is 01:15:58 when I was testing things out, and I met this dude who- Like take me through that on the street audit show, that sounds really cool. I'd just walk up to people, you know, those kind of camera in the face things, but I would just ask them money questions about their finances and then just kind of get my thoughts on it.
Starting point is 01:16:12 But we met this dude who, you know, Rover? Rover? The app. Like Rover for dogs? For dogs? No, so it's the dog walking that you were mentioning. So you can hire dog watchers, walkers, or anything off of Rover. And...
Starting point is 01:16:25 Oh, wow. Beautiful animals on there. Is that a corgi? He's making $175,000 a year doing that. No, he's not. Walking dogs. House-sitting dogs. But because it's just house-sitting, he can also work his full-time tech job from the house that he's sitting.
Starting point is 01:16:38 So he's making like $300,000 a year. Yeah. Right. There's a lot you could do. No degree required for that. Sit in someone's house. Feed's a lot you could do. No degree required for that. Sit in someone's house, feed their dog, take them out. And the funny thing is, man, I'll say this.
Starting point is 01:16:51 Once you start doing something, you don't know where it's gonna lead. I will be so shocked how many times it's like, okay, you're a barista, you become a good barista. Then somebody who runs a company of some sort, they show up, they see a good worker when they know, when they see one. They're like, what are you making here?
Starting point is 01:17:08 Are you making $18 an hour plus tips? I'll pay you $80,000 a year to come work right next door. You know, why don't you come in tomorrow and we can just talk about it, see if it's something you would like. Just cause they see your work ethic or I'll pay you. It's just, it's amazing sometimes when somebody who runs a business starts
Starting point is 01:17:23 to see good work ethic, that they will latch onto it immediately. Absolutely. But also the things you don't know, it's like you start with a small thing and then next thing you know, it's like, like my brother was a tree cutter, right? He started just cutting down trees.
Starting point is 01:17:35 And after a couple of months, he was like, oh wait, I could be the foreman. I understand how this works. And I can do the foreman's job, right? I need to learn more. but once I learn more, I'd be happy to hire some other tree guys and put up my own advertising. Like the barrier to entry to things,
Starting point is 01:17:53 it's not as hard as you think a lot of times. It's just, you don't know it until you start. Yeah, one of the first full-time editors that I hired, dude was making, the math worked out to almost like six bucks an hour working for a YouTuber, but his editing was great and with the different incentives and everything I give just based on skill, he was making six bucks an hour to now a hundred, a thousand a year. So like, if you can prove it. Right.
Starting point is 01:18:21 And I have a friend who's into some personal assistanting for another friend. And I was like, bro, you should start learning social media edits, learn how to do them. So then whenever you're with this guy, now you could, you know, just capture a couple things on your phone, put it through one of these kind of like different filters or different programs that they have online. You know, there's CAP, there's all these different things. And next, you know, you can show him three examples the next day. And now the next time he hires you to go out with him for an EVA or whatever it is, you know, you can tack on an extra 30 bucks an hour
Starting point is 01:18:48 because you're gonna make a sick edit for him. Or something, you know, like, there's just, there's a lot of things that you can do. I think that's kind of an easy one you can learn is how to become a social media editor, video editor. Yes. Now you're gonna have to have a computer that works to do it and you're gonna have to have at least
Starting point is 01:19:02 your cell phone to be able to do that. But I think that that's realistic. Trying to think of what else, oh, carpet cleaning is something that people don't wanna do a lot of times. Yeah, so I mean, that's my small business, or that's what the small business my dad owns is, is just a little power washing, window cleaning, carpet cleaning. Wow.
Starting point is 01:19:18 And that's what took him from being a cashier at a gas station when we were poor when I was born, to now they're doing really well, because you can grow that, you can scale that, they opened a second branch, they're doing well. There's a lot of opportunities there. And then in the video editing world, if you're just asking yourself,
Starting point is 01:19:34 what can I do to make that person's life easier, they'll give you money. Yeah, yeah, I agree. Trying to think of some other ones, work from home, that aren't as blue collar, I know there's data entry is one. I see a lot of advertising for data entry. Is that a valid one?
Starting point is 01:19:49 Honestly, I have no idea. It could be. Yeah. Yeah, look that up. Is data entry a valid gateway job or something? I mean, honestly, just any way to get into a building, a business, and just getting to know management there and, a business, and just getting to
Starting point is 01:20:05 know management there and working with them and just asking what do they need and being able to fulfill those tasks, you'll move up. Yeah. According to current data, an entry-level data entry position typically pays around $15 to $20 per hour in the U.S. with an average annual salary ranging from $30,000 to $40,000. And are you going to do that your whole life? No, but sometimes just getting into the companies. You may need to do it for a couple months to get out of a situation, you know?
Starting point is 01:20:31 Maybe you could do it while your kid's at school. You know what I'm saying? I'm just trying to think of little ways. I know that these are obviously me saying these things and I have no idea what some of people's real lives are like. No, of course, but in the conversations, what I see are people looking down on shops like that. They're not willing to, even though they're not paying their bill. Yeah, right
Starting point is 01:20:49 It's like at that point Everyone's just looking down upon them. I mean the car company is that's about to repo them The bank is looking down on them. They can work that job. They can work the McDonald's whatever it is Just make ends meet have you ever had somebody come in with a business idea that was just repulsive and you saw them going down a road and you're like... That old guy I was telling you about, he did pump about a million bucks into this whole thing, really, his entire life savings,
Starting point is 01:21:16 everything he's worked for, into his 60s, 70s, wherever he was. And again, the machine, whatever this body scanning machine is, I'm not in that world, so I don't know. But I know it was like 50,000 or something crazy, and the storefront that he was investing in, again, just a quarter later.
Starting point is 01:21:33 Biofrequency gadgets are a total scam. Let's zoom in on this, see if this sounds like it. I would like to find this so we can put this out. This is interesting. I recently asked what I thought about the Solex AO scan. This website for the product includes this claim A o scan technology why solex is an elegant yet simple to use frequency technology based on Tesla Einstein and other prominent scientists discoveries uses delicate buyer frequencies and
Starting point is 01:22:01 Electromagnetic signals to communicate with the body was it something like that or no it had nutrients involved Yeah, well no he used the results to try to sell people to get nutrients. Oh, I see. And that was the pyramid scheme he was a part of. Got it. So first, there's going to be a place where people are going to get this scan done. And then based on the outcomes of the scan, you're going to be able to sell them nutrients to get them equal. Exactly. Get them whole. Wow.
Starting point is 01:22:23 Man, it's crazy the level of people. We had a glitter mining thing by us growing up. People sold these glitter, like you could buy shares at glitter mines or whatever where they were mining glitter. And they fucking robbed so many of us. Oh yeah. I was in a pyramid scheme too.
Starting point is 01:22:37 I lost something. What'd you sell? Just, it was like, you basically sold somebody right into a pyramid. Like I got into, and it was on the chart, it was a pyramid. Yeah. And it was like, well, I remember asking somebody, like, is this a pyramid scheme?
Starting point is 01:22:51 And they're like, I don't know. You remember what you were selling? Just you sold literally the square that you had. It was like, I'm gonna sell, somebody sold me a square. And then it was like, okay, now I get two squares. I get to sell two squares. It was a- That is like is like a literal okay, yeah And dude the crazy part was I remember asking my friend's dad about it, and he had bought into it, too
Starting point is 01:23:14 So everybody got took by us we see people get into the makeup one a lot the makeup pyramids Yeah And this is where you you buy makeup from someone else and you sell that to other people and you try to recruit people To sell makeup and well, there's like Donna. What's that Donna? What's that? Kay Mary Kay Mary Kay we get lots of Mary Kay's you do. Yes. Absolutely. I'll tell you a story I was at in West Virginia I was doing a show there one weekend and they had the Grand sellers of the Mary Kay group and they all had
Starting point is 01:23:44 Cadillacs and whatever and they were doing a big thing there and they all pulled up I mean they must had 40 different Cadillacs that they pulled up. They figured out the game. Multi-level marketing, right? So it's kind of yeah, I mean again people don't want to do the low and slow they want to get rich now Right. They're not willing to just invest and hopefully hit that 59 and a half That's when you can withdraw from your retirement tax advantage, retirement accounts without a penalty. Is that one of the things you see with the younger generation is just because of Tik Tok, there's so many more schemes out there.
Starting point is 01:24:14 Yeah. It's people wanting the easy way out. Absolutely. Cause they see other people that have a proven success rate to actually do it. So it's just a quick way to get to wealth. And 60 seems so far to a 20 year old. So far. Yeah. What were some, I know there were some,
Starting point is 01:24:30 I'm trying to think of some different inventions or schemes. There was one called Dyna, Dyna, D-Y-N-A, it was a bike wheel. This thing was crazy. Dyna bike wheel, this was it. Pull up this Dyna-sphere. Dyna-sphere vehicle. Zoom in.
Starting point is 01:24:51 The Dyna-sphere is a mono-wheel vehicle designed, designed, patented in 1930 by John Archibald Pervez from Somerset, UK. Pervez's idea for the vehicle was inspired by a sketch made by Leonardo da Vinci. Look at this thing. Two prototypes were initially built, a smaller electric model and one with a gasoline motor.
Starting point is 01:25:13 Let me see, the driver's seat and the motor were part of one unit mounted with wheels upon the interior rails of the outer hoop. I mean, this thing looks crazy. If you can't see this on audio, but it's basically a guy driving a huge tire around. The singular driving seat and motor unit when powered forward would thus try to climb
Starting point is 01:25:34 up the spherical rails, which would cause the lattice cage to roll forward. So basically you're in a fair, it's like something you'd be in at a carnival. Steering of the prototype was crude, requiring the driver to lean in the direction sought to travel. It's like something you'd be in at a carnival. Steering of the prototype was crude, requiring the driver to lean in the direction sought to travel.
Starting point is 01:25:49 Though Pervez envisioned future models equipped with gears that would shift the inner housing without leaning, thus tipping the Dinosphere in the direction of travel. A novelty model was later constructed by Pervez that could seat eight passengers. The Dinosphere 8 made specifically for beach use. I wanna see that. How do you fit eight people in that? It looks like a beach,
Starting point is 01:26:08 it's basically like a hamster wheel. If you guys could imagine a hamster wheel that someone drove. Oh, there you go, there's that eight seater. Oh, that's kind of cool. You get to sit in a circle and it just cruises. That's romantic. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:26:20 Okay, go back. I just wanna see what happened to it. It was also impossible to steer or brake. Another aspect of the vehicle that received... Oh. While the vehicle could move along just fine, it was also impossible to steer or brake. Another aspect of the vehicle that received criticism
Starting point is 01:26:37 was the phenomenon of gurgling, oh, gerbiling, the tendency when accelerating or breaking the vehicle for the independent housing, holding the driver within the monowheel to spin within the moving structure. Imagine you slam on the brakes, right? The vehicle stops, but you just keep spinning in the middle. We need an Elan to get on this, bring it back.
Starting point is 01:26:57 Yeah, that's something we need back. What else did that? I'm trying to think of a, oh, the banana slicer. Can you see if you find that one? This was something that somebody invented. The problem was- no go to that one right there on the right. Hutsler, go to the Hutsler right there. It was a one size fits all uh, your banana had to be one size. Right.
Starting point is 01:27:18 So if your banana was obtuse or if it was like I don't want to say an African banana or whatever, but if it was a different type of banana or a Filipino banana, I don't think this, you couldn't use this one. But that's crazy to think about, right? Yeah. That somebody invented that, that was kind of a crazy one. Trying to think of anything else I remember hearing about. Oh, there's always that baby cage,
Starting point is 01:27:41 that was, people would put that baby outside of the window. Remember that, that baby cage out window, yeah. It hung it from a window. Yeah, there you go, right there. Get that little baby out that cage, baby. The bizarre history of the baby cage. Pull up, click on that, get me a link to that, daddy. It's a little outswitzy.
Starting point is 01:27:59 Little outswitzy, yeah. Little outsideswitzy, huh? Okay. Play on words there. Dangling baby cages came into vogue after they were invented in 1922, but their origins really began with the 1884 book, The Care of Feeding of Children by Emmett Holt. Emmett carefully describes how babies need to be aired out.
Starting point is 01:28:22 Fresh air is required to renew and purify the blood. And this is just as necessary for health and growth as proper food. And what were those cages? How big was that baby cage, daddy? Oh, that baby's enjoying it, huh? It's gotta be kind of nice, put your baby out there for an hour,
Starting point is 01:28:39 let him meet a bird or whatever. Have a falcon fucking befriend him. It was believed that exposing infants to cold temperatures both outside and through cold water bathing would grant them a certain immunity to catching minor illnesses. I could see some of that. This is the first cold plunge.
Starting point is 01:28:53 Yeah, that's all this is, yeah. Yeah, that's the first cold plunge right there. That's Wim Hof, I think. That's one of the earliest pictures of Wim Hof right there. That's Joe Rogan right there when he was a baby. Tell me a little bit about your own budgeting app, Simpler Budget, so I can make sure that people know about that young people who are confused
Starting point is 01:29:14 or they don't want to end up in a bad financial realm. Tell me about Simpler Budget. The first part of just fixing finances is the budget, because you've got to know what's going in and out. And a lot of people overcomplicate it. They get a spreadsheet that they can't manage or they download an app like you need a budget Which is another really good one But it's like so complicated and the learning curve is huge and it has all these
Starting point is 01:29:35 Qualifications for so many things that you just don't need people that are in bad finances Literally just need one place where they can just connect their accounts tells tells them where money's going, and you can figure out where to actually stop spending money or close a credit card, or we even were tracking different accounts where you can see your investments as well. So you can see if you're on track and whatnot. So just that simple stuff and what a lot of people struggle with, even if they create a simple budget on a spreadsheet, they don't come back to it the next month So they make the budget then they don't actively budget because budgeting is not just making a budget
Starting point is 01:30:10 You got to stick to it You got to follow it so this helps you by setting alerts and whatever you need and continued education and you know premium version we have these classes with financial professionals that you can join live and Ask them questions and they help mentor you now are these classes more valuable than the original classes? So these are real classes, these are valuable classes. Yeah, well these are financial professionals, you know, certified financial planners and people with budgeting experience. Again, the thing we talked about at the beginning, that was just teaching how to day trade. So that's right. So day trading in its own right is risky. This is teaching people how to save and budget and plan. Budget, budget, proven things that like the most, every licensed financial professional
Starting point is 01:30:48 would talk about. So keeping people on track, people just need those extra motivations. A lot of people watch our show that are on, that are on track to budget and pay off debt, but they keep coming back because it helps them stay motivated throughout the week. For sure. It's just like, it's almost like going to recovery meetings or AA meetings. It's like you go to the meetings just to keep the word in your head. Right. You want to stay motivated. Exactly.
Starting point is 01:31:10 I love the idea that you have this world that's entertaining, but then the back end of the entertainment is, let's keep people budgeted and on track. It's exactly really what a lot of young generation needs because everything has entertainment value now. It's like you're at a funeral and there's people, like they're selling albums and shit or whatever. But everything has entertainment value now.
Starting point is 01:31:35 So to have an entertainment value with adding financial structure to people's lives, I think that's really amazing. There's a lot of people out there that you don't know if you can trust. I've seen them in over my lifetime. Oh, yeah. You come with these guys. I'm gonna name some of these guys. Financier types in the world. And can you, will you be willing to just give me your take?
Starting point is 01:31:55 If I know them. If you know them. Okay, Grant Cardone. People pull them up. Okay, Grant Cardone is one. Yeah, Grant Cardone. One thing, one message that I kind of know about him is he's okay
Starting point is 01:32:09 with going into a lot of debt and risking everything in order to get property or start a business. He's like, if you're not making six figures, a 21 year failure, I think. Hopefully I'm not putting words into his mouth because I don't follow a lot of his stuff. But I know it's a little too risky for my taste. It's a little too risky a little too flexing of wealth him with his private jet there That's you know, that's I get the aspirational part. That's great. You know, maybe you'll get there someday But let's just be realistic for the average American Low and slow invest try to get to retirement
Starting point is 01:32:39 Yeah I think if flexing of wealth is so bizarre to me because I would never want, I would never, if I looked at something somebody else had, I would feel bad if I don't have it, I feel like, or part of me would. Part of me would feel inferior or something, maybe not like up here, but somewhere in my head, I'd be like, oh, I'm not good enough or something.
Starting point is 01:32:56 I don't understand sometimes why people do that sort of thing. But I also understand that's just my school of thought and that some people like this aspirational style, like, you know what I'm saying? Let's see the flash and that motivates some people. So I think there's a motivational tactic in it. Alex Hormazi. You know him?
Starting point is 01:33:13 Oh, yeah. I think he's really good in like the motivational part. You know, I don't know a lot about his own financial advice, but in terms of, you know, really being motivated for your entrepreneurial mindset, that's been really good. And honestly, I've watched a couple of his videos when I was dealing with a couple, you know, issues while we were scaling our business, and just like, you know, what does this guy do?
Starting point is 01:33:36 He built like a multi-million, 100-million dollar business. And, you know, obviously that's if someone's done it, maybe listen to them. So I've listened to a couple things that have been beneficial from him. Ty Lopez, he's the famous guy that would read a book a day. That shit always was crazy to me. I think this is the guy that kinda put a bad taste
Starting point is 01:33:56 in everyone's mouth about buying courses online, which kinda sucks. Because I think we've put a lot of time in value and resources in producing educational content that, you know, people could pay for that helps guide them a little more handheld. And we've seen like one of the lowest refund rates, even though we offer free refunds, like no matter what, and we've seen like the lowest refund rate in the industry, but so many people immediately they see the class and like, oh, it's a scam.
Starting point is 01:34:24 It's a scam. You have to pay for it. It's a scam, right? Kind of started with this dude selling a course on a million different things We had the book in a day shit was always weird Like I don't even know if I want to talk to a guy who just read where the red fern grows You know what I'm saying? Like I don't know if I if I want to fucking talk to the guy who just read that in one day But again, it was also those the grand card don't like wealth flexing thing all his videos were like, you know behind Lamborghini in a garage and that's not where the average person is gonna be and that's okay. It's okay to be
Starting point is 01:34:55 Poor it's fun. Well, it's okay to be settled with just a good content retirement Now everyone needs to risk everything to go crazy and go into a lot of debt on a big risk not that that's what he advocates for, but... Yeah, and having a job is just one of the most important things. I remember my buddy's dad would always just say, do you have a job? It's the first thing he would ask me every time I saw him. Do you have a job? If I had a job, he'd talk to me. If I didn't have a job, he wouldn't talk.
Starting point is 01:35:17 It's just like, you need to have a job. You need to have something you are doing. And not because you need to be part of capitalists, but because you need to go and do something. Right. You have to have a job. It can be, you know, you're making something at home that you're aiming towards selling or doing, but you want to have some motivation.
Starting point is 01:35:33 A job is just a form of motivation. It's just an active motivation. Well, there's some purpose. People find purpose in jobs. Some people are purposeless after retirement. People do, you know, fire. Do you know fire? Do I know fire?
Starting point is 01:35:47 Fire? The independence movement where you stack up as much money as possible, invest it all like crazy so you can retire at like 45. A lot of people did that and no one's really doing it anymore because everyone retired at 45 with a few million bucks and they're bored and they have no purpose and there's nothing because they don't have a job.
Starting point is 01:36:03 They have a family maybe but they don't have the purpose. Oh, I know. I have some women friends that have like spent, really got focused on and now they want families and stuff and so now that's a little bit tough for some of them. Oh, sure. I think fire affects women probably differently because they can have children maybe too, you know,
Starting point is 01:36:18 if they focus so much. But even guys, like, I mean, I focus on work mostly. My biggest relationship is my work. Yeah. You know, it's like, I don't have a relationship right now. I'm not lamenting about it. I would like to get married or something, but when I'm like, who's my spouse? It's my, you know, I put a wedding ring on my job.
Starting point is 01:36:35 I like working. The second I think about doing something, I think about working. What about Gary Varner, Chuck? He's kind of a wild one, huh? Gary's always been like the guy, he's like, Oh, you got silverware in your house? Sell it. Sell it right now. You know? Sell your silverware, sell your house.
Starting point is 01:36:55 How much is your house worth? $3,000? What? To get out of debt? Sell the silverware, $65. And then he'll pull up a guy who'll be standing in a park, right? Because he has nowhere to live now. He's eating soup with his hand because he has no more utensils And Gary will be like how much money you got the guys like I got four thousand dollars You fucking did it buddy, and he'll hug him and then drive off in a limousine right all right, but it's like that's the thing
Starting point is 01:37:18 It's like you don't want any loose cash sitting around you know He's like your grandmother's asleep seller fucking fucking nightgown while she's resting. She don't need it. You know, it's like anything, anything they have, lease it out. Your grandfather's taking a nap, lease out his eyeglasses while he's resting, you know? It's just all type of stuff like that, man.
Starting point is 01:37:37 Do you know the purpose though? I'm so curious, because I do not know this guy. It's a motivation, I feel like, right? And this is just my opinion also, but it's just, it's always, there's always something they wanna motivate you to do, you know? Yeah. And Varnerchuk, his family owned a wine company growing up.
Starting point is 01:37:53 No shade, but it's like, dude, if my family had a wine company growing up, you know, I remember my mom beat me one time with a bag of fucking frozen oranges, I remember that shit. Did he sell his winery? It's a little different than that, but I'm just saying, I'm not sure. But I'm just saying, you know what I'm saying?
Starting point is 01:38:11 The Merlot don't fall far from the grave. You know what I'm saying, brother? What else are we gonna talk about? Ty Dolla Sign, is he an investor? No, he's just a, what does he do? Financial advisor? No. There isn't much information about Todd Ollerson's investments. Okay. So I don't know how you ended up on our list then.
Starting point is 01:38:38 What else? Anything else on our sheet you wanted to go over? Was there anything else that you wanted to talk about specifically, Caleb? Oh man, I just want people to realize that they're in a better place than they think they are. You know, that's kind of one thing we didn't really talk about. Okay. Is that, you know, I don't want to like, just like glug glug on America. I agree, I agree. I don't want to be negative only. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:38:57 Yeah. There's a lot more opportunity that people aren't willing to accept. We're in a very doom and gloom right now, where everyone, again, we talked about the victim thing earlier and everyone's like, it's impossible to get ahead. It's a why do anything because everything's so hard right now. And obviously inflation was brutal, especially when it was near that like 9%. But like we just had yesterday, yesterday before we filmed this, 256,000 jobs added in the last month when they expected 155,000. Like unemployment rate at 4.1%. Here we have a GDP $25 trillion, where in the UK, Germany,
Starting point is 01:39:36 Japan we're looking at $3 to $5 trillion. GDP per capita here is 70 to 80,000. UK, 47,000. There's a lot of opportunity here, and I don't want people to just really always beat themselves down. And I know, like my shows, it is on the negative side because their finances are really bad.
Starting point is 01:39:52 But I want people to know they do have more opportunity out there if they're willing to take a little bit of risk. Yeah. Yeah, and I think that, I think there's this pressure probably especially with the younger generation to put, you have to put your life on the social media, right? And so then you would feel more shame
Starting point is 01:40:11 about having certain jobs because you wouldn't want to put that reality on the social media. Where like when I was in high school or in college, that wasn't a thing, it was like, you didn't, I mean social media was coming up, but it wasn't like that. It wasn't like, you didn't have that immediate reaction with people ripping you or roasting you
Starting point is 01:40:30 or making funny online. So I think that that's a different thing where it's like, oh man, not what will I think of this job. Man, what will other people think if I post about this job or if I live in this world? And I think that that's where you can just be creative if you do want to post about your job be funny about it be like, you know what I'm saying and And also you have to just realize like it's the shit that you don't want to be doing that's when you sit there and your
Starting point is 01:40:56 Brain thinks up the shit you do want to be doing. Yeah when I was doing shit. I did not want to do dude That's what my brain was getting inspired I was doing shit I did not want to do dude. That's when my brain was getting inspired Mm-hmm. I mean my brain was like and that's when I got to see what my brain even was my brain was like we're gonna figure this out my brain started to surprise me with ideas and thoughts and so I think that Yeah, you have to like just know that sometimes you feel like man I'm in the dirt, but you're really in the soil kind of vibe, you know? Yeah, I like that mentality.
Starting point is 01:41:26 There's a lot of shame in certain jobs right now. And that needs to go away. Yeah, and we put it on. It's like, just put the fries in the bag. It's like, sure, but dude, I used to just put the pizza in the box forever. You know what I'm saying? Like we had a, and it was a blast, dude.
Starting point is 01:41:39 Yeah, I delivered Jimmy John's for like six years. Oh, really? Yeah, it was great. I've had Jimmy John on this podcast. Yeah as a business Big dude. Yeah, great dude, man. I saw him at three weeks ago Yeah, so it's just like you just never know where you're gonna be, you know, like I mean you just don't you know Jimmy John's my favorite sandwich. You almost got hit running across a fucking highway to get a couple ones What are you a number nine guy? I'm a number nine guy. Me, I go turkey Tom, extra turkey, light mayonnaise.
Starting point is 01:42:06 Don't look me in the fucking eyes. I'll come in there and get it, okay? I love it. Yeah. Nice. And I'll honk my horn for him when I come in. I'll even call him and tell him that. And they're like, this is getting a little weird. I'm like, Jess, I want everybody looking the other way.
Starting point is 01:42:18 Leave the sandwich on the counter. It is a very kind of like, it's the closest I get to like robbing a bank or whatever. What was the last thing I was going to ask you? Oh, what do you think of an eight leg parlay as a realistic probability for somebody trying to get a leg up in the world? You're gonna have to explain that one to me. I'm talking about somebody who's got ten dollars left and they put it on and they put it on eight football games to all hit for a weekend.
Starting point is 01:42:44 Okay. Because this is happening basically in every Pi Kappa house in America. Yeah. Dude, betting is getting kind of out of control right now. It's getting crazy. I mean, you have people laying in their bed at night, fucking, you know, just hopped up on Zins, praying for Saquon Barkley.
Starting point is 01:43:01 It's getting bizarre. These betting companies wanna sponsor us like every day. We have to tell them to fuck off so much, it's crazy.. These betting companies want to sponsor us like every day. We have to tell them to fuck off so much, it's crazy. It's like any kind of drug, any kind of drink, and any kind of whatever, you know, betting can be fun, it can be good, if it gets addictive, that's where it's bad. $10, if you have $10 to your name, that's all you have left. People probably shit on me for saying this,
Starting point is 01:43:21 but it's probably not gonna make the biggest difference. If we're just being real world about it. No, for sure. But behavior not gonna make the biggest difference. We're just being real world about it. For sure. But behavior, there is the behavior conversation. If you are gonna throw it towards the bet, that is demonstrating maybe why you got there in the first place. So that could be a good step to correct your behavior for the first time, even if the $10 is gonna be make or break for whether or not your mortgage is gonna be paid.
Starting point is 01:43:40 No. Yeah. But it's a good behavior fix. What is a good investment? You just say you keep things pretty safe for the most part, huh? Yeah. But it's a good behavior fix. What is a good investment? You just say, you keep things pretty safe for the most part, huh? Yeah, I mean, I'm mixed with real estate and like just S&P 500.
Starting point is 01:43:52 And when you say real estate, what do you mean? Like what type of stuff would you get into? Well, I got my personal residence, but then up in Michigan, where I'm from, in Kalamazoo, I have some rental properties there that were like, essentially almost like burned down pieces of shit that like no one would live in and like Alright, I'll buy it fix it up
Starting point is 01:44:06 And now it's you know students are able to live there and so there's you know it kind of makes it matches with my morals A little bit instead of just buying up desperately needed housing, but also it's Making money. This is good. Yeah, and over time it definitely I mean it time goes fast to people don't realize it You know time goes fast um Yeah, people people bag on Gen Z a lot. I think there's always that thing where it's like we're bagging on the next generation. But I was looking at a statistic the other day
Starting point is 01:44:33 where Gen Zers, like the average job, they keep it for two, like two and a half years. And it's only six months less than millennials kept their jobs. Sure. So it's not like Gen Zers can't work or that they're not working. You know sometimes. That's a lot of the energy. That's out there Well, you know the crazy thing can you look up what Gen Z thinks they need to live have you seen this this shit's crazy? And I'm kind of Gen Z. I'm like in that middle so I can shake talk both sides
Starting point is 01:45:03 Well that wasn't the nest that wasn't the report that came out but Google AI is telling us something. There we go, see Yahoo right there. They think they need $500,000 a year to be successful. Okay, go to that. Minimum. Generation Z thinks it needs half a million dollars a year to succeed, wow. That part's crazy.
Starting point is 01:45:21 Half a million dollars. They pay $4000, let me see. Armandar here, Howard, and her fiance together earn more than $200,000. The 28-year-old knows that's more money than the vast majority of Americans make, yet the Los Angeles couple still live about half an hour's drive from their pricier neighborhoods
Starting point is 01:45:41 where most of their friends live. They pay $4,000 a month in rent on top of her $450 student payment, their $400 car payment, and the $200 she sends home to her family in Indonesia. So they're saying that they need the zillennial, she's at the cusp of millennial generation in Gen Z, set aside 10% of her income for retirement
Starting point is 01:46:00 as a healthy monthly budget of $500 for entertainment and dining out, which she said comes with a side of guilt as bigger financial goals continually loom. In this economy, she said a household income of 500,000 between two people would be very comfortable. Very comfortable, it would be very comfortable. Yeah, it would be very comfortable.
Starting point is 01:46:15 And that's also there, man, that's Los Angeles. Yeah, that's fair, but like the median household income in the United States is like $60,000, you know? Right. 60, 75, something like that. Yeah, that's one thing that I like about living in a regular place a little bit more, is that you start to get a more reasonable idea of things. Yeah, absolutely.
Starting point is 01:46:30 You know? I mean, one of the issues is we're all stuck watching these celebrities who are living these insane lives. Or pretending to also, you know? I find Los Angeles in its own, like it has this like, movies and parties and all this shit, but I always found it to be like, it shuts down early like at all the bars close early everything It's it's all for look right everything there was more like let's make it look this way right interesting One thing I think that tells me specifically though. It's a lineo like I'm a lineo you know in between that era I Didn't have a job during the Great Recession. I didn't need to.
Starting point is 01:47:05 I was a kid. What that tells me, thinking they need $500,000 a year, is that there's about to be a big awakening when my generation and the people around me go through our actual first recession. And you realize that, okay, maybe living isn't about being able to get, you know, five cups of coffee a day. That isn't the requirement for life. I want you to do it, yes. But for them, that is full comfort where,
Starting point is 01:47:29 throughout most of human civilization, we're just trying to survive. And we are very comfortable right now. Yeah. It's a comfortable world, man. America's a comfortable place. I know it feels uncomfortable a lot of times, certainly in comparison to other people's lives.
Starting point is 01:47:43 But yeah, it's like most of us have food, we have clothing, we have a place to sleep. And that internet, in the world, that is opulence. Like a demonstration of this, I was dating someone from Venezuela for a little bit. Oh wow, okay. I know, exotic. And she, one thing she was telling me about her culture,
Starting point is 01:48:03 I was like asking what's different about this culture versus the different cultures she lived in all over the world when she was telling me about our culture I was like asking what's different about this culture versus the different cultures She lived in all over the world when she was escaping Venezuela And she says you know things are good in America because of how much we focus on The minor little social issue for everything when you have the luxury to focus on Tray and stuff not just that like okay, so Zuckerberg right yesterday He announced that tampons are leaving men's bathroom or whatever like I don't care either way whatever
Starting point is 01:48:29 But the fact that that is able to be such a major thing that we're freaking out about when you have that in a culture That's how you know everything else is pretty damn Okay, cuz we're allowed to focus our energy on that and not just making sure that half the country isn't starving Yeah, or sometimes that the media is tricking us to by saying like this is what we should be talking about, you know our energy on that and not just making sure that half the country isn't starving. Yeah. Or sometimes that the media is tricking us too by saying like, this is what we should be talking about. Yeah, click. But I agree.
Starting point is 01:48:52 The fact that people are bringing that kind of stuff up. I'm trying to think of anything else that I wanted to talk about. Any other group that came on your show that was kind of fascinating to you? I would love to play one more clip from your show. What's another one that we have that said we could play? Yeah, I just encourage you guys to go.
Starting point is 01:49:09 If you like, you know, you get a financial take, it's very much, it's just a perfect microcosm that you're in. And it can be a macrocosm too, I'm not trying to little it by saying that. I'm not the best with words, but I think it's just a perfect like Like nucleus that you're in of like entertainment and finances, what's this one right here? Oh
Starting point is 01:49:37 Yeah, play this one dude We built $75,000 of student loan debt is say the degree one more time. I study Shakespeare. Okay, Shakespeare. Lovely guy. What are you gonna do with that? Well, that's such a complicated question. Like, I was really hoping for more. You knew what you were gonna do with this much school. So this is where I just have to say we come from different worlds. You're not going to understand this. You won't understand like the precarity and why it's really all right. What do you mean though? Like your reaction there was like, oh, no, I studied music composition in college. I was in the college of arts school of music.
Starting point is 01:50:09 Okay. But I asked the job and you didn't know what to say. So I have a lot of experience working at writing centers. So I could be, what are you going to do with that? Yeah. You know what that is? That is an other major thing that is happening a lot throughout It's the continuous college because they're they don't want to leave college
Starting point is 01:50:29 So they go for the master's degree the doctorate degree and that's more and more We're seeing so many more people doing the endless college get the other degree because once you leave college, it's a scary world You're on your own. It's very scary. I want to go back every day I want to go back every day and this person gets a Shakespeare degree I want to go back every day. I want to go back every day and this person gets a Shakespeare degree So yeah doctor and Shakespeare. Yeah to be broke or not to be broke, dude. That's the question I feel like what now unless now unless you're gonna go to a Renaissance fair and get winked at by the king or something I feel like that's gonna be an uphill Climb dude, you know, she wants to be a teacher. That's what they do. You go to school to teach other people to go to school.
Starting point is 01:51:07 Right, and you stay in this world. There is always a person who stays in school. And sometimes it gets blamed on like, oh, look at this dude. He can't get his diploma or this girl is an alcoholic and she, you know, goes to Rutgers or whatever. But every now and then there's the opposite of it of somebody who just stays in because they don't want to get out and face the world.
Starting point is 01:51:29 Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Cool, Caleb Hammer. I appreciate it so much, man. Thank you so much for just being willing to come and chat with me. I'm excited to see what you guys do. And yeah, I just think it's really,
Starting point is 01:51:42 I think it's really neat to have just a kind of this corner of entertainment and finances and kind of just basic needs really, you know? Yeah. We all need a basic needs voice, you know? We need that kind of like Jiminy Cricket that shows up on your shoulder. Yeah, a little wake up call.
Starting point is 01:51:57 Yeah, for sure. And you're an alarm clock, man. So thank you so much, Caleb Hammer. Best of luck, brother. Thanks, man, I appreciate it. Now I'm just floating on the breeze So thank you so much, Caleb Hammer. Best of luck, brother. Thanks, man. I appreciate it. I found I can feel it in my bones But it's gonna take a little

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