May 23, 2025 • 36 mins
Time for a Friday Flight- our little sampling of the week’s financial news and what it means for your personal finances. There are a lot of headlines out there, but we boil them down to specific takeaways that will allow you to kick off the weekend informed and help you to get ahead with your money. In this episode we explain some relevant and helpful stories like: flipping dishwashers, credit crunch, what a US downgrade means for us, $70k high school jobs, the Humble Dollar match, MAGA money, gas gouging, competition at the gas pump, rising home internet costs, newsletter overload, where gold and real estate stack up, & small businesses leading to stealthy wealthy.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Had a Money. I'm Joel, I am Matt's
the other host, and today we're talking about the Credit
Crunch mag of money and gas gouging. Jill, you know,
(00:27):
I can't but hear Credit Crunch and think of like
a cereal I would have eaten back in like nineteen
ninety one. Was that peak cereal? Peak cereal aisle? I
don't know, man, I just saw something just the other
day that apparently cereals getting even worse for you, like
it's become of course, yeah, cereals terrible. How's it getting
worse because they're taking all the dies out? Well, maybe
it will get less worse in the near future. Right now,
(00:50):
right now, it's the worst. We're at peak cereals, terrible
for your health. So I feel like the nineties were
peak cereal culture, just as far as it just constantly
being everywhere cheerios, because like they normally on the commercials
to make it seem like parents, your kids wake up
on Saturday, get a couple of bulls here and watch
that TV. You know that heart shaped bullet cheerios? Yeah, yeah,
with the ones problem, it seems less bad and it
(01:11):
probably is less bad than a lot of the other
kinds that you could eat. But those are the just
a few of the stories we're going to get to
today on our Friday flight, which generally speaking is the
nice little sampling of the different headlines we've come across
this week, and specifically we like to address how those
issues are going to impact your money specifically. But before
we get to all that, Joel, do you want to
give a quick little update on your dishwasher the dishwasher
(01:33):
saga that we shared on Monday with folks. So, I'm
sure folks are wondering. They've been on the edge of
their seat. I know. Well, yeah, so I ended up
I bought four dishwashers from Costco, as I said, and
my wife was were they all shrink wrapped together? Were
they connected with the big handle? Amazing? How could you
carry that? Well? No, separately shrink wrapped olive oils. But man,
(01:56):
so I had mine installed and I sold my old dishwasher,
and then my dad wanted one of the dishwashers, and
so caught free installation from Costco for for mine and
for his, and then I sold serious serious deja vous,
but but keep going Keeka, And then so I sold
the other two on Facebook pretty quickly for five hundred
(02:16):
bucks each. So my dad, I gave him the essentially
the price that I paid per dishwasher, right, but but
for the ones I should get, that can discount. That's right, right,
But I'm not gonna like charge him extra. But people
on Facebook paid the full freight that I was asking
five hundred bucks. I was like, well, it started off
higher than that because I was like, maybe I'll get more,
but had takers at five hundred and so ultimately I
(02:39):
ended up not getting paid, which I thought I would.
I think I told you I thought I would, and
I did. I ended up getting paid to get a
new dishwasher put in at my house. And like I
told you, that was getting long in the tooth. I
was getting frustrated with it. So yeah, I'm happy. So okay,
so the big question does it You've had it now
for for a few days, and you so you said
you wanted to get a new dishwasher because your old one.
(02:59):
You are the man who handles the dishes, the dish
like you you are, Yeah, you're in charge of clean up.
Does it clean better? Because this is a Bosh dishwasher
and we know that with it being a German company. Well,
I guess just because this German doesn't mean it's automatically better.
But Bosh specifically are incredibly highly rated. They last, does it,
does it clean? It's been cleaning better, and so my
mornings when I'm putting the dishes away are far less frustrating.
(03:22):
Are they dryer as well? They are dryer as well? Yeah, yeah,
see that was that was my big hold up because
of the plastics. Yeah, I was, yeah, all right, there's
certain spots in like those kids food containers that just
didn't always going to get all the way dry. I
don't think in any like if it could have, if
you could get rid of all the water in there,
that'd be impressive. But evidently some of them can't, including plastics.
(03:43):
All right, Okay, so one of our our biggest hang
ups has been we tried some uh like some green
detergent pods because we're like, yeah, you know, maybe we
should be a little more health conscience health conscious. But
they didn't do a great job cleaning the freaking dishes.
And I do. I am credibly hesitant to throw something away.
I don't like to waste stuff. It's the leftover's principle. Right,
(04:05):
like you got it, like put it to use. I
was so close to toss on those things because the
dishes were not getting clean. I was so happy to
see to put the last pod in the thing. And
then we kind of swung in the other direction and
got like these incredibly highly rated, very not natural, very
not green, little gel pod looking things or whatever. And
I hate those two not because so they do a
(04:25):
good job cleaning the best. Well, the fragrance specifically on
these it's terrible, like all the cups and plates, everything
smells like this, like flowers or something. Yeah, I hate it. Again.
I'm like this close to toss on all those, but I
can't bring myself to waste these perfectly fine, they get
the job done. I just prove a conundrum right there. Oh,
I got a grit and Barratt, and I can't give
(04:46):
them to somebody you think might appreciate them. Maybe we should. Yeah,
So I'm looking forward to being done with those and
just moving back to the what is it the power ball?
You know it's got the little red classic. I feel
like those are just they're not overly fancy, they're not
super expensive, they don't seemed like the absolute worst pods
for you, But I'm on sale and it's what we
have been using. I don't know why we switched it up.
Is that what y'all use? No, we use the liquid
(05:08):
because he's like squirted in there. Is it multiple like that?
You get this from Costco? Yeah, so it's the Kirkland sig.
It's not Kirklands. Okay, what does it with? The brain
is in a green bottle? But okay, they want to
say it's like seven bucks for giant tub of dishrusher liquid. Interesting, Yeah,
not bad. Let's go for it. But let's keep moving though.
This is like a quite a departure from what we're
(05:28):
talking about now that you want to talk about. I
just want to say a macro level what's going on.
It's thrilling to me, to the frugal guy and me
to get paid to put a new dish rusher in
when I already married that. I am very happy for
you for me, that's just that's like a that's a
big money win. It's good. But yes, let's talk about
a bunch of other stories, Matt. Personal finance stories that
are going to impact people's people's finances in America's credit worthiness.
(05:51):
That's something that we should probably talk about in the beginning.
It's in greater question right now. After Moody's one of
the credit rating agents, he's joined the other two credit
rating agencies and downgraded the America's credit standing. So it's
it's like essentially the like Equifax telling you, yeah, you
had a seven forty, now you're down to like seven
(06:12):
to twenty five. We just don't think here as good
at handling credit as we thought four. But this is
on a national scale, so this isn't surprising, but it
does shine a light on our unwillingness to face economic
facts head on as a country. I think it's some
people might be overestimating the impact though it's I think
it is also not a red warning light that should
(06:33):
be freaking us all out. But it does reveal the
fact that our country could be on better financial footing
if we were better managing guard title entitlement programs and
our overall debt load. That would have a positive impact.
That's actually part of the reason I think that this
big beautiful bill as it's being called, is becoming a
political football right now, and the extra trillions in debt
(06:56):
that we're likely to be racking up in the coming
decades if this bill goes through, which could impact the
economy and the desirability of owning US treasuries, which impacts
all of us. Right, but it's also relative, Right, Matt,
you and I have had these conversations off the mic.
America's financial strength is still unparalleled. When we're talking about
pure nations, we're number one. Yeah. Still, even if we're
(07:17):
all like making dumb moves like shooting ourselves in the foot,
to a certain extent, America is still in a top
notch position. So yeah, I think, similar to prior downgrades
from the other credit rating agencies, I think it's likely
to have a minimal impact, but it doesn't mean it's
still not tough to watch. I totally agree. So yeah,
I wanted to highlight that because there's been a lot
of talk about this being political. It's not political. So
(07:39):
the first downgrade as we came down from the triple
A rating, it happened back in twenty eleven. And guess
who was president back then, a very popular Democrat who
was residing in the White House, Barack Obama yea, and
twenty thirteen. For some reason, twenty I think, well, maybe
it was twenty eleven, maybe twenty thirteen, But then I
know that the second one of the other ones, maybe
it's Fitch at that point downgraded. That happen in twenty
(08:00):
twenty three, and I remember we covered that then and
again how it's likely to be overblown, But it's definitely
not political, because you've got two Democratic presidents who are
in office at that point in time. It is not political.
But I also don't think it's as big of a
deal as many folks are making it out to be,
because it's in particular, I find myself thinking more and
more like in this line of thought, thinking about what
(08:21):
are the alternatives when it comes to borrowing from countries,
because and so I looked it up, and there are
maybe about a dozen countries out there who still have
retained the perfect triple A status. But here's the thing,
they're tiny. They are so stink and small. So you
average the GDP of those around twelve countries who still
(08:42):
retain that perfect rating, and we are something like twenty
seven times larger than the average at all, the GDP
of all those combined, but just on average, like it's
anywhere from like Germany is the biggest, And I think
there's something like four trillion dollars or something like that,
compared to the US is twenty seven. But the other
countries are closer to not fortunately, but like three two,
(09:04):
and most of them are in the hundreds of billions
of dollars that retain that perfect ring. So that's something
to keep in mind on a macro level as folks
are freaking out. I don't think this is something that
folks should be overly concerned about. Yeah, and you say
that it's not political, and I think you're right. It's
not some sort of like denigration of a particular party
or their policies. But I do think this is in
(09:24):
some ways the extension of the tax cuts and Job Act,
or this new big, beautiful bill that we're starting to
learn more about, which I'm sure we'll talk more about
next week. The tax cuts, extension of the tax cuts,
the elimination of taxes on social Security tips, over time pay.
Those policies aren't raining spending it in any meaningful way,
and so it's not obviously just a reflection of the
(09:47):
current administration. It's a reflection of what's been happening with
under both Democratic, Democrat and Republican regimes. It's a reaction
to the fiscal reality of what's likely to happen. But
I think we're also seeing a wait a second, like
this bill. Well, yeah, it'll provide tax savings for many Americans,
it'll grow the deficit, which is not great for the
long term financial health of our country. Yeah, and of
(10:08):
course on an individual level, borrowing costs are going to
go up because these I mean, basically, the US has
been told, hey, you know, before you addition on these
these treasuries at four percent, like, we're going to need
to see a little more from you because we're not
totally sure if you're going to be able to pay
these off. And so we saw like thirty year treasuries
go from like they went over five percent for the
first time in quite a while. But the way this
(10:30):
is going to impact us as individuals, specifically for borrowers, right, so,
for folks who are looking to buy a home, the
thirty year fixed mortgage rate is closely aligned with a
ten year treasury note this is how it's going to
more directly impact folks on a personal level. But even still,
I wouldn't be freaking out, joll. Let's talk about the
youths for a minute. Here one of the kids up
(10:52):
to you. Matt, not totally sure. I'm not on social
media as much these days, but I did see that
some high school juniors are getting seventy thousand dollars job,
which is more than the average pay for Americans across
the country. You know what I would say to that
skibity rizzler or that someone I'm assuming kids would say
to that. I think that's what you would have to say. Honestly,
(11:12):
I would just assume I heard that like six months
ago from my honor, so I'm assuming it's not going
to anymore. This is incredibly impressive for teenagers who are
just starting out with no college degrees, and so you
might be thinking, gosh, these are some smart kids. You know,
they've gotten straight a's, maybe they've gotten insane score on
their SATs, whatever other tests these kids are taking these days. Nope,
(11:34):
that is not the case. Companies are hiring these kids
who have shop experience, something like welding, for instance, and
they are being courted almost like star athletes because of
the extreme lack of skilled labor in the country. We've
talked about this before, including with different experts here on
the show. Yeah, but blue collar work apprenticeships are thriving
(11:54):
right now, and man, you combine that with the ability
to start making money early, you're able to avoid college debt.
It's certainly not for everyone, but I really love seeing
this trend. It's hard for me to not project and
picture myself in a situation like this where I wasn't
totally sure what I wanted to do when I was
sixteen or seventeen. And I say that because that's how
(12:15):
old you are. When you're a junior, that's when you
start making some of these decisions as to what you
might be doing for the next five years of your life.
We're talking to a friend of ours recently. They've got
a rising senior. They're going to be spending the summer
going to different colleges. And that's great for a lot
of folks. Who are I mean kids, who are I
was not mature at that age, That's all I'm going
to say. That's all I'm saying. And I lucked out.
(12:36):
I was fortunate enough to not have to take on
student loans and chose a degree that blighted me in
great careers and I found my way, Joel. But for
a lot of students out there, I think this can
be such a fantastic way to make some money for
a couple of years, to gain some maturity, to figure
out what it is that you want to do with
your life. Yeah, before you, especially before you take on
some inordinate student loan debt. Yeah, I mean, there's a
(12:56):
school not too far from where we live. In one
of our friends, Matt oversaw this program of kids learning
to become airplane mechanics and so amazing. They are graduating
with the best skill set, the better skill set than
most of their peers with immediate professions. And he would
he told me this with a little smack of I
(13:18):
don't know, sadness on his face. He's like, they're gonna
get paid more than I am right when they graduate
high school, because he's a teacher, And like, I feel
to hear the pain in your voice when you say that,
but also the pride that those kids are able to
instantly earn coming from a tough background in lots of situations,
instantly earn more than he was after all the education
he'd received amazing. And it's not that, I mean when
(13:39):
you look at the data, still on average, people earn
more with a college degree over the lifetime of their
earning some a million dollars more over time. But it's
also with the price of college and with the dearth
of blue collar workers. If you're if you're smart in
the path that you take, you can do better I
think in many instances than your college kind of parts.
(14:00):
Especially the people who go to college for a couple
of years then drop out. They've got college debt, they
don't have the degree to show for it. That's the
worst case scenario. Yeah, especially when it hasn't cost you
any money to gain these skills, Like why not buy
yourself a couple of years if you want to change
your mind, that's something you can do. You can then
apply for college at that point in time when you've
got maybe a clear idea of what it is you
want to pursue, and drop tens of thousands of dollars
(14:22):
on in high ra and how much you spend on that.
College education is crucial, especially in today's job market and environment.
If you're talking about taking on six figures in student
loan debt, it's tough to overcome. But if you're talking
about a free or incredibly cheap education, then that's also
a case of like, well, yeah, I don't know why
not go for it. But let's hope those youngsters Smatt
making good money right out of high school are investing
(14:44):
in a roth Ira from the get go. That's something
we would recommend they do right to build up to
start building wealth through their future. They really should be
that kind of salary. And one of the best people
in personal finance Jonathan Clements, he used to write for
The Wall Street Journal. He launched a website called the
Humble Dollar, which is which great well. He's launched a
new initiative to help kids from poor families start investing
(15:06):
in a wrath early on. And so Jonathan, he was
sadly diagnosed with a terminal form of lung cancer about
a year ago, but he's still and I've been really
interested to watch kind of how he's handled this man.
He's handled it so well in the way he's talked
about it, but also the way that he's continued to
pursue the things that he cares about, even in the
(15:26):
face of death coming soon. And he's so he's pursuing
that passion of personal finance and education despite those trials
that he's facing. And proceeds from his new book, which
is an anthology of his writings from the journal back
in the day. Are it's going to fund a getting
going on savings initiative, and this is being launched in
Boston specifically, and it pairs education with free matching ROTH
(15:51):
contributions for some lucky teens. And they're also what I
love about this, They're going to do some tracking. They're
going to see how this impacts those savers moving forward,
like incentivizing them to invest in a wrath so good
in their teens when they otherwise likely would not have.
Is this going to lead to lifelong savers and investors?
I think it will. I'm really curious to see the results.
(16:12):
But I love that Jonathan is like putting his money
where his mouth is in this, and he's really not
only investing in kids, but investing in some data that's
gonna I think help us, help us all figure out
what it looks like to help the next generation become
better savers and investors totally. And I think another lesson
we can gain here is that that we have more
power as individuals to make change out in the world right,
(16:33):
like incentivize the type of behavior that you want to see.
I I don't want to make everything about like fitness,
and I don't know, I feel like we've kept we
kept that rained in some but like this is a
part of and I've shared this. This is one of
the reasons. That's part of the reason why I built
up the home gym is because I wanted to empower
my daughters, Like I wanted them to see that it
is okay and in fact great to be a strong female.
And I've incentivized them to like do pull ups and
(16:55):
depths and stuff like that. And as well as the
kids in the neighborhood, like when they came over, if
they're able to, you know, to do that, they get
paid money, Like it's a party when the kids come over.
We don't have to fully rely on the government to
enact ways for future generations to save. Will you pay
me for public stoy? No, I'm sorry, Joe. So. On
an opposite note, there might be a new investment account
(17:18):
created out of thin air, and it's called this is
so terrible, but the money account for growth and advancement
or of course maga. Yeah, I will say this sort
of account has been proposed by both Republicans and Democrats
in the past as a way to jump start savings
for the next generation. They call like baby bonds at
different there's different methodologies behind this, but the whole goal
(17:40):
is to say, in effect, it's the same thing. Yeah,
And as part of the new big, beautiful tax bill,
it's meant to be away for the government to put
a thousand bucks into the hands of kids across the
country for their futures. So the way it's proposed, parents
could then contribute more up to five thousand dollars a year.
And it seems like this account would be sort of
like a hybrid of a five twenty nine account and
(18:00):
the four to one K so part education part, like
this is money you can live off off in the future,
but it would allow kids to use that money that's
a crew to start a business, or you could buy
your first home once you turn eighteen. It's all up
in the air right now. It's hard for us to
take a to give our opinion, to give a hot take.
It could help peak investing interest, making a lifelong difference. Certainly,
(18:24):
it could legitimately help some kids have a bit of
a nest egg when they graduate high school even or
certainly maybe by college. But the way the law is warded,
this account might not be around for long. That's one
of the saddest parts to me. Like so a lot
of the proposed parts of the bill, there is a
senset of twenty twenty eight, which in off the mic
jel We've talked about why we think this is. But
(18:46):
it's not a done deal. And the fact is, it's
tough to get really excited about something when there is
a clear expiration date. When it's set to sunsets. It
could literally help three years worth of children, and then
it's away. It's weird, and I don't if this is
a good policy, let's keep it around, and if it's not,
then let's not do it at all. It might be
a way to try it out then to be able
to silently just okay, yeah, let's go ahead and let
(19:07):
allow that program to end because folks aren't excited about it.
It could just be a political maneuver to be like, hey,
you want this to continue. We've got to pass another big,
beautiful bill in another three four years. But we will
certainly make sure to keep folks posted as that bill
comes together, solidifies gets passed, like, for instance, the child
tax credit. Some of the different changes likely to increase
(19:29):
for the next two years as well. Yeah, exactly at
lots of cover that will impact your personal finances as
it solidifies. I'm sure we'll be talking about it in
the weeks to come. All Right, man, We've got more
to get to though on this episode, including gas stations
that are gouging if you use a credit card. We'll
talk about that and more right after this. All right, buddy,
(19:53):
we are back from the Barak. We've got more to
get to. We're gonna talk about plenty more like gold
in real estate. But if horse now at a time
for the ludicrous headline of the week, and you know what,
I think you are a little more enraged about this
headline than I am, because I don't know if I
can officially call it gallaging. But okay, I feel you
feel a little more in that direction. Well, let's go ahead.
(20:15):
Let's go ahead, and then we can So the headline,
it comes from Yahoo Finance, and it reads I can
make it any number I want. Gas stations are charging
customers a dollar more a gallon for using credit cards,
and I so I was frustrated by reading this. The
gas stations are I would be frustrated going to charge
that much if I rolled up to that gas station
and I was like, wait a second, gas is two
(20:38):
eighty five a gallon? With three eighty five a gallon
if I use my credit card, if I had rotten
fruit in the car, Matt, I would throw it at
the at the gas not the person, but at the
gas station itself, because that's assault. Brother, Yeah, I know,
because that's messed up. That's it was a Billy Madison
life for all the oldies out there. Classic movie, classic movie.
But then Kiplinger, alongside this article documented the rise of
(21:00):
gas stations charging outrageous fees for credit card usage at
the gas pump too, and we seems like it's becoming
more of a widespread It's not like just the Florida
man or the Florida man gas station owner, right, which
apparently this is largely happening in Florida. And you and
I we've documented this on the show. We know that
taking credit cards eats into the profit of a small
(21:22):
business or a gas station operator, which is why many
small businesses are saying there's a cash discount or there's
a price you have to pay to use a credit card,
and it's why more gas stations are charging ten cents
a gallon, but a dollar a gallon, that to me
seemed pretty ludicrous. And so I think this is just
a heads up for you. If you're the kind of
person tap fill up, you don't even realize, you're not
(21:44):
even thinking about it, you're kind of thoughtlessly filling up
at whatever gas station you come across. Just know that
they might be charging this significant amount extra for using
your gas, for using your credit card at the pump.
And I just I also kind of don't see the
financial incentive for gas stations to charge this much more,
far beyond the cost that they incur for taking credit cards.
Because if I was a customer who found out that
(22:06):
I got, you know, kind of the hoodwinked, paying more
than I thought I was going to for the gas
house putting in my car, I wouldn't come back there.
So I just see like, a yeah, really stupid move.
It does seem like a stupid it's a short term.
It seems like it's a short term, a short sided,
near sighted like cash grab. Yeah, and I would not
even go back to that gas station, I think, even
(22:26):
after they lowered the price, because it's like wait a minute, wait,
was that an error? And maybe they're counting on folks
thinking that. But the fact that at least in this
in the one report that the guy's like, no, I can,
I can just make it whatever whatever I want. It's like, yeah,
you can run yourself out of business too, and he
might actually end up doing that. But the reason I
don't think this is gouging, of course, is because are
there other options? Do you have the ability to leave?
(22:47):
And man, there are a ton of gas stations all
over the place unless you happen to live somewhere or yeah,
it is your only gas station option. Right your town
is an intersection, like the radiator spring, there's like one
flashing red light. If that's the case, well maybe it's
tign for a town hall and there's there there should
be some social pressure, yeah, like that station owner. H
So that's the difference between like two eighty five versus
(23:08):
like three eighty five a gallon or something like that.
But like, for instance, the a ten cent per gallon
difference is typically worth it if you're using the right
credit card. Of course, Costco Visa. It gives you four
percent cash back and five percent with no fee at Costco,
which is also a very superior form of gas, Joel,
Speaking of gas, there's another gas station that I've been
(23:29):
to and I won't go back to because the the
check engine light came on after we filled up at
this text, I don't know what you want to say
it because, like you did, I'm sure it's a particular
gastation owner who maybe isn't doing a great job, or
maybe it was just a bad batch of gas. But
I'm like, I'm not going to risk my wonderfully old
engine in our our odyssey, uh going on the fritz. Yeah,
(23:51):
I mean we've talked about this before too, but there
is a type of gas called top tier gas. So
you're not just saying here, baby, no, it seems like
it's better at costco, but it really is really formulated
better to keep your engine clean. And so yeah, they
sell this stuff at the AutoZone or whatever. You can
dump in your dump in your engine to try to
clean your engine. Well, if you're filling up top tier
gas with regularity, your engine and components are going to
(24:13):
be cleaner. Maybe you don't need to even do that
at all. And by the way, it doesn't cost more
to get top tier gas. But they're just so certain
stations that provide it, so make sure you know where
you can get it. So as we're talking about competition,
there's actually an interesting white paper recently about competition at
the gas pump and how it spurs price reductions. They
maybe think of like when an Audi moves into the neighborhood, Well,
the prices at the other grocery stores, of course are
(24:35):
going to come down. Or maybe like when Southwest when
they start operating out of a certain airport, all the
other airlines, they got to get a bit more competitive,
although maybe that's declined with the Southwest drop spirit the
frontier when they jump in like Delta's like, all right,
we got to lower our prices for a little while.
At least, so the price per gallon at existing gas
stations gets reduced immediately because now they gotta work harder
(24:55):
to get you to fill up there. The study said
that the effects are immediate and person competition works man
because prices create important signals to the shoppers. If gas
stations try to gouge you make sure to peace out.
You can vote with your dollars. Prices are signals, and
we react accordingly when a price goes up somewhere and
make my little Antennas pick up, Matt. We might get
(25:16):
honorary economic degrees from some college out there who might
be willing, probably for some if you keep saying signals, Joel,
some fly by Nightronic Credit University. Uh yeah, we'll see
University of Phoenix. We're getting our honorary degrees from there.
I don't know. Is that a good I don't know.
If I'm not trying to cast, if they've got great
programs over there, I don't know. Well, the price of
(25:38):
home internet has been on the rise. C net found
that two thirds of folks are paying more for Internet
than they were last year, and not just not just
by a little bit. I was kind of shocked to
see this, by almost two hundred dollars more over the
course of a year. And they also said that service
has not improved with the with their Wi Fi, which
makes the cost increase even more frustrating. If I'm paying
(25:59):
more because I'm getting something superior, I might be willing
to look past the price increase, But if the service
is degrading at the same time, I mean, that makes
me frustrated. But it makes sense that this is happening because,
first off, home internet it's not a competitive industry in
many locations around the country, you're looking at a duopoly,
which means your options are paltry, like one of two
(26:22):
places you can go. Yeah, and then price competitiveness, it's
not really a thing, and it's still worth monitoring your
bill for price increases and calling your service provider to
ask about a reduction, or I've talked about this before,
you're reaching out to them on Twitter, because sometimes those
are the people who are most empowered to help you
get a better price, as opposed to call them the one
eight hundred number other options we've talked about this in
(26:45):
the past. Two or to choose slower speeds, or to
stop renting equipment. Buying your own equipment can reduce that
monthly cost. Oh yeah, but yeah, I think it's just
important to note this. That's slow creep up of your
internet price. You may be like, yeah, I'm paying seventy
bucks a month for an internet or something like that.
That is probably more than you should be paying, and
there are a lot of ways to reduce that bill.
Just don't pay the increased bill price because that's what
(27:06):
came in the mail, and not do a lick. Do
not to a lick about it. Because you really could
save a couple hundred bucks a year. Yeah, pretty easily
with maybe a couple hours of your time. Hek. Yeah,
So we're talking about paying for gas, paying for internet,
talking about paying our favorite authors for news because newsletter
subscription costs are also adding up. And this is too
(27:28):
Like it looked like for a minute there that all
news was going to be ad supported, everything was going
to be free. Of course, that's when substat came along.
They kind of changed the game kind of shockingly, right.
I don't know that you or I could have predicted that,
know that that was kind of moving in that direction.
And like, we pay for a few of these subscriptions
as well, some of which actually help us to stay
informed in order to do the show. Here. We had
(27:48):
Noah Smith on not too long ago, and right, that
dude crushes on substances, no opinion. We are torn though,
on this new model, because it's cool. I love that
you can directly support independent creators. It's amazing that great
writers out there can succeed without the backing of a
major corporation or a network. But then as an individual,
you've also got to be careful not to overdo it.
(28:10):
It's the boiling water and the frog, right, Like, you
just kind of get used to paying a little bit more,
a little bit more every single month, especially when the
average cost is just it's five bucks, it's ten bucks
a month. You know, you don't think that's going to
make or break anything, but you multiply that times all
the subscriptions they can get six to seven or eight,
it really adds up. Yeah, yeah, recurring subscriptions. So just
keep track of how many you have, and even speaking
(28:32):
from experience, can you actually read them all? I would
dare say that there is some waste. You know, I
was talking about waste earlier. I don't like to throw
things away, and in effect, that's what's happening, right Like,
if this is something that you're paying for and it's
not actually something you're consuming, that's just a whole jewel,
that's a ribby that's in the fridge that you're like, oh, man,
I didn't get to I didn't get to throw that
on the grill, which I know you've never done, never would,
but maybe you should start thinking about it. If there's
(28:54):
something you ever read you're like, man, that's just wasted money.
Maybe I should reevaluate and that doesn't mean don't subscric
to substack newsletters that move the needle for you, because,
like you said, we do there are some yeah really
but and some of which really do help us think
about money incredibly well and translate that for the show
for you as listeners. I love reading Noah Smiths articles,
(29:16):
and I yeah, happy to pay creators that I think
do great work. But I think for some folks it's
adding up and then they're like, I just got so
many newsletters. I'm my inbox is swamped and the only
newsletter that really matters Matt, After all you and I
both know is that how the Money Newsletter. Of course,
that's why we try to keep it shorter and sweeter
and free and freer. Yeah, exactly how to money dot
(29:40):
com slash newsletter for that. Let's talk about investing, and
as we know Americans, you know, when it comes to
investing and being informed about the best ways to invest,
maybe they're not as informed as you and I would love.
That's part of the reason the show exists. But there's
this new report from Gallup and it finds that's similar
to last year, people assume that real estate and gold
(30:03):
are the top notch absolute best investments that you could
be for taking in. And so it's a sticky myth.
That's right, sticky myth because it perpetuates people continue to
think this. You and I we talked about gold a
little bit last week, so we won't like brate that
topic and keep going at it. And it hasn't been
a bad investment recently. We documented that over the past
twenty years, it's actually it's actually been an awesome investment.
(30:24):
But it doesn't hold a candle to investing in stocks
over many decades, and you and I were real estate investors,
but we would still, I think hesitate to tell folks
that real estate is the best long term investment. There's
a lot of just nuance and specifics that come into
play there. If it can be if you buy at
the right time and you know what you're doing right,
or if you bought a property that was pretty inexpensive
(30:46):
and you use leverage to buy it and you've seen
what returns have done over the past fifteen years, it's
no wonder the recency bias inside of you would say
real estate crushes stocks no matter what, even those stocks
have done well too. But just to assume that gold
and real estate are better than investing in the stock market.
I don't think the numbers over all an extended period
of time bear that out. I was sad to see
(31:07):
that only sixteen percent of folks who were surveying thought
that the stocks were the best long term investment. And
it's worth mentioning that it is just so much easier
to invest in the market right like it can be
worth working hard. It's maybe it's worth you spending some
time on the weekend putting in some sweat equity, putting
in some elbow grease in order to increase your returns
as you are forcing equity into that property. But many
(31:28):
folks are going to find it hard to make the
numbers work investing in real estate specifically right now. Plus
it's just hard to save up enough liquid cash to
get you in the game. And there's also the part
time job aspect of it, and you do have to
do all that Like this, yeah, exactly, Like I'm not
trying to shatter your landlord dreams if you've got them,
but just simply dollar cost averaging into the market is
still the best way for the vast majority of folks,
(31:50):
despite what it is that they think. I think a
lot of individuals lash onto the different anecdote. They lash
onto the outliers. They've heard stories of, Oh he made
all his money in real estate, and well it feels
more approachable too. Then like I built a business around
AI and I sold it for billions or something. It
seems like something that they can do. But even still,
like the average American, they've got a nine to five. Yeah, like,
and then after that, you've got a family who you
(32:12):
want to see, or you've got friends, You've got interest,
you've got other hobbies. And I think there are some
things in life that are hard to do and it's
worth putting in. Like you wrote, you want to run
a marathon, That's gonna take a whole lot of work.
It's not an easy thing to do. You want to
be able to snatch two times your body weight, That's
a hard thing to do. It's gonna take a whole
lot of grit to make this thing happen. And unfortunately,
(32:36):
I think people they take that principle and they apply
it to their investments when truly, when it comes to
building wealth, it pays to be average, Like it pays
to be able to literally dollar cost average into the market,
paying low fees and just doing that over the course
of decades, like you are going to be able to
retire comfortably and with a whole lot of wealth by
doing that. It doesn't have to be hard without going
(32:57):
as hard as you can, right, which, yes, that's typically
when we're talking about real estate and buying physical properties. Yeah,
it could certainly work out to your advantage, and you
could be wealthier because of it, but there are so
many factors at play just to knee jerk assume that
real estate is the best investment. I think that's what
kind of irks me about this study, that people just
continue to assume that real estate and gold are better
(33:19):
than stocks. And it's like that doesn't bear out in
the numbers, and it doesn't bear out for a lot
of people's personal experience. And yes, there are some people
who massively crush at real estate, but it, yeah, it
takes and we talk to some of those people, and
you and I are real estate investors ourselves. But just
be careful before thinking that real estate is the golden
ticket to building wealth, because stocks can certainly be that
(33:39):
for you too, and they can be a much easier
way to get there. Another tried and true way to
get wealthy in the US is to build a business.
And the journal had an awesome profile of small to
medium sized business owners across the country this week, and
they called the folks who built those businesses the stealthy wealthy.
And the people that they highlighted here make their living
(34:02):
manufacturing flooring or having an auto dealership, or they distribute beverages,
stuff like that, Like these kind of run of the
mill businesses you don't think about. And I think the
gist of the article was that it doesn't have to
be sexy to make money, right. Makes me think of
when you interview kids these days, Matt, Like, so many
of them say they want to be influencers, Like that's
(34:23):
what they want to grow up to be. It's the
hot career. Wouldn't it be nice to be mister beast Right,
to follow in his footsteps? And it's kind of like
when you would have interviewed kids my age and me
in particular, probably all I want to be Michael Jordan,
Like that's how cool would it be to play basketball
every day and earn a living and earn millions of dollars.
But I think it's important to highlight, to not neglect
the boring ways of being able to make a living
(34:45):
and in fact how successful those people can be. And
in fact, boomers are selling their boring businesses these days.
You can buy their business as they're ready to retire,
they might let it fold otherwise. I mean, this is
the kind of thing where could boring business be your
path to success potentially? And I love reading that article
just how Yeah, I just think those things get neglected
(35:08):
so often because they're not snazzy, they're not fancy. But
I mean that's what you're going for with your life
and if you want to if you want to build
wealth without and you don't want to be famous, this
could be a great way to go. Yeah. Honestly, like
going back to investing in the stock market, it's a
similar thing, like take the boring path. Yeah, it also
comes with a whole lot less drama as well. Quick
(35:28):
shout out to listener Bill. He just launched his his
comics website, Joel Pizza from scratch dot Net. We wanted
to mention him. He I don't know if there's any
listener who that we correspond with as much as Bill. Yeah,
so we just wanted to give him a quick shout out. Bill,
Thank you for listening to the show. Yeah. Love, love
The Bill's doing his comics they're good, or checking out.
(35:50):
We'll link to his site in the show notes. All right, Matt,
that's gonna do it for this one until next time.
Best Friends Out, Best Friends Out Only became the
Welcome to Had a Money. I'm Joel, I am Matt's
the other host, and today we're talking about the Credit
Crunch mag of money and gas gouging. Jill, you know,
(00:27):
I can't but hear Credit Crunch and think of like
a cereal I would have eaten back in like nineteen
ninety one. Was that peak cereal? Peak cereal aisle? I
don't know, man, I just saw something just the other
day that apparently cereals getting even worse for you, like
it's become of course, yeah, cereals terrible. How's it getting
worse because they're taking all the dies out? Well, maybe
it will get less worse in the near future. Right now,
(00:50):
right now, it's the worst. We're at peak cereals, terrible
for your health. So I feel like the nineties were
peak cereal culture, just as far as it just constantly
being everywhere cheerios, because like they normally on the commercials
to make it seem like parents, your kids wake up
on Saturday, get a couple of bulls here and watch
that TV. You know that heart shaped bullet cheerios? Yeah, yeah,
with the ones problem, it seems less bad and it
(01:11):
probably is less bad than a lot of the other
kinds that you could eat. But those are the just
a few of the stories we're going to get to
today on our Friday flight, which generally speaking is the
nice little sampling of the different headlines we've come across
this week, and specifically we like to address how those
issues are going to impact your money specifically. But before
we get to all that, Joel, do you want to
give a quick little update on your dishwasher the dishwasher
(01:33):
saga that we shared on Monday with folks. So, I'm
sure folks are wondering. They've been on the edge of
their seat. I know. Well, yeah, so I ended up
I bought four dishwashers from Costco, as I said, and
my wife was were they all shrink wrapped together? Were
they connected with the big handle? Amazing? How could you
carry that? Well? No, separately shrink wrapped olive oils. But man,
(01:56):
so I had mine installed and I sold my old dishwasher,
and then my dad wanted one of the dishwashers, and
so caught free installation from Costco for for mine and
for his, and then I sold serious serious deja vous,
but but keep going Keeka, And then so I sold
the other two on Facebook pretty quickly for five hundred
(02:16):
bucks each. So my dad, I gave him the essentially
the price that I paid per dishwasher, right, but but
for the ones I should get, that can discount. That's right, right,
But I'm not gonna like charge him extra. But people
on Facebook paid the full freight that I was asking
five hundred bucks. I was like, well, it started off
higher than that because I was like, maybe I'll get more,
but had takers at five hundred and so ultimately I
(02:39):
ended up not getting paid, which I thought I would.
I think I told you I thought I would, and
I did. I ended up getting paid to get a
new dishwasher put in at my house. And like I
told you, that was getting long in the tooth. I
was getting frustrated with it. So yeah, I'm happy. So okay,
so the big question does it You've had it now
for for a few days, and you so you said
you wanted to get a new dishwasher because your old one.
(02:59):
You are the man who handles the dishes, the dish
like you you are, Yeah, you're in charge of clean up.
Does it clean better? Because this is a Bosh dishwasher
and we know that with it being a German company. Well,
I guess just because this German doesn't mean it's automatically better.
But Bosh specifically are incredibly highly rated. They last, does it,
does it clean? It's been cleaning better, and so my
mornings when I'm putting the dishes away are far less frustrating.
(03:22):
Are they dryer as well? They are dryer as well? Yeah, yeah,
see that was that was my big hold up because
of the plastics. Yeah, I was, yeah, all right, there's
certain spots in like those kids food containers that just
didn't always going to get all the way dry. I
don't think in any like if it could have, if
you could get rid of all the water in there,
that'd be impressive. But evidently some of them can't, including plastics.
(03:43):
All right, Okay, so one of our our biggest hang
ups has been we tried some uh like some green
detergent pods because we're like, yeah, you know, maybe we
should be a little more health conscience health conscious. But
they didn't do a great job cleaning the freaking dishes.
And I do. I am credibly hesitant to throw something away.
I don't like to waste stuff. It's the leftover's principle. Right,
(04:05):
like you got it, like put it to use. I
was so close to toss on those things because the
dishes were not getting clean. I was so happy to
see to put the last pod in the thing. And
then we kind of swung in the other direction and
got like these incredibly highly rated, very not natural, very
not green, little gel pod looking things or whatever. And
I hate those two not because so they do a
(04:25):
good job cleaning the best. Well, the fragrance specifically on
these it's terrible, like all the cups and plates, everything
smells like this, like flowers or something. Yeah, I hate it. Again.
I'm like this close to toss on all those, but I
can't bring myself to waste these perfectly fine, they get
the job done. I just prove a conundrum right there. Oh,
I got a grit and Barratt, and I can't give
(04:46):
them to somebody you think might appreciate them. Maybe we should. Yeah,
So I'm looking forward to being done with those and
just moving back to the what is it the power ball?
You know it's got the little red classic. I feel
like those are just they're not overly fancy, they're not
super expensive, they don't seemed like the absolute worst pods
for you, But I'm on sale and it's what we
have been using. I don't know why we switched it up.
Is that what y'all use? No, we use the liquid
(05:08):
because he's like squirted in there. Is it multiple like that?
You get this from Costco? Yeah, so it's the Kirkland sig.
It's not Kirklands. Okay, what does it with? The brain
is in a green bottle? But okay, they want to
say it's like seven bucks for giant tub of dishrusher liquid. Interesting, Yeah,
not bad. Let's go for it. But let's keep moving though.
This is like a quite a departure from what we're
(05:28):
talking about now that you want to talk about. I
just want to say a macro level what's going on.
It's thrilling to me, to the frugal guy and me
to get paid to put a new dish rusher in
when I already married that. I am very happy for
you for me, that's just that's like a that's a
big money win. It's good. But yes, let's talk about
a bunch of other stories, Matt. Personal finance stories that
are going to impact people's people's finances in America's credit worthiness.
(05:51):
That's something that we should probably talk about in the beginning.
It's in greater question right now. After Moody's one of
the credit rating agents, he's joined the other two credit
rating agencies and downgraded the America's credit standing. So it's
it's like essentially the like Equifax telling you, yeah, you
had a seven forty, now you're down to like seven
(06:12):
to twenty five. We just don't think here as good
at handling credit as we thought four. But this is
on a national scale, so this isn't surprising, but it
does shine a light on our unwillingness to face economic
facts head on as a country. I think it's some
people might be overestimating the impact though it's I think
it is also not a red warning light that should
(06:33):
be freaking us all out. But it does reveal the
fact that our country could be on better financial footing
if we were better managing guard title entitlement programs and
our overall debt load. That would have a positive impact.
That's actually part of the reason I think that this
big beautiful bill as it's being called, is becoming a
political football right now, and the extra trillions in debt
(06:56):
that we're likely to be racking up in the coming
decades if this bill goes through, which could impact the
economy and the desirability of owning US treasuries, which impacts
all of us. Right, but it's also relative, Right, Matt,
you and I have had these conversations off the mic.
America's financial strength is still unparalleled. When we're talking about
pure nations, we're number one. Yeah. Still, even if we're
(07:17):
all like making dumb moves like shooting ourselves in the foot,
to a certain extent, America is still in a top
notch position. So yeah, I think, similar to prior downgrades
from the other credit rating agencies, I think it's likely
to have a minimal impact, but it doesn't mean it's
still not tough to watch. I totally agree. So yeah,
I wanted to highlight that because there's been a lot
of talk about this being political. It's not political. So
(07:39):
the first downgrade as we came down from the triple
A rating, it happened back in twenty eleven. And guess
who was president back then, a very popular Democrat who
was residing in the White House, Barack Obama yea, and
twenty thirteen. For some reason, twenty I think, well, maybe
it was twenty eleven, maybe twenty thirteen, But then I
know that the second one of the other ones, maybe
it's Fitch at that point downgraded. That happen in twenty
(08:00):
twenty three, and I remember we covered that then and
again how it's likely to be overblown, But it's definitely
not political, because you've got two Democratic presidents who are
in office at that point in time. It is not political.
But I also don't think it's as big of a
deal as many folks are making it out to be,
because it's in particular, I find myself thinking more and
more like in this line of thought, thinking about what
(08:21):
are the alternatives when it comes to borrowing from countries,
because and so I looked it up, and there are
maybe about a dozen countries out there who still have
retained the perfect triple A status. But here's the thing,
they're tiny. They are so stink and small. So you
average the GDP of those around twelve countries who still
(08:42):
retain that perfect rating, and we are something like twenty
seven times larger than the average at all, the GDP
of all those combined, but just on average, like it's
anywhere from like Germany is the biggest, And I think
there's something like four trillion dollars or something like that,
compared to the US is twenty seven. But the other
countries are closer to not fortunately, but like three two,
(09:04):
and most of them are in the hundreds of billions
of dollars that retain that perfect ring. So that's something
to keep in mind on a macro level as folks
are freaking out. I don't think this is something that
folks should be overly concerned about. Yeah, and you say
that it's not political, and I think you're right. It's
not some sort of like denigration of a particular party
or their policies. But I do think this is in
(09:24):
some ways the extension of the tax cuts and Job Act,
or this new big, beautiful bill that we're starting to
learn more about, which I'm sure we'll talk more about
next week. The tax cuts, extension of the tax cuts,
the elimination of taxes on social Security tips, over time pay.
Those policies aren't raining spending it in any meaningful way,
and so it's not obviously just a reflection of the
(09:47):
current administration. It's a reflection of what's been happening with
under both Democratic, Democrat and Republican regimes. It's a reaction
to the fiscal reality of what's likely to happen. But
I think we're also seeing a wait a second, like
this bill. Well, yeah, it'll provide tax savings for many Americans,
it'll grow the deficit, which is not great for the
long term financial health of our country. Yeah, and of
(10:08):
course on an individual level, borrowing costs are going to
go up because these I mean, basically, the US has
been told, hey, you know, before you addition on these
these treasuries at four percent, like, we're going to need
to see a little more from you because we're not
totally sure if you're going to be able to pay
these off. And so we saw like thirty year treasuries
go from like they went over five percent for the
first time in quite a while. But the way this
(10:30):
is going to impact us as individuals, specifically for borrowers, right, so,
for folks who are looking to buy a home, the
thirty year fixed mortgage rate is closely aligned with a
ten year treasury note this is how it's going to
more directly impact folks on a personal level. But even still,
I wouldn't be freaking out, joll. Let's talk about the
youths for a minute. Here one of the kids up
(10:52):
to you. Matt, not totally sure. I'm not on social
media as much these days, but I did see that
some high school juniors are getting seventy thousand dollars job,
which is more than the average pay for Americans across
the country. You know what I would say to that
skibity rizzler or that someone I'm assuming kids would say
to that. I think that's what you would have to say. Honestly,
(11:12):
I would just assume I heard that like six months
ago from my honor, so I'm assuming it's not going
to anymore. This is incredibly impressive for teenagers who are
just starting out with no college degrees, and so you
might be thinking, gosh, these are some smart kids. You know,
they've gotten straight a's, maybe they've gotten insane score on
their SATs, whatever other tests these kids are taking these days. Nope,
(11:34):
that is not the case. Companies are hiring these kids
who have shop experience, something like welding, for instance, and
they are being courted almost like star athletes because of
the extreme lack of skilled labor in the country. We've
talked about this before, including with different experts here on
the show. Yeah, but blue collar work apprenticeships are thriving
(11:54):
right now, and man, you combine that with the ability
to start making money early, you're able to avoid college debt.
It's certainly not for everyone, but I really love seeing
this trend. It's hard for me to not project and
picture myself in a situation like this where I wasn't
totally sure what I wanted to do when I was
sixteen or seventeen. And I say that because that's how
(12:15):
old you are. When you're a junior, that's when you
start making some of these decisions as to what you
might be doing for the next five years of your life.
We're talking to a friend of ours recently. They've got
a rising senior. They're going to be spending the summer
going to different colleges. And that's great for a lot
of folks. Who are I mean kids, who are I
was not mature at that age, That's all I'm going
to say. That's all I'm saying. And I lucked out.
(12:36):
I was fortunate enough to not have to take on
student loans and chose a degree that blighted me in
great careers and I found my way, Joel. But for
a lot of students out there, I think this can
be such a fantastic way to make some money for
a couple of years, to gain some maturity, to figure
out what it is that you want to do with
your life. Yeah, before you, especially before you take on
some inordinate student loan debt. Yeah, I mean, there's a
(12:56):
school not too far from where we live. In one
of our friends, Matt oversaw this program of kids learning
to become airplane mechanics and so amazing. They are graduating
with the best skill set, the better skill set than
most of their peers with immediate professions. And he would
he told me this with a little smack of I
(13:18):
don't know, sadness on his face. He's like, they're gonna
get paid more than I am right when they graduate
high school, because he's a teacher, And like, I feel
to hear the pain in your voice when you say that,
but also the pride that those kids are able to
instantly earn coming from a tough background in lots of situations,
instantly earn more than he was after all the education
he'd received amazing. And it's not that, I mean when
(13:39):
you look at the data, still on average, people earn
more with a college degree over the lifetime of their
earning some a million dollars more over time. But it's
also with the price of college and with the dearth
of blue collar workers. If you're if you're smart in
the path that you take, you can do better I
think in many instances than your college kind of parts.
(14:00):
Especially the people who go to college for a couple
of years then drop out. They've got college debt, they
don't have the degree to show for it. That's the
worst case scenario. Yeah, especially when it hasn't cost you
any money to gain these skills, Like why not buy
yourself a couple of years if you want to change
your mind, that's something you can do. You can then
apply for college at that point in time when you've
got maybe a clear idea of what it is you
want to pursue, and drop tens of thousands of dollars
(14:22):
on in high ra and how much you spend on that.
College education is crucial, especially in today's job market and environment.
If you're talking about taking on six figures in student
loan debt, it's tough to overcome. But if you're talking
about a free or incredibly cheap education, then that's also
a case of like, well, yeah, I don't know why
not go for it. But let's hope those youngsters Smatt
making good money right out of high school are investing
(14:44):
in a roth Ira from the get go. That's something
we would recommend they do right to build up to
start building wealth through their future. They really should be
that kind of salary. And one of the best people
in personal finance Jonathan Clements, he used to write for
The Wall Street Journal. He launched a website called the
Humble Dollar, which is which great well. He's launched a
new initiative to help kids from poor families start investing
(15:06):
in a wrath early on. And so Jonathan, he was
sadly diagnosed with a terminal form of lung cancer about
a year ago, but he's still and I've been really
interested to watch kind of how he's handled this man.
He's handled it so well in the way he's talked
about it, but also the way that he's continued to
pursue the things that he cares about, even in the
(15:26):
face of death coming soon. And he's so he's pursuing
that passion of personal finance and education despite those trials
that he's facing. And proceeds from his new book, which
is an anthology of his writings from the journal back
in the day. Are it's going to fund a getting
going on savings initiative, and this is being launched in
Boston specifically, and it pairs education with free matching ROTH
(15:51):
contributions for some lucky teens. And they're also what I
love about this, They're going to do some tracking. They're
going to see how this impacts those savers moving forward,
like incentivizing them to invest in a wrath so good
in their teens when they otherwise likely would not have.
Is this going to lead to lifelong savers and investors?
I think it will. I'm really curious to see the results.
(16:12):
But I love that Jonathan is like putting his money
where his mouth is in this, and he's really not
only investing in kids, but investing in some data that's
gonna I think help us, help us all figure out
what it looks like to help the next generation become
better savers and investors totally. And I think another lesson
we can gain here is that that we have more
power as individuals to make change out in the world right,
(16:33):
like incentivize the type of behavior that you want to see.
I I don't want to make everything about like fitness,
and I don't know, I feel like we've kept we
kept that rained in some but like this is a
part of and I've shared this. This is one of
the reasons. That's part of the reason why I built
up the home gym is because I wanted to empower
my daughters, Like I wanted them to see that it
is okay and in fact great to be a strong female.
And I've incentivized them to like do pull ups and
(16:55):
depths and stuff like that. And as well as the
kids in the neighborhood, like when they came over, if
they're able to, you know, to do that, they get
paid money, Like it's a party when the kids come over.
We don't have to fully rely on the government to
enact ways for future generations to save. Will you pay
me for public stoy? No, I'm sorry, Joe. So. On
an opposite note, there might be a new investment account
(17:18):
created out of thin air, and it's called this is
so terrible, but the money account for growth and advancement
or of course maga. Yeah, I will say this sort
of account has been proposed by both Republicans and Democrats
in the past as a way to jump start savings
for the next generation. They call like baby bonds at
different there's different methodologies behind this, but the whole goal
(17:40):
is to say, in effect, it's the same thing. Yeah,
And as part of the new big, beautiful tax bill,
it's meant to be away for the government to put
a thousand bucks into the hands of kids across the
country for their futures. So the way it's proposed, parents
could then contribute more up to five thousand dollars a year.
And it seems like this account would be sort of
like a hybrid of a five twenty nine account and
(18:00):
the four to one K so part education part, like
this is money you can live off off in the future,
but it would allow kids to use that money that's
a crew to start a business, or you could buy
your first home once you turn eighteen. It's all up
in the air right now. It's hard for us to
take a to give our opinion, to give a hot take.
It could help peak investing interest, making a lifelong difference. Certainly,
(18:24):
it could legitimately help some kids have a bit of
a nest egg when they graduate high school even or
certainly maybe by college. But the way the law is warded,
this account might not be around for long. That's one
of the saddest parts to me. Like so a lot
of the proposed parts of the bill, there is a
senset of twenty twenty eight, which in off the mic
jel We've talked about why we think this is. But
(18:46):
it's not a done deal. And the fact is, it's
tough to get really excited about something when there is
a clear expiration date. When it's set to sunsets. It
could literally help three years worth of children, and then
it's away. It's weird, and I don't if this is
a good policy, let's keep it around, and if it's not,
then let's not do it at all. It might be
a way to try it out then to be able
to silently just okay, yeah, let's go ahead and let
(19:07):
allow that program to end because folks aren't excited about it.
It could just be a political maneuver to be like, hey,
you want this to continue. We've got to pass another big,
beautiful bill in another three four years. But we will
certainly make sure to keep folks posted as that bill
comes together, solidifies gets passed, like, for instance, the child
tax credit. Some of the different changes likely to increase
(19:29):
for the next two years as well. Yeah, exactly at
lots of cover that will impact your personal finances as
it solidifies. I'm sure we'll be talking about it in
the weeks to come. All Right, man, We've got more
to get to though on this episode, including gas stations
that are gouging if you use a credit card. We'll
talk about that and more right after this. All right, buddy,
(19:53):
we are back from the Barak. We've got more to
get to. We're gonna talk about plenty more like gold
in real estate. But if horse now at a time
for the ludicrous headline of the week, and you know what,
I think you are a little more enraged about this
headline than I am, because I don't know if I
can officially call it gallaging. But okay, I feel you
feel a little more in that direction. Well, let's go ahead.
(20:15):
Let's go ahead, and then we can So the headline,
it comes from Yahoo Finance, and it reads I can
make it any number I want. Gas stations are charging
customers a dollar more a gallon for using credit cards,
and I so I was frustrated by reading this. The
gas stations are I would be frustrated going to charge
that much if I rolled up to that gas station
and I was like, wait a second, gas is two
(20:38):
eighty five a gallon? With three eighty five a gallon
if I use my credit card, if I had rotten
fruit in the car, Matt, I would throw it at
the at the gas not the person, but at the
gas station itself, because that's assault. Brother, Yeah, I know,
because that's messed up. That's it was a Billy Madison
life for all the oldies out there. Classic movie, classic movie.
But then Kiplinger, alongside this article documented the rise of
(21:00):
gas stations charging outrageous fees for credit card usage at
the gas pump too, and we seems like it's becoming
more of a widespread It's not like just the Florida
man or the Florida man gas station owner, right, which
apparently this is largely happening in Florida. And you and
I we've documented this on the show. We know that
taking credit cards eats into the profit of a small
(21:22):
business or a gas station operator, which is why many
small businesses are saying there's a cash discount or there's
a price you have to pay to use a credit card,
and it's why more gas stations are charging ten cents
a gallon, but a dollar a gallon, that to me
seemed pretty ludicrous. And so I think this is just
a heads up for you. If you're the kind of
person tap fill up, you don't even realize, you're not
(21:44):
even thinking about it, you're kind of thoughtlessly filling up
at whatever gas station you come across. Just know that
they might be charging this significant amount extra for using
your gas, for using your credit card at the pump.
And I just I also kind of don't see the
financial incentive for gas stations to charge this much more,
far beyond the cost that they incur for taking credit cards.
Because if I was a customer who found out that
(22:06):
I got, you know, kind of the hoodwinked, paying more
than I thought I was going to for the gas
house putting in my car, I wouldn't come back there.
So I just see like, a yeah, really stupid move.
It does seem like a stupid it's a short term.
It seems like it's a short term, a short sided,
near sighted like cash grab. Yeah, and I would not
even go back to that gas station, I think, even
(22:26):
after they lowered the price, because it's like wait a minute, wait,
was that an error? And maybe they're counting on folks
thinking that. But the fact that at least in this
in the one report that the guy's like, no, I can,
I can just make it whatever whatever I want. It's like, yeah,
you can run yourself out of business too, and he
might actually end up doing that. But the reason I
don't think this is gouging, of course, is because are
there other options? Do you have the ability to leave?
(22:47):
And man, there are a ton of gas stations all
over the place unless you happen to live somewhere or yeah,
it is your only gas station option. Right your town
is an intersection, like the radiator spring, there's like one
flashing red light. If that's the case, well maybe it's
tign for a town hall and there's there there should
be some social pressure, yeah, like that station owner. H
So that's the difference between like two eighty five versus
(23:08):
like three eighty five a gallon or something like that.
But like, for instance, the a ten cent per gallon
difference is typically worth it if you're using the right
credit card. Of course, Costco Visa. It gives you four
percent cash back and five percent with no fee at Costco,
which is also a very superior form of gas, Joel,
Speaking of gas, there's another gas station that I've been
(23:29):
to and I won't go back to because the the
check engine light came on after we filled up at
this text, I don't know what you want to say
it because, like you did, I'm sure it's a particular
gastation owner who maybe isn't doing a great job, or
maybe it was just a bad batch of gas. But
I'm like, I'm not going to risk my wonderfully old
engine in our our odyssey, uh going on the fritz. Yeah,
(23:51):
I mean we've talked about this before too, but there
is a type of gas called top tier gas. So
you're not just saying here, baby, no, it seems like
it's better at costco, but it really is really formulated
better to keep your engine clean. And so yeah, they
sell this stuff at the AutoZone or whatever. You can
dump in your dump in your engine to try to
clean your engine. Well, if you're filling up top tier
gas with regularity, your engine and components are going to
(24:13):
be cleaner. Maybe you don't need to even do that
at all. And by the way, it doesn't cost more
to get top tier gas. But they're just so certain
stations that provide it, so make sure you know where
you can get it. So as we're talking about competition,
there's actually an interesting white paper recently about competition at
the gas pump and how it spurs price reductions. They
maybe think of like when an Audi moves into the neighborhood, Well,
the prices at the other grocery stores, of course are
(24:35):
going to come down. Or maybe like when Southwest when
they start operating out of a certain airport, all the
other airlines, they got to get a bit more competitive,
although maybe that's declined with the Southwest drop spirit the
frontier when they jump in like Delta's like, all right,
we got to lower our prices for a little while.
At least, so the price per gallon at existing gas
stations gets reduced immediately because now they gotta work harder
(24:55):
to get you to fill up there. The study said
that the effects are immediate and person competition works man
because prices create important signals to the shoppers. If gas
stations try to gouge you make sure to peace out.
You can vote with your dollars. Prices are signals, and
we react accordingly when a price goes up somewhere and
make my little Antennas pick up, Matt. We might get
(25:16):
honorary economic degrees from some college out there who might
be willing, probably for some if you keep saying signals, Joel,
some fly by Nightronic Credit University. Uh yeah, we'll see
University of Phoenix. We're getting our honorary degrees from there.
I don't know. Is that a good I don't know.
If I'm not trying to cast, if they've got great
programs over there, I don't know. Well, the price of
(25:38):
home internet has been on the rise. C net found
that two thirds of folks are paying more for Internet
than they were last year, and not just not just
by a little bit. I was kind of shocked to
see this, by almost two hundred dollars more over the
course of a year. And they also said that service
has not improved with the with their Wi Fi, which
makes the cost increase even more frustrating. If I'm paying
(25:59):
more because I'm getting something superior, I might be willing
to look past the price increase, But if the service
is degrading at the same time, I mean, that makes
me frustrated. But it makes sense that this is happening because,
first off, home internet it's not a competitive industry in
many locations around the country, you're looking at a duopoly,
which means your options are paltry, like one of two
(26:22):
places you can go. Yeah, and then price competitiveness, it's
not really a thing, and it's still worth monitoring your
bill for price increases and calling your service provider to
ask about a reduction, or I've talked about this before,
you're reaching out to them on Twitter, because sometimes those
are the people who are most empowered to help you
get a better price, as opposed to call them the one
eight hundred number other options we've talked about this in
(26:45):
the past. Two or to choose slower speeds, or to
stop renting equipment. Buying your own equipment can reduce that
monthly cost. Oh yeah, but yeah, I think it's just
important to note this. That's slow creep up of your
internet price. You may be like, yeah, I'm paying seventy
bucks a month for an internet or something like that.
That is probably more than you should be paying, and
there are a lot of ways to reduce that bill.
Just don't pay the increased bill price because that's what
(27:06):
came in the mail, and not do a lick. Do
not to a lick about it. Because you really could
save a couple hundred bucks a year. Yeah, pretty easily
with maybe a couple hours of your time. Hek. Yeah,
So we're talking about paying for gas, paying for internet,
talking about paying our favorite authors for news because newsletter
subscription costs are also adding up. And this is too
(27:28):
Like it looked like for a minute there that all
news was going to be ad supported, everything was going
to be free. Of course, that's when substat came along.
They kind of changed the game kind of shockingly, right.
I don't know that you or I could have predicted that,
know that that was kind of moving in that direction.
And like, we pay for a few of these subscriptions
as well, some of which actually help us to stay
informed in order to do the show. Here. We had
(27:48):
Noah Smith on not too long ago, and right, that
dude crushes on substances, no opinion. We are torn though,
on this new model, because it's cool. I love that
you can directly support independent creators. It's amazing that great
writers out there can succeed without the backing of a
major corporation or a network. But then as an individual,
you've also got to be careful not to overdo it.
(28:10):
It's the boiling water and the frog, right, Like, you
just kind of get used to paying a little bit more,
a little bit more every single month, especially when the
average cost is just it's five bucks, it's ten bucks
a month. You know, you don't think that's going to
make or break anything, but you multiply that times all
the subscriptions they can get six to seven or eight,
it really adds up. Yeah, yeah, recurring subscriptions. So just
keep track of how many you have, and even speaking
(28:32):
from experience, can you actually read them all? I would
dare say that there is some waste. You know, I
was talking about waste earlier. I don't like to throw
things away, and in effect, that's what's happening, right Like,
if this is something that you're paying for and it's
not actually something you're consuming, that's just a whole jewel,
that's a ribby that's in the fridge that you're like, oh, man,
I didn't get to I didn't get to throw that
on the grill, which I know you've never done, never would,
but maybe you should start thinking about it. If there's
(28:54):
something you ever read you're like, man, that's just wasted money.
Maybe I should reevaluate and that doesn't mean don't subscric
to substack newsletters that move the needle for you, because,
like you said, we do there are some yeah really
but and some of which really do help us think
about money incredibly well and translate that for the show
for you as listeners. I love reading Noah Smiths articles,
(29:16):
and I yeah, happy to pay creators that I think
do great work. But I think for some folks it's
adding up and then they're like, I just got so
many newsletters. I'm my inbox is swamped and the only
newsletter that really matters Matt, After all you and I
both know is that how the Money Newsletter. Of course,
that's why we try to keep it shorter and sweeter
and free and freer. Yeah, exactly how to money dot
(29:40):
com slash newsletter for that. Let's talk about investing, and
as we know Americans, you know, when it comes to
investing and being informed about the best ways to invest,
maybe they're not as informed as you and I would love.
That's part of the reason the show exists. But there's
this new report from Gallup and it finds that's similar
to last year, people assume that real estate and gold
(30:03):
are the top notch absolute best investments that you could
be for taking in. And so it's a sticky myth.
That's right, sticky myth because it perpetuates people continue to
think this. You and I we talked about gold a
little bit last week, so we won't like brate that
topic and keep going at it. And it hasn't been
a bad investment recently. We documented that over the past
twenty years, it's actually it's actually been an awesome investment.
(30:24):
But it doesn't hold a candle to investing in stocks
over many decades, and you and I were real estate investors,
but we would still, I think hesitate to tell folks
that real estate is the best long term investment. There's
a lot of just nuance and specifics that come into
play there. If it can be if you buy at
the right time and you know what you're doing right,
or if you bought a property that was pretty inexpensive
(30:46):
and you use leverage to buy it and you've seen
what returns have done over the past fifteen years, it's
no wonder the recency bias inside of you would say
real estate crushes stocks no matter what, even those stocks
have done well too. But just to assume that gold
and real estate are better than investing in the stock market.
I don't think the numbers over all an extended period
of time bear that out. I was sad to see
(31:07):
that only sixteen percent of folks who were surveying thought
that the stocks were the best long term investment. And
it's worth mentioning that it is just so much easier
to invest in the market right like it can be
worth working hard. It's maybe it's worth you spending some
time on the weekend putting in some sweat equity, putting
in some elbow grease in order to increase your returns
as you are forcing equity into that property. But many
(31:28):
folks are going to find it hard to make the
numbers work investing in real estate specifically right now. Plus
it's just hard to save up enough liquid cash to
get you in the game. And there's also the part
time job aspect of it, and you do have to
do all that Like this, yeah, exactly, Like I'm not
trying to shatter your landlord dreams if you've got them,
but just simply dollar cost averaging into the market is
still the best way for the vast majority of folks,
(31:50):
despite what it is that they think. I think a
lot of individuals lash onto the different anecdote. They lash
onto the outliers. They've heard stories of, Oh he made
all his money in real estate, and well it feels
more approachable too. Then like I built a business around
AI and I sold it for billions or something. It
seems like something that they can do. But even still,
like the average American, they've got a nine to five. Yeah, like,
and then after that, you've got a family who you
(32:12):
want to see, or you've got friends, You've got interest,
you've got other hobbies. And I think there are some
things in life that are hard to do and it's
worth putting in. Like you wrote, you want to run
a marathon, That's gonna take a whole lot of work.
It's not an easy thing to do. You want to
be able to snatch two times your body weight, That's
a hard thing to do. It's gonna take a whole
lot of grit to make this thing happen. And unfortunately,
(32:36):
I think people they take that principle and they apply
it to their investments when truly, when it comes to
building wealth, it pays to be average, Like it pays
to be able to literally dollar cost average into the market,
paying low fees and just doing that over the course
of decades, like you are going to be able to
retire comfortably and with a whole lot of wealth by
doing that. It doesn't have to be hard without going
(32:57):
as hard as you can, right, which, yes, that's typically
when we're talking about real estate and buying physical properties. Yeah,
it could certainly work out to your advantage, and you
could be wealthier because of it, but there are so
many factors at play just to knee jerk assume that
real estate is the best investment. I think that's what
kind of irks me about this study, that people just
continue to assume that real estate and gold are better
(33:19):
than stocks. And it's like that doesn't bear out in
the numbers, and it doesn't bear out for a lot
of people's personal experience. And yes, there are some people
who massively crush at real estate, but it, yeah, it
takes and we talk to some of those people, and
you and I are real estate investors ourselves. But just
be careful before thinking that real estate is the golden
ticket to building wealth, because stocks can certainly be that
(33:39):
for you too, and they can be a much easier
way to get there. Another tried and true way to
get wealthy in the US is to build a business.
And the journal had an awesome profile of small to
medium sized business owners across the country this week, and
they called the folks who built those businesses the stealthy wealthy.
And the people that they highlighted here make their living
(34:02):
manufacturing flooring or having an auto dealership, or they distribute beverages,
stuff like that, Like these kind of run of the
mill businesses you don't think about. And I think the
gist of the article was that it doesn't have to
be sexy to make money, right. Makes me think of
when you interview kids these days, Matt, Like, so many
of them say they want to be influencers, Like that's
(34:23):
what they want to grow up to be. It's the
hot career. Wouldn't it be nice to be mister beast Right,
to follow in his footsteps? And it's kind of like
when you would have interviewed kids my age and me
in particular, probably all I want to be Michael Jordan,
Like that's how cool would it be to play basketball
every day and earn a living and earn millions of dollars.
But I think it's important to highlight, to not neglect
the boring ways of being able to make a living
(34:45):
and in fact how successful those people can be. And
in fact, boomers are selling their boring businesses these days.
You can buy their business as they're ready to retire,
they might let it fold otherwise. I mean, this is
the kind of thing where could boring business be your
path to success potentially? And I love reading that article
just how Yeah, I just think those things get neglected
(35:08):
so often because they're not snazzy, they're not fancy. But
I mean that's what you're going for with your life
and if you want to if you want to build
wealth without and you don't want to be famous, this
could be a great way to go. Yeah. Honestly, like
going back to investing in the stock market, it's a
similar thing, like take the boring path. Yeah, it also
comes with a whole lot less drama as well. Quick
(35:28):
shout out to listener Bill. He just launched his his
comics website, Joel Pizza from scratch dot Net. We wanted
to mention him. He I don't know if there's any
listener who that we correspond with as much as Bill. Yeah,
so we just wanted to give him a quick shout out. Bill,
Thank you for listening to the show. Yeah. Love, love
The Bill's doing his comics they're good, or checking out.
(35:50):
We'll link to his site in the show notes. All right, Matt,
that's gonna do it for this one until next time.
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Matthew Altmix
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