December 11, 2025 • 10 mins
Host of ‘How to Money’ Joel Larsgaard joins the show to discuss cash is ‘cringe’ to Gen Z, Instacart’s algorithmic pricing, and what if electricity was free in the afternoon?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Joel Larsguard every Sunday from twelve to two pm has
heard right here on KFI how to Money. His social
address at how to money Joel. His website is howtomoney
dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Good morning Joel, Good morning bill Ah.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Now I have a question.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
I want to throw something at you, and that is
how cash is a joke. I have one checkbook one
and when I first started, actually up until I met
my current wife, she's number four, number five.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Is that it?
Speaker 3 (00:35):
I feel like the Big lou commercial.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Anyway, she she started laughing at me for writing checks,
and I still think of checks, but then I'm a dinosaur.
I'm getting better at it. Where today, of course, particularly
a gen Z, do they even know what cash is?
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Well, they know what cash is, but they treat it
like it's got no value at all, And you know,
it's It's interesting because this was the problem with credit
cards a decade ago in particular, but still is with
a lot of people who treat using plastic right, oh,
tap to pay. I've got my auto fill of my
credit card payment information on my favorite retail websites, and
(01:20):
people use tend to use credit cards and they don't
know what they're spending they're not keeping track, and so
credit cards were the slippery slope, or have been for
previous generations, but for gen Z, cash is kind of
the slippery slope.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Like they're used to everything being digital and maybe they.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Have like a you need a budget why NAB account,
or they have a monarch money account or something like.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
That, and so all of their spending is done.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
From a digital thing, whether it's from one of their
payment apps or a credit card or a debit card.
Everything lives and filters into that website. So it's easy
for them to go in and look at their dashboard
and say, well, what did I spend here or there?
But if they if they get randomly one hundred bucks
or two hundred bucks or something like that dropped into
their life, that's cash. They're like, well, this doesn't compute
(02:05):
with my digital system that everything's set up on, and
so they treat it like it's absolutely They just like, go,
wasit it on?
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Stuff?
Speaker 4 (02:12):
And so it's just really interesting to see kind of
generational differences in how we think about different types of money.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Yeah, Goo, you can figure out what you spend on
a credit card in three seconds. Cash you have to
bring the receipt and you have to look at it
and compile it.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Also, now the tap to pay or even using your phone.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Usually anything under ten bucks, I reach in my pocket
and take out cash, and I pay.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
For it and then I wait for the change.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Now, if it's three bucks, I'll still to just take
out my credit card, only because it's so.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Much easier than actually dealing with money.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
And that's not even generational, it's just it's easier.
Speaker 4 (02:53):
I mean, I don't like change clinking around in my pocket,
and so that's one of the Like my dad used
to always have a pocket full of change, and I'm
like the complete opposite. I'm like, if I have cash,
or if I have like pennies and pennies going the
way of the Dodo bird, but if any of those
coins jingle around my pocket, I gotta get them out.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
I'm just like, oh, it's so annoying. And so yeah,
I'm the same way.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Like even with with small, small purchases, I'm typically using
my credit card, and if you use your credit card responsibly,
I'm a big fan of people using credit cards as
a method of payment. I guess what I want to
stress to gen zers or to people who feel like
cash is becoming this thing where it just slips right
out of their hands when it comes in one it's
(03:34):
okay to splurge, like when you get cash, right, So
let's say you get birthday holiday money something like that. Yeah,
it's it's totally fine to spend that money on something
that you might not have otherwise allocated it for. But
I also love the idea of people having an envelope
and so when they get cash, maybe instead of just
frittering that money away, they have a bigger thing that
(03:58):
they're saving for, whether it's like vacation or a down
payment for a home. Think about even just those jar
I'm sure you knew people, Bill who had a big
jar of coin.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
It's me. You save up and you go to one
of those cash machines at the supermarket, you throw it
all in there. The coin machines they grab fifteen percent
or eighteen percent. You walk out with in some cases,
in my case, it was hundreds of dollars. But that
took Yeah, it took free. What is it took forever
(04:29):
to say that? By the way, the point of having
a change in your pocket. I enjoy having change in
my pocket, and a fair amount because here's what happens.
I'll be walking down the street and there'll be some
homeless guy sitting there and say, hey, mister, do you
have any change?
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Well, I reach in my pocket, I jingle.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
All the money so you can hear it, and I say, why,
yes I do, and I just keep on walking.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
The entertainment value of doing that is very high.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
All right.
Speaker 4 (04:58):
Yeah, I guess if that's what you're in too, If
that's it makes you smile, yeah, it does.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Makes me smile a big time, all right, Joel.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
Instacart with algorithmic pricing, is that dynamic pricing.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
It's not just dynamic because that's already been happening, right,
and that's happening all across the internet. And we're talking
about Yeah, you log in the morning to look for
a flight, it's one price you No.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
I understand that. But this is instacart. This is going
to the supermarket.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
That's right. So this is this is different. This is less.
Speaker 4 (05:29):
Hey, prices are changing based on the price we pay,
and it's more, prices are changing based on who you
are and where you're buying from, and it's seemingly random.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Uh in.
Speaker 4 (05:42):
So there was this test done by Consumer Reports. It
consumer Reports is one of the stalwarts in the you know,
in the in the business of looking out for consumers.
They do an amazing job on so many different fronts.
They partnered with this company called Groundwork Collective to look
into what's going on with instacart pricing, and basically, it's
not just that the prices are dynamic, it's that are
(06:04):
seemingly random and so even when like twenty different shoppers
at the very very same time are adding a specific
item to their cart. Let's say something as basic as eggs,
one person might be paying four dollars for a dozen,
the other might be paying close to five dollars a dozen,
and Instacart's kind of like cut with their pants down here.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
They don't really know what to say.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
I find insacart fascinating. I really do, for a couple
of reasons. One it is, on the one hand, it
is the easiest way of shopping. You literally go and
do a cart, and you actually save money because you're
not at the market if you're hungry. Particularly, you should
see the stuff that I throw into the into the
(06:47):
into the shopping cart. So instacart is easy. Except have
you ever do you use instacart at all?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
So I do.
Speaker 4 (06:57):
And I've really come around on this because I agree
I think in so many ways what happens, especially like Bill,
I know your fondness for Costco. When you go to Costco,
like there's something about you don't stick to the list right,
because no, I do not.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
I buy a treasure there if you can.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
I have a freezer in my garage that is my
Costco freezer.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
Also Smart and Final.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
I sort of you know, I hate to say it,
but I also shop a Smart and Final.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
It is filled with my crap killed. I'm not kidding you.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
A full freezer that's top to bottom jammed inner looks
like a display case at Costco.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And it's only because I shop there.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
But here's the other thing with instacart is you also
shop for produce and they don't pick and squeeze the
tomatoes and actually squeeze the avocados to get the perfect rightness.
That that is the problem yet with produce, if you notice, Yeah,
(08:01):
for sure.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
I mean like when my wife or like she eats
spinach like it's her job, and when when the spinach
comes it like expires the next day sometimes and I'm like,
you didn't look in the back, like you didn't rifle
through the spinach to find the furthest out expiration date,
and that's one of my frustrations. But I will say, yeah,
it saves time, and I think in some ways it
can save money, like if you're really diligent and you're shopping.
(08:23):
And I also I keep my eye out for discounted
Instacart gift cards, which just helps bring that price down
a little bit. But I think what this reveals one
is just kind of that Instacart is like they're testing
some things out here, and they're testing to see how
much people are willing to pay and how price conscious
people are. And I think if you were to do
a poll, the average instacart user is less price conscious
(08:46):
than the person who's going out in the making for
every week.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Right.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
That's the convenience.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Hey, In terms of dynamic pricing, has it reached supermarkets?
I'm thinking, let's say eggs, which used to be fourteen
fifteen dollars a dozen if you bought the fan, if
you bought the fancy schmancy you know, brown eggs, organic stuff,
you know, grain feed or whatever the hell they do
with chickens and expensive eggs. But as the inventory goes down,
(09:14):
you would think the price would go up.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Have they reached that point?
Speaker 4 (09:18):
So we are seeing more supermarkets put in like digital
displayed readers, But most of the supermarkets are saying that
the reason for that is not so that they can
institute dynamic pricing. It's just so that it will be
less labor intensive to change the price labels. And especially
when prices are going up more regularly and you have
to change the pricing labels more frequently, I get that
(09:40):
it makes sense, and I think people still have like
a backlash against prices going up. Like you remember when
Wendy said, hey, we're thinking about charging more during lunch
and maybe less during Some of the people were so
upset about that, and when Wendy's had to change on
a dime. So especially, I think for every day necessities,
(10:01):
people are revolting a little bit more when when they're
being told they're gonna have to pay more if they
come at the wrong time of day.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
But this is instant.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
I think with instacart, you're going to see because people
using it are less price conscious, you might see some
of that shifting upward of prices and they might see, oh,
you know what, Bill in California is well, you know,
he doesn't care if the eggs are three ninety nine
or four sixty nine, So we're going to keep pushing
up prices on him. But somebody else might abandon some
(10:31):
of the items in their card or start using this
tide less and then they might start trying to pull
you back in with discounts and coupons like it's just
one of those buyer beware things in the modern age
of internet grocery shopping.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
All right, Joel will catch you this Sunday at twelve
to two pm, and we can reach you at at
how to Money Joel, And then the website is howdomoney
dot com.
Joel Larsguard every Sunday from twelve to two pm has
heard right here on KFI how to Money. His social
address at how to money Joel. His website is howtomoney
dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Good morning Joel, Good morning bill Ah.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Now I have a question.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
I want to throw something at you, and that is
how cash is a joke. I have one checkbook one
and when I first started, actually up until I met
my current wife, she's number four, number five.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Is that it?
Speaker 3 (00:35):
I feel like the Big lou commercial.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Anyway, she she started laughing at me for writing checks,
and I still think of checks, but then I'm a dinosaur.
I'm getting better at it. Where today, of course, particularly
a gen Z, do they even know what cash is?
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Well, they know what cash is, but they treat it
like it's got no value at all, And you know,
it's It's interesting because this was the problem with credit
cards a decade ago in particular, but still is with
a lot of people who treat using plastic right, oh,
tap to pay. I've got my auto fill of my
credit card payment information on my favorite retail websites, and
(01:20):
people use tend to use credit cards and they don't
know what they're spending they're not keeping track, and so
credit cards were the slippery slope, or have been for
previous generations, but for gen Z, cash is kind of
the slippery slope.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Like they're used to everything being digital and maybe they.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Have like a you need a budget why NAB account,
or they have a monarch money account or something like.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
That, and so all of their spending is done.
Speaker 4 (01:44):
From a digital thing, whether it's from one of their
payment apps or a credit card or a debit card.
Everything lives and filters into that website. So it's easy
for them to go in and look at their dashboard
and say, well, what did I spend here or there?
But if they if they get randomly one hundred bucks
or two hundred bucks or something like that dropped into
their life, that's cash. They're like, well, this doesn't compute
(02:05):
with my digital system that everything's set up on, and
so they treat it like it's absolutely They just like, go,
wasit it on?
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Stuff?
Speaker 4 (02:12):
And so it's just really interesting to see kind of
generational differences in how we think about different types of money.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Yeah, Goo, you can figure out what you spend on
a credit card in three seconds. Cash you have to
bring the receipt and you have to look at it
and compile it.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Also, now the tap to pay or even using your phone.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Usually anything under ten bucks, I reach in my pocket
and take out cash, and I pay.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
For it and then I wait for the change.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Now, if it's three bucks, I'll still to just take
out my credit card, only because it's so.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Much easier than actually dealing with money.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
And that's not even generational, it's just it's easier.
Speaker 4 (02:53):
I mean, I don't like change clinking around in my pocket,
and so that's one of the Like my dad used
to always have a pocket full of change, and I'm
like the complete opposite. I'm like, if I have cash,
or if I have like pennies and pennies going the
way of the Dodo bird, but if any of those
coins jingle around my pocket, I gotta get them out.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
I'm just like, oh, it's so annoying. And so yeah,
I'm the same way.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Like even with with small, small purchases, I'm typically using
my credit card, and if you use your credit card responsibly,
I'm a big fan of people using credit cards as
a method of payment. I guess what I want to
stress to gen zers or to people who feel like
cash is becoming this thing where it just slips right
out of their hands when it comes in one it's
(03:34):
okay to splurge, like when you get cash, right, So
let's say you get birthday holiday money something like that. Yeah,
it's it's totally fine to spend that money on something
that you might not have otherwise allocated it for. But
I also love the idea of people having an envelope
and so when they get cash, maybe instead of just
frittering that money away, they have a bigger thing that
(03:58):
they're saving for, whether it's like vacation or a down
payment for a home. Think about even just those jar
I'm sure you knew people, Bill who had a big
jar of coin.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
It's me. You save up and you go to one
of those cash machines at the supermarket, you throw it
all in there. The coin machines they grab fifteen percent
or eighteen percent. You walk out with in some cases,
in my case, it was hundreds of dollars. But that
took Yeah, it took free. What is it took forever
(04:29):
to say that? By the way, the point of having
a change in your pocket. I enjoy having change in
my pocket, and a fair amount because here's what happens.
I'll be walking down the street and there'll be some
homeless guy sitting there and say, hey, mister, do you
have any change?
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Well, I reach in my pocket, I jingle.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
All the money so you can hear it, and I say, why,
yes I do, and I just keep on walking.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
The entertainment value of doing that is very high.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
All right.
Speaker 4 (04:58):
Yeah, I guess if that's what you're in too, If
that's it makes you smile, yeah, it does.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Makes me smile a big time, all right, Joel.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
Instacart with algorithmic pricing, is that dynamic pricing.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
It's not just dynamic because that's already been happening, right,
and that's happening all across the internet. And we're talking
about Yeah, you log in the morning to look for
a flight, it's one price you No.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
I understand that. But this is instacart. This is going
to the supermarket.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
That's right. So this is this is different. This is less.
Speaker 4 (05:29):
Hey, prices are changing based on the price we pay,
and it's more, prices are changing based on who you
are and where you're buying from, and it's seemingly random.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Uh in.
Speaker 4 (05:42):
So there was this test done by Consumer Reports. It
consumer Reports is one of the stalwarts in the you know,
in the in the business of looking out for consumers.
They do an amazing job on so many different fronts.
They partnered with this company called Groundwork Collective to look
into what's going on with instacart pricing, and basically, it's
not just that the prices are dynamic, it's that are
(06:04):
seemingly random and so even when like twenty different shoppers
at the very very same time are adding a specific
item to their cart. Let's say something as basic as eggs,
one person might be paying four dollars for a dozen,
the other might be paying close to five dollars a dozen,
and Instacart's kind of like cut with their pants down here.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
They don't really know what to say.
Speaker 1 (06:26):
I find insacart fascinating. I really do, for a couple
of reasons. One it is, on the one hand, it
is the easiest way of shopping. You literally go and
do a cart, and you actually save money because you're
not at the market if you're hungry. Particularly, you should
see the stuff that I throw into the into the
(06:47):
into the shopping cart. So instacart is easy. Except have
you ever do you use instacart at all?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
So I do.
Speaker 4 (06:57):
And I've really come around on this because I agree
I think in so many ways what happens, especially like Bill,
I know your fondness for Costco. When you go to Costco,
like there's something about you don't stick to the list right,
because no, I do not.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
I buy a treasure there if you can.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
I have a freezer in my garage that is my
Costco freezer.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
Also Smart and Final.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
I sort of you know, I hate to say it,
but I also shop a Smart and Final.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
It is filled with my crap killed. I'm not kidding you.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
A full freezer that's top to bottom jammed inner looks
like a display case at Costco.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And it's only because I shop there.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
But here's the other thing with instacart is you also
shop for produce and they don't pick and squeeze the
tomatoes and actually squeeze the avocados to get the perfect rightness.
That that is the problem yet with produce, if you notice, Yeah,
(08:01):
for sure.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
I mean like when my wife or like she eats
spinach like it's her job, and when when the spinach
comes it like expires the next day sometimes and I'm like,
you didn't look in the back, like you didn't rifle
through the spinach to find the furthest out expiration date,
and that's one of my frustrations. But I will say, yeah,
it saves time, and I think in some ways it
can save money, like if you're really diligent and you're shopping.
(08:23):
And I also I keep my eye out for discounted
Instacart gift cards, which just helps bring that price down
a little bit. But I think what this reveals one
is just kind of that Instacart is like they're testing
some things out here, and they're testing to see how
much people are willing to pay and how price conscious
people are. And I think if you were to do
a poll, the average instacart user is less price conscious
(08:46):
than the person who's going out in the making for
every week.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Right.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
That's the convenience.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Hey, In terms of dynamic pricing, has it reached supermarkets?
I'm thinking, let's say eggs, which used to be fourteen
fifteen dollars a dozen if you bought the fan, if
you bought the fancy schmancy you know, brown eggs, organic stuff,
you know, grain feed or whatever the hell they do
with chickens and expensive eggs. But as the inventory goes down,
(09:14):
you would think the price would go up.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Have they reached that point?
Speaker 4 (09:18):
So we are seeing more supermarkets put in like digital
displayed readers, But most of the supermarkets are saying that
the reason for that is not so that they can
institute dynamic pricing. It's just so that it will be
less labor intensive to change the price labels. And especially
when prices are going up more regularly and you have
to change the pricing labels more frequently, I get that
(09:40):
it makes sense, and I think people still have like
a backlash against prices going up. Like you remember when
Wendy said, hey, we're thinking about charging more during lunch
and maybe less during Some of the people were so
upset about that, and when Wendy's had to change on
a dime. So especially, I think for every day necessities,
(10:01):
people are revolting a little bit more when when they're
being told they're gonna have to pay more if they
come at the wrong time of day.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
But this is instant.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
I think with instacart, you're going to see because people
using it are less price conscious, you might see some
of that shifting upward of prices and they might see, oh,
you know what, Bill in California is well, you know,
he doesn't care if the eggs are three ninety nine
or four sixty nine, So we're going to keep pushing
up prices on him. But somebody else might abandon some
(10:31):
of the items in their card or start using this
tide less and then they might start trying to pull
you back in with discounts and coupons like it's just
one of those buyer beware things in the modern age
of internet grocery shopping.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
All right, Joel will catch you this Sunday at twelve
to two pm, and we can reach you at at
how to Money Joel, And then the website is howdomoney
dot com.
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