ARE YOU KIDDING ME????
February 27, 2008 | 26 Comments
I just found a new statistic regarding money that my own financial planner/retirement specialist sent me. A stat that shocked even me! The average savings of a 50 year old in the United States is only $2500.
Okay, you 50 year old idiot, let’s say you started to work at the very late age of 25 (I picked that number because the math is easier.) From the age of 25 to the age of 50, you were only able to put away one hundred dollars per year. Aren’t you proud? Somehow you were able to set aside $1.92 a week. I am SO impressed.
Are you kidding me? How does that happen? There are lots of ways. You spend more than you earn - that’s certainly the biggest way. You don’t have a plan. You have screwed up priorities. You don’t pay attention. You indulge yourself. You indulge your kids.
I got an email today from a woman who explained that she and her husband filed bankruptcy in 1999. Now, eight years later, their debt is right where it was then. First let me say this: Bankruptcy gave you a second chance and you blew that too!!! She said that she and her husband don’t buy anything for themselves but do have three daughters that in her words, “don’t want for anything.” Her question was how does she explain to her daughters that they have financial problems and need to “cut back” without “failing her daughters?” I wrote her back. You can imagine how nice I was. First, her statement about how her daughters “don’t want for anything” is a lie. They want for responsible parents who are smart enough to learn from their mistakes - who know how to provide for their family’s future - who have put away for college for their three kids - who have their priorities straight - who can teach them about financial planning and budgeting - who know how to live a lifestyle they can afford - who aren’t idiots!!!!!!! Failing her daughters? One more time: are you kidding me? She and her husband have already failed her daughters. She said that her daughters all have cell phones that run more than $200 a month but that they are barely scraping by. She told me that she doesn’t think it is fair that her daughters “suffer” because of her mistakes. Holy crap!!!!! Since when is a young teenager doing without a cell phone called suffering?
I could really get off on a rant here but you get the point already I believe. Sadly, I get lots of emails like this. People just can’t figure out how they got into their mess. It’s like those bills sneaked into their house at night along with the plasma TV and the closet full of cheaply made crap they can’t get their fat butts into anyway. Then they wake up in the morning and SURPRISE!!!! they are in debt up to their eyeballs and have no money to pay for all that stuff they don’t need and probably don’t even want.
Pay attention people!!!! SAVE SOME MONEY. Get a wealth strategy! Wishful thinking is NOT a wealth strategy. Hope is a not a plan for success! Get a grip. Anyone can save money. I don’t care how bad your situation is, it can be done. How? By just doing it! Stop writing me and asking me how to save money. Really. I am sick of your stupid emails begging me to tell you the secret to saving money. There is no frigging secret! Put some of your money into a savings account. Period. Just do it. Before you do ANYTHING else - do it! It’s as simple as that.
Here is another stat for you: Only 1 out of 100 of the people who start working at age 25 will be wealthy by the age of 65. Only a total of five out of a hundred will have enough money to retire at 65. Get a plan! The first step is to spend less than you earn. I get accused of being simple and people have trashed my book, You’re Broke Because You Want To Be, because there is nothing earth shattering in it, yet 40% of our society spend more than they earn and live paycheck to paycheck. Seems to me like “spend less than you earn” is earth shattering news for 40% of society so I’ll stick with my simple approach. That simple approach has served me well. I spend less than I earn and save some and invest some and give some away. That simple approach has made me a millionaire. It’s worked for lots of my millionaire friends too.
There are as many ways to be rich as there are rich people. I am not going to tell you how to do it. That is not my area of expertise. In fact, I pay people who are richer than me to show me what to do when it comes time to invest my money. I can, however, tell you how to end up broke and heartbroken and disappointed with your life: spend more than you earn. That’s all it takes.
Hillary - Barack - McKain - Huckabee: do you really care?
February 21, 2008 | 55 Comments
I do. I care a lot. Hopefully you do too. Most don’t though. Oh they say they do, but they don’t really. People talk about who they like, who they can’t stand, who “if they get the nomination, I’m switching parties”, who is an idiot and on and on and on. But you know what? 40% of people who could vote are not even registered and only half of the ones who are registered vote! This ticks me off. I know who I am voting for. I know why. Half of you will think I’m wrong. I don’t care. I will also think you are wrong. I hope you don’t care either. If you vote, I’m happy with anything you decide to do. People say they want a better government but I think they are liars. Yep, liars. They want a better government but they don’t want it enough to get off their big fat butts and do something about it. That makes them lazy liars. I think George W. Bush is the biggest idiot to has ever held the office of the presidency. Without exception. He is a liar and a dim bulb at best. He is a nimrod who combines arrogance and ignorance - a lethal combination for sure. I have every right to say this stuff because I voted against him. I earned the right to complain. He has an approval rating of less than 30%. But sadly that isn’t fair to him. Because many of the people who disapprove didn’t vote. How can you disapprove if you didn’t vote? In my books, you can’t. (And I guess what makes me the most upset is that a third of Americans think he is doing a good job.) I don’t care how anyone votes. I really don’t. I would love to see the election go my way but if it doesn’t, I will live with the results. Afterall, Bush wasn’t elected the first time by a majority of anything and I have lived with him for the past eight years. I can do it again if I have to. My point is simple: vote. Vote for anyone you want to and for any reason you have. But do it.We salute the flag - brag that America is the greatest country on earth - and we talk a good game when it comes to patriotism - but unless you PRACTICE democracy by voting, you don’t deserve to enjoy it.Hope this rattles some cages.
Credit card commercial and Government stupidity
February 13, 2008 | 35 Comments
Okay, I am on a roll trashing stupid commercials. I think maybe it is the result of too much time stuck in hotel rooms while on the road. This is the newest one that pisses me off: Chase Bank, those good ol’ credit card people! Here is the commercial: A couple decides they need a new TV. He rushes to the electronic store and surrounds himself with big screen plasma television sets. Background music: I Want It All And I Want It Now. THAT IS A CLUE to why I have a problem! He grabs his cell phone and dials a number to check his available credit to see how much he can charge. The voice over says something to the effect that you can find out how much of the good life you can buy with a simple phone call encouraging him to max out his card to indulge himself and his wife.Chase should be ashamed. Promoting that I Want It All And I Want It Now mentality and then telling you to max out your entire credit balance on a big screen television. People SHOULD be smart enough to see through this stuff, but sadly they aren’t. People will stupidly watch this and think, “How cool! I should totally go get whatever I want because I deserve it and I can just charge it.” Do you need it? Who cares? Can you afford it? Why does that matter? Is it a good idea? Beats me! I just want it!!!!!!!That is the problem with the government’s new economic stimulus package as well: stupidity. We (the US Government) are going to borrow money from China (because we spent all our money on a stupid war) to give people some money they didn’t earn so they can go buy stuff made in China that they don’t need. Looks to me the economy that gets the most stimulus is China’s. Add to that the issue that most people will look at the money they get as a downpayment and won’t spend just what they are given but will spend much more. Why are we rewarding bad behavior and irresponsibility in people? Do people really need help spending? Isn’t that the basic problem anyway? Why don’t we reward things like saving and investing and putting away for healthcare and for a college fund? That makes more sense to me. I just don’t believe in rewarding spending and encouraging more spending.If you get some of that free government money (I won’t) I hope you don’t do what the government wants you to do. They want you to help retailers and the economy by spending the money at the mall. I want you to pay off those high interest credit cards you have. If you don’t have any high interest credit card debt, then save or invest the money. Be smarter than our government.Until next time.EXTRA EXTRA!!!!!!!!! Just got an email from a Chase executive. I admire them for making contact with me. That alone deserves respect in my books. They acknowledged to me that perhaps their true message was not clear enough. That the goal was to teach people NOT to buy the biggest but to get what they could afford based on their available credit. Sorry I missed it - I think Queen screaming out I want it all and I want it NOW!!!!!!! while flashing a credit card drowned out their intent - at least to me. Again, I respect Chase for making contact with me. They were very respectful of me and what I do so I give them CREDIT for that. I appreciate any effort to teach people to spend responsibly. In their words, “We are trying to establish a responsibility message (see www.chaseclearandsimple.com, which offers people a number of tools to help them pay on time and know theimpact of only making minimum payments.” I applaud any effort to help people do just that! I have said for years that credit card companies are NOT at fault for people being in a credit card mess. People sign the contract and then don’t live according to the document they signed. I do not believe predatory lending runs rampant as many would lead you to believe. I believe big boys and girls sign papers and agree to payment plans and then don’t keep their word. Then when there are consequences, they cry ‘Foul!”This is full disclosure between me and you, them and me and now all of us. I think it is refreshing to see people COMMUNICATE their differences and talk things out openly.Larry
Forget passion. Work hard and get good instead!
February 7, 2008 | 24 Comments
The other day when I was on Donny Deutsch, I made the statement, “Passion is a load of crap.” The poor guy grew pale under his stage make-up and his heart pounded hard while he gasped for air. To say the least, he disagreed. My point to him was that passion is little more than a starting place but true long term success is based on excellence and hard work. Again, he disagreed. That’s fine. He has the right to be wrong. And he clearly is.
I know many passionate people. They are passionately stupid, passionately wrong and passionately incompetent. Passion and success have about as much to do with each other as gravy and Raisin Bran. But this is the trash being dumped on us by the ill-informed motivational idiots who know little about true success but are quick to tell you how to achieve it. No business ever makes it based on passion. No successful business person every made it to the top based on passion.
Back to my earlier point: Excellence is what moves you to the top. And hard work doing the right things is what makes you excellent. To tell people that passion is the key to success does those folks a great disservice. Because somewhere down the road, they will discover that no one cares or shares their passion. They will find out that while they are passionate, they haven’t done the work to be really good, they know nothing about selling or marketing, leadership, management, finance, their competition, serving customers or all the other facets of a successful life or business. All they have is their passion. Try cashing that at the bank.
A guy after a speech I gave a couple of weeks ago caught me in the bar (another reminder to RUN to my room after a speech!) and told me how lucky I was to have found my passion in life through my speaking. I told him I was NOT passionate about my speaking. I have a good time doing it. I enjoy doing it. I am really good at it. But it is not my passion. It is my job. Period. It pays well. Really well. And if it didn’t pay really well, I would find something else to enjoy and I would figure out another line of work to be great at that would pay me well. The guy just stood with his mouth open looking at me.
I told him my passion was sitting on my patio watching the sun go down over the horizon, with a glass of Johnny Walker Blue next to me, a great cigar in my hand, my big ol’ sweet bulldog, Ralph on my lap slobbering on me, my wife sitting next to me having a great conversation and a little Merle Haggard playing in the background all while I am enjoying the smell of a great big bone-in big eye grilling a few feet away from me. I can get passionate about that. Standing on a stage thousands of miles away from home and going back to a crappy hotel room only to eat one more room service cobb salad is nothing that creates any passion in me. It’s my job. I’m good at it. I like it. It pays well. My being good at it is why people hire me. If I was only passionate and not amazing at it, no one would ever hire me.
Passion qualifies me to stand on the street corner and preach my message, but it doesn’t allow me to make a living. Excellence gets me paid. And twenty years of hard work, study and practice made me excellent. The same applies to you. Set your passion aside and get really good at what you do. Got it? Forget what you are hearing about passion and just go to work.
Attack the REAL problem & not just the symptom
February 4, 2008 | 25 Comments
I just saw a television commercial for Aleve. The guy is a mover and he has problems with his knees and according to him, Aleve helps him with his problems and his knees no longer hurt: So take Aleve! The commercial made me sick. But this commercial is typical of what we do - we go for the quick fix of the symptom and never bother attacking the real problem. If you happen to see this commercial, I want you to notice that the poor mover guy with the bad knees weighs about 300 pounds!!!!! No wonder the guy’s knees hurt. Why wouldn’t they hurt? They are carrying around 150 pounds more than they were engineered to carry.
So this guy “fixes” his problem with a pain reliever. Actually, he is making his problem worse. That pain is a CLUE!!!! The clue is to lose some weight you dim-witted lardass! Instead, he is masking his problem so he won’t notice it……..as he continues to get fatter and fatter. He is numbing himself to his real problem. Hey Tubbo, you want your knees to hurt less? Listen to the pain and go after the REAL problem: your weight… lose 150 pounds! But as I said already, this approach is typical of what we do in all areas of life and business. We mask our problems so we won’t notice them, hoping they will go away if we can’t feel them.
This happens physically: just numb yourself to the pain and you won’t have to deal with the real cause of the pain. But it also happens with our finances. People shop to feel better about the fact they don’t have any money because shopping numbs the pain. Shopping is CAUSING the pain! It happens in our jobs and relationships and in every other area of our lives. We spend money and time and energy fixing the symptom instead of dealing with the real problem. Almost always the real problem can be found looking back at you from your mirror. You are the problem. How you live, what you say or don’t say, what you do or don’t do, who you hire and who you don’t fire, what you eat or don’t eat, what you spend and how you spend it: these are your real problems.
Want a better life? Go for the cause of your problem. Don’t mask the problem. Don’t dull yourself from the pain. Instead, feel the pain and ask yourself what is really causing it. Then attack the cause!
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