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Diving Deep Into The $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill

March 11, 2021 Brandcasting You Podcast 00:19:18 Comments Off on Diving Deep Into The $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill

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TWS 81 | $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill

 

Just recently, the House passed the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill in the hopes of rescuing America from the economic damages brought about by the pandemic. But what does it really entail? What are the underlying consequences of putting out all of this money? In this episode, Patrick Donohoe flies solo to share with us his thoughts about this new bill. He takes a look at it from different perspectives and then offers some insights on how you can best navigate your wealth and more.

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Diving Deep Into The $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill

Thank you for supporting another episode. I’m glad that you’re here. I’m going to freestyle it, I’ll be by myself. I’m going to bring on some cool guests to speak about some of the points I’ll bring up. I’m going to make some comments regarding the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill. There’s enough information out there in other podcasts that analyze the details. I’m going to approach it from a couple of different angles in hopes of inciting you a different perspective of what’s going on so that you can best navigate your wealth, your business, your profession and the enjoyment of life. I believe that is what wealth is. It’s to extract, to experience the joy in life, regardless of what’s going on, tall order. Wealth is something that most people pursue. Oftentimes when they associate it with money and material things, they come to find out that it is not what they wanted.

Best to start with what wealth truly is, which is mindset, being able to look at your circumstances, look at your life and extract the good, the beauty, the gratitude, which if you think about it is all around us. I tried to approach this $1.9 trillion bill from a more neophyte position, meaning 8-to 10-year-old who understands ideas at a certain level. I look at the $1.9 trillion package from an economics perspective, a legal perspective, a precedent setting perspective. I stepped back and I look at the first idea, which is the surface, especially the title, the American Rescue Plan is pitching this $2,800 per family and also extension of unemployment benefits. I look at how much of the bill that amount is. I’ve seen figures around 9%, 10%, even if it’s 15%. That’s where the focus has been.

It’s unfortunate because in the end, when an 8-to 10-year-old see’s candy, they see an amusement park. They see the surface benefit and don’t necessarily have the experience to look at the unintended consequences. It makes sense to me. Majority of Americans do support the bill. At the same time, I believe if they took a shovel deep look into the other points of the bill, tenets of the bill, where money is being spent, it would cause even the young person to scratch their head. $1 billion here, $10 billion here, $500 million here, things that are unrelated to COVID, but at the same time are being pitched under this umbrella that it’s necessary to rescue America. That’s the first thing that I observed is looking at this from a psychological perspective and how a bill that is monumentally massive in size.

TWS 81 | $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill

$1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill: The government was not set up to take care of people. It was set up to protect the rights of the people.

 

We’ve become desensitized to the language of money. I’m sure $1.9 million to most Americans is a lot of money. 1.9 trillion seconds ago is 60,000 years. This is a massive amount of money and it is going everywhere. If money were free that grew on trees, if it’s what most 8 to 10-year-olds think money is where you swipe a card and you get stuff, it makes sense. Who wouldn’t want all of this stuff? There are consequences for spending this money because it’s not free. Interest has to be paid on it. Principal has to be paid back. For those of you who are interested in economics, monetary policy, and monetary theory, this idea of MMT, Modern Monetary Theory, which removes some of the responsibilities associated with spending money at a government level, it’s something that is happening in a sense. This $1.9 trillion, the amount of debt that’s being piled up, it’s not possible to payback without some significant dire changes.

We’ll get into some of the precedent setting. A couple episodes back, I talked about some of the points of Biden’s fiscal ideas and specifically taxes, what’s going to change in that respect? I believe that because of how this bill was passed, $1.9 trillion, the majority of Republicans, all of them I think opposed it and all of Democrats were in favor of it to an extent. It was right down the line. It’s interesting where this sets a precedent with all their laws that are going to be pushed forward through the House, the Senate and then signed into law. It’s interesting to look at what Biden wants to push forward is going to be an inevitability. That’s the precedent that it sets. It may not be 100% absolute but close.

Going back to a couple episodes ago, whether it’s higher taxes, whether it’s removing step-up in basis for real estate, whether it’s eliminating capital gains, meaning capital gains will be treated, especially for high income earners as ordinary income. These are sweeping changes, changes to the debt tax, the estate tax, the lifetime exemptions that are available and what can be included. It’s crazy. It’s time to pay attention. There is going to be an impact. This is the precedent that it’s setting. It’s setting another precedent as well, which is one that’s way more philosophical. I’ll end with this, making this a shorter episode.

The precedent is that American people are not creative enough, hardworking enough to take care of themselves, to solve their own problems, to exercise their ingenuity, which is deep inside of everybody. This is where the precedent is dangerous. An example is an article that came out a few years ago, it was a study. It was done in Europe, somewhere Sweden, I believe. The study showed that if families had one less child, it would make a huge difference as far as the carbon footprint human beings leave. It’s an incredible claim. You can remove people and we wouldn’t have any carbon footprint. You look at the human ingenuity specific to this claim. The inventor, Bill Gross, you can look him up, has a project called Carbon Capture, which is an economical way to remove a toxic carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. If one of those children that weren’t born wasn’t Bill Gross or was Bill Gross, there’s no solution at that magnitude.

The point I’m trying to make is that when we’re put in predicaments of challenge and difficulty, we can take the easy way out and most people would, if that hand is extended. We can take another way out, a route that allows us to understand ourself at a deeper level, to understand what we’re made of. Think of the loss of fulfillment, the loss of self-respect, self-esteem knowing that you overcame challenge. It’s the feeling of rising above adversity. It’s a feeling of conquering something on the surface that you did not believe was within you, what you weren’t capable of. To me, these are the massive losses that are impossible to quantify. The precedent that’s being set is that, “When there’s challenge, don’t worry about it. You don’t have to do anything. You can sit back and relax. We’ll be there to help you.”

I don’t believe that this is an environment of growth that leads to what we’re looking for, which is a sense of self-understanding, a sense of self-reliance, respect, and having the understanding, having the knowledge that we accomplished something. We overcame something. That to me is sad. I look at the genius in everyone and how that genius is being put on the altar of sacrifice. I believe that there are circumstances where people find themselves in challenging times, maybe impossible to fend for themselves. At the same time, I think that is the exception, but we are making it the rule.

There are a couple of interviews I’m going to link to as I conclude this short episode. They were done a couple of years ago, one with Greg Lukianoff, who’s the author of The Coddling of the American Mind, another one, which is a follow-up to that book with Andy Tanner, talking about what we teach our children, the importance of challenge, of difficulty, of overcoming, and the sense that comes from overcoming, the muscle that builds. It’s important especially with what’s going on now.

As a recap what to take from this episode, number one, I look at it’s a clear path to higher taxes, to inflation, and ensuring that you ask yourself the question, “How is my wealth, my portfolio, my financial future impacted by inflation?” I’ll give you a short crash course on inflation, this $1.9 trillion in addition to the north of $100 billion that hasn’t been spent from the previous COVID stimulus bill. This is the money that will go into circulation even though it goes into areas that would make you question, “Why would we do that?” Go look at some of the details. That money is going to find its way into the business’ pockets. That business is going to buy stuff. They’re going to pay their employees, maybe give them a bonus or raise. Those employees are going to go out and spend money. This money came out of nowhere. The money was not earned. Now, we have that much more that is circulating in our economy.

When you have more money circulating and a seemingly finite amount of goods and services, what ends up happening is that more money bids up the price of assets, of goods and services. We’ve seen that already and we’re going to see even more of that. What that means is that the money you have, the money you earned, the value of your assets, your wealth will be buying less stuff in the future because those things have gone up in price. That’s the nature of stimulus and inflation, higher prices. You can also define inflation as the devaluation of the dollar. That’s the first thing.

We have a prime opportunity as human beings to grow, to thrive, and to learn. Share on X

The second thing is legislation that is coming down the pipe, whether it’s taxes or otherwise that is being pushed forth by the administration. We see that a precedent has been set where they can pass laws that are highly controversial. They can pass measures that are highly controversial. Pay attention and start setting up your tax strategy to help you keep more of the money that you’ve earned. Finally, it’s the context of challenge and hardship. I’m not debating that there isn’t hardship. I’m not debating that COVID hasn’t made an impact or the response to COVID has not made an impact. It has. It is evident, not just the United States but around the world.

I remind myself that government was not set up to take care of people. Government was set up to protect the rights of people. People have done some incredible things over the course of time. In this day and age with access to limitless information, resources, knowledge, we can debate the definition of knowledge, but finding solutions, whether it’s YouTube, books, blogs, podcasts, the majority of which is free if not insanely inexpensive. People have the resources to solve problems. At the same time, when resources aren’t needed, they are rarely taken advantage of. Water is not valuable until you’re in the middle of a desert and thirsty, or running a race. It’s the environment where resources become valuable.

We have a prime opportunity as human beings to grow, to thrive, to learn, not just for our own betterment and the remuneration that comes tangibly materially but it’s the feeling, the sensation. It’s the understanding we have about ourselves about what we’re made of. I think we all thirst for that. In essence, we’re being robbed of that because of what’s going on, where governments are taking care of us. They’re solving our problems. They’re giving us handouts. As I look at it from an 8 to 10-year-old, I can see on the surface that the bill makes sense, the narrative makes sense. As 8 to 10-year-old, maybe 12-year-old, when you realize you’ve been deceived or screwed, you’re going to be pissed. I look at the emotions that are going on in the social and political atmosphere. They’re high, it’s tense.

TWS 81 | $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill

$1.9 Trillion Stimulus Bill: People have the resources to solve problems. At the same time, when resources aren’t needed, they are rarely taken advantage of.

 

This is by no means to incite more of what doesn’t serve you, but it’s to make you even more aware of what’s going on, to navigate your life where you’re not dependent on others, you’re not dependent on handouts. You’re dependent on yourself. It’s to take actions, to make efforts to those ends. Thanks for reading. I appreciate the support. Tune in to the next couple of episodes. We’re going to be talking politics. We’re going to be talking tax strategy and some investment strategy given what’s going on with our environment, specifically how the tax implications could impact your investment strategy or wealth strategy, and some ideas of how to remedy that. Until next time, take care. Bye.

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TWS 16 | Wealth

David Neagle: What It Truly Means To Be Wealthy

December 27, 2018 Patrick Donohoe Podcast 00:42:13 Comments Off on David Neagle: What It Truly Means To Be Wealthy

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TWS 16 | Wealth

 

Just as we thought we are doing just fine with the bare minimum, life happens. After a near-death experience, David Neagle woke up to the realization that he has to do something with his life and make the most of it. Now, as the best-selling author of The Millions Within and is known as one of the architects of the coaching and personal growth industry itself, he has been impacting people to live their purpose and affect others as well. David shares his perception of the world and his attitude. He also talks about how we express ourselves or deal with negative situations in a productive way as he correlates everything to what we know about being wealthy.

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David Neagle: What It Truly Means To Be Wealthy

TWS 16 | Wealth

The Millions Within: How to Manifest Exactly What You Want and Have an EPIC Life!

It’s quite the honor to have my guest on. His name is David Neagle. He’s the best-selling author of The Millions Within: How to Manifest Exactly What You Want and Have an Epic Life! He has a number of things going on. The book was written a couple of years ago. We’re going to also talk about some of his presence online, the courses that he has and other resources. David, maybe give us an idea of who you are, what your background is and what you’re all about.

I’m from Chicago, Illinois. As a teenager, I was headed in the wrong direction, quit high school at seventeen, got married early, started having children young. Creating all the responsibility that goes with that without any way of being able to fulfill it. I was working two jobs. I was working at a dock six and a half days a week and driving a truck. Right after my son was born in 1989, I had a water-skiing accident. I got separated from a boat and I was sucked through the dam, broke my back. I was only one of two people that ever survived going through that dam up until that time. It was a rough day. That day woke me up to the idea that we don’t know how long we have here. I was playing small. I was not fulfilling my commitments. I didn’t know what it was to be a responsible man, husband, father. My parents split up when I was thirteen. My dad wasn’t around a whole lot. I didn’t have a whole lot of guidance.

That woke me up to the idea that if I was ever going to do something with my life, I need to stop procrastinating and start doing something now. I learned a lot of lessons from that day. As far as the story of where I was and where I’ve come to, that was the main story that changed for me that day, that I need to do something. I didn’t know what to do. I had an idea in my mind that if I’ll let this happen, something was going to break open and my life was going to change in some way, which turned out not to be true. It did cause me to start thinking differently. Once I got back to work and I was okay, I was working so much I was just exhausted. We were living in a bad neighborhood next to a drug dealer. My self-esteem was going down on a consistent basis. I was ashamed of where we were living and that we had to be exposed to that.

On a Tuesday morning in February, I had a complete emotional meltdown in the back of the trailer that I was loading on this dock. I was just praying to God, “Show me a way out. How do I get out of this? What do I need to change?” A little voice in my head said, “Change your gratitude.” I didn’t even know what an attitude was. I began to think about what is an attitude. I picked the person that owned the company that I worked for and I asked myself, “What’s the difference between him and I as far as our attitude? He’s so much further than I am and I would love to be where he is. What is the difference?” I broke it down to three main things that I noticed about myself and him as far as the difference. He must have loved what he did because he started the company in his garage and he was the largest food importer in the country at that time. He treated everybody with total respect. He would very often come through with other business people through the warehouse.

He would always stop and say hello, shake your hand, thank you for working for him, ask how your family was if he had time. He acknowledged people. I figured he also must have done a great job. That’s how he built the business. I wasn’t doing any of those three things. I hated what I did. I was angry internally so I was taking it out on other people. I didn’t hear about the quality of my work. I decided I’m going to change those three things. At that time, I was making $20,000 a year working two jobs, six and a half days a week, all the overtime I could take. I was trying to find a way to get to $40,000. I thought if I get $40,000, that will solve all of my problems. After I changed my attitude and I made this commitment, no matter what, I am going to stick to this. Thirty days later, I tripled my income. I went from $20,000 a year to $62,000 a year.

There were a couple of things out of that that was extremely significant for me. One was I knew that some way somehow, I caused that to happen. I just didn’t know how. Years later, my mentor told me I was an unconscious competent, which is fine until something changes and then you don’t know what to do. I was blown away that this kind of a change could happen this fast with relative ease. It wasn’t like I went back to school. It wasn’t like I was working harder. It was an internal shift in how I was showing up every day. That’s what made the change happen. The other thing was that I was stunned when I realized that the opportunity for that to happen was around me for two years and I couldn’t see it. Later on, I had been reading Think and Grow Rich. In the beginning, he talked about the sly disguises of opportunity. I immediately resonated with that paragraph where he said, “Sometimes opportunity shows up as fortune or temporary defeat or just being unfortunate.”

I thought, “This opportunity was around me for two years and because of my mindset, I couldn’t see it.” That caused me to start studying. I studied for seven years and then I started working with a mentor. From there, I went on to create my own business and became a multimillionaire. Nothing outside of that original attitude change changed all that much. I didn’t go back to school. I didn’t get a degree. I just kept working on myself and applying myself the best that I could at every opportunity that I had. I found out what my purpose was that I’ve wanted to teach other people how to do this. I like working with entrepreneurs, which I still do now. I’ve worked with people all over the world and continue to do so. It is my passion and my joy to wake up other people and lead them to their purpose and the freedom and the expansion of what it is that they’re here to do to affect the people that they’re meant to affect. That’s what gives me the greatest joy of all being able to do that.

How we view things is largely a function of the past. Share on X

The first thing I see is the perception of the world, how we view things is largely a function of the past. Opportunities are probably all around us. It can’t be seen because it’s our past perception unless we start to make changes. That’s a big thing. Napoleon Hill talked a lot about this, which is taking on a mastermind group and essentially an archetype of someone else that represents or an archetype way has characteristics, traits, attributes that are desirable to you and start to act that way. If you act the way you act, you’re just going to get what you’ve always got. It’s the perception. As you wake up every morning, how has that adjusted your perception of the world? When you wake up, how do you view the world?

I view the world as an amazing place. We’re probably at the most amazing time in history. I view the world with an incredible amount of potential that is slightly misguided at the moment. We’re in the midst of a major change. Anytime you see a lot of change occurring, you usually will see a lot of confusion simultaneous to that or parallel to that. That’s what we’re seeing right now. We’re seeing a lot of confusion in values, a lot of confusion in where we’re going as human beings, what’s important to us. I also think that there’s a lot of delusion out there that goes along with it. I’m very optimistic about what we’re doing. One of the things that keeps me optimistic is how many people are showing interest in a positive change for our world and getting involved and working on themselves and trying to make a difference, versus the way that we did it 50 years ago in the ‘60s. We had a great idea back then but I don’t know that we have the emotional tools or the psychological tools to pull it off. We made some progress but people now are starting to show a little bit different and realize, “I’ve got to change me in order to change what is a representation of me, which is the reality that I live in.”

How do you see the correlation of your perception of the world and your attitude?

I can tell you that it is so vastly different from what it was like before I went through that data. I felt very unempowered. I felt very victimized. I felt like I lived in a world where there was nothing that I could do to control my outcome or my destiny. The world that I live in now, just because of the changes that I’ve made personally, is 180 degrees different. The people that I know, that I work with, that I come in contact with are nice, friendly and they want to help. They want to make a difference. That’s not what I used to see before. I saw anger, victimization and entitlement. I know that those things are out there but it’s not part of what my experience is now. I hope I’m answering your question. It’s very different because I changed that.

TWS 16 | Wealth

Think and Grow Rich

This goes to the relationship idea. I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately. I know you’ve spoken alongside Tony Robbins, Bob Proctor and a few others in the personal development world. Something I have learned through just study and education is the idea that having a lot of money doesn’t equate to what people think it does. People are seeking an emotion. They’re seeking a way of feeling about something and proof of that is the people that take their own life even though they have a lot of money. The correlation to attitude and to this is all money and all wealth is an exchange. When you have a lot of money it’s because you’ve affected in one way or another a lot of people. I believe attitude is that connecting piece, which I find fascinating. I never thought about it like this. It’s fascinating to think about how you come across with a perception of like, “We’re the most amazing time in the world or we’re in the shittiest period of history.” You could see it both ways and sympathize with it in a sense. The attitude and how that connects with other people based on that perception is curious. With a person in a perspective of the glass is half empty, you don’t want to be around that person or do business with them. If it’s the other way around, you do.

You’ll hear people talk about what it’s like to go visit different countries. I’ve been to a lot of different countries. I’ve had people say, “The people are rude there. They’re not nice,” and I go and have a completely different experience where the people are warm, friendly, helpful and wonderful. I don’t have that experience. The money part of it, what you’re saying is so dead-on. Every dollar that we spend or that we earn benefits the lives of other people. Money is just a tool. If I’m spending money, I’m contributing to the people that bought or own the companies of the products that I’m buying, which benefits them and their families and their kids. They can send their kids to school. If I’m earning money, I’m building a business which provides jobs and income for people’s families so that they can grow. When I first started off, I didn’t know I was going to have that experience of how much joy I’d get in contributing to the lives of other people in that way. Not just with the products and services that I deliver to the world, but the fact that I provide jobs, I’m doing something that’s meaningful in a very holistic way with everybody that I come in contact with.

There’s a correlation there more than we think. You can do something that’s not meaningful and get money from it. The idea of being wealthy or fulfilled or have that sense of emotion of achievement is because you have both, which is you’ve done something and you feel that. You also have impacted the lives of somebody else because they’ve given you a lot of money.

It’s interesting what people think about money. I remember before I was wealthy, the thought was about what I would do when I was wealthy, what I would spend money on, houses, cars and trips and stuff like that. Then you become wealthy and after you buy things for a little while, it’s not about what you’re going to buy next. You’re not coming from that place. It’s about how you’re going to serve more. For me, that’s what it is. To watch the light go on in somebody’s eyes when you make a difference for them, the psychic income that you get for that far surpasses any financial income that you could. If I wanted to stop working now, I could. I get to get up and do this every day. It’s not something I have to do. The whole attitude behind the fact that I get to get up and make a difference, I make choices in my life that allow me to do that. I get to watch other people have those breakthroughs. That to me is absolutely amazing.

It’s like the accelerator. I was observing a dinner conversation and the net lottery was a huge amount. I was just listening and observing but they were like, “We’re going to be able to do this and do this.” It’s interesting because most people think that way. If you get to that place and you have those things, you realize that it’s an emotion that you’re after, then the acceleration piece is you get to that point. From my perception of those that are wealthy, you’re on a different gear where your drive doesn’t come from having more money. It comes from having more of those feelings, which is serving and helping people.

People want to feel good. One of the problems that we have as a society is that we’re having difficulty keeping up emotionally with how fast everything is changing. The answer that we have to that is drugging people. That causes a major problem because it doesn’t allow them to grow. When we’re seeking those feelings, when we want to feel good, you mentioned about wealthy people taking their own life. I’ve seen that and we’ve also seen some very prominent people commit suicide that you would think to yourself, “They’ve got everything. They’ve got dream careers and they hanged themselves or something.” I did a podcast about Anthony Bourdain after he hung himself because he was one of my heroes. There was no other way for him to get that feeling, whatever it is that was missing in his life. There’s something to be said for finding why you’re here and having the appreciation and the gratitude for that.

If you act the way you act, you're just going to get what you've always got. Share on X

We do an exercise that we do as a company and I also do it with my family. That is every day you have to say three things that you appreciate about yourself and three things that you’re grateful for in your life. The hardest part for adults is to sit around at a dinner table with a bunch of adults and say, “Tell me three things that you appreciate about yourself.” They go blank, they have a hard time with that. If you ask a five-year-old to do it, they’ll be like, “I appreciate my nose. I appreciate my coat.” They come up with things. They have no problem with it whatsoever. It’s almost like it’s taught out of us as we go through life. It’s like waiting for the other ball to drop or whatever that saying is. It’s like there’s always an air of disappointment ready to come into somebody else’s life because they don’t feel they have control over where it’s going.

It’s like you’re selfish or you’re self-centered if you appreciate yourself for something. It’s interesting, it’s like a social stigma. I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s the school that teaches. It affects a lot of people because I know a lot of people like that, even myself to an extent.

It starts off with the idea that part of our value systems is to put other people first. We’re never taught a healthy balance of putting ourselves first, taking care of ourselves, giving ourselves what it is that we need first and making that okay without being shamed for it. We’re not born with shame and guilt but it is used as a correction tool from the moment we’re born almost and then all through life. Once you pass that on to somebody, we do it ourselves. If my parents shamed and guilted me for my behavior, I don’t need them to continue doing it. I’ll do it for the rest of my life unless I correct that. If I’m doing something that would be outside of what was acceptable for them, I’ll immediately go into shame or guilt and automatically correct my behavior to go back to stay in that pattern. That’s where it has to start to change. Plus, the other thing is this. We’re the only form of life that adjusts our behavior for the appreciation of other forms of life. It happens in nature. The way that we were trained to do that is by limiting the way we can express ourselves.

I’ll do seminars and I’ll ask by a show of hands, “How many of you grew up in a household where it was not okay for you to express your anger?” 90% of the room will raise their hand. We were taught to express ourselves in a way that our parents were comfortable with, but not necessarily based on what we were going through emotionally or how we were feeling. In order to set ourselves free, we have to get back to that baseline of who are we and accepting ourselves for who we are and where we are. Not to say that we can’t get better, but not shaming ourselves for what we haven’t done yet and learning how to express ourselves authentically. Anything that would be considered a negative emotion, like a lot of people, consider anger a negative emotion. I suppose that it is when it’s expressed in a negative way. We’re human beings. When we do have those emotions, how do we express it in a positive way so that we can get it out of our body instead of suppressing it, then at some point blowing up where it does get expressed in a negative way?

We do tend to deal with it. It may seem so subtle on the surface where there’s this little issue and it’s like, “I’m not going to deal with it.” Even though we don’t think that it affects us, it does and it stays. Then the next time something happens, that it’s a little bit more and then a little bit more. That compounds out of control. I’ve thought about a lot of this about how we express ourselves or how we deal with especially negative situations in a productive way. I don’t know if I have the answer to it. I’ve been aware of it and I’ve thought through and I’ve had difficult conversations or had to have difficult conversations. What do I do in order to not subconsciously come across as a jerk?

TWS 16 | Wealth

Wealth: The natural progression is that whatever the dysfunction in life is, it’s going to continue to get worse until we have one of those radical wakeup call moments.

 

Part of it is evaluating how much a person has the ability to accept responsibility for themselves and talking to them based on that level of where they are. If you’re dealing with somebody who is projecting that they’re victims and that they’re entitled. You come like, “No, in order for you to change your life, you’ve got to accept responsibility.” They’re not going to be able to hear you. We have to get back to a place where we were teaching what responsibility is in society and holding people accountable for that. The difficulty that we have is that’s great for kids. A kid’s mind is not programmed yet to blame other people for their actions or where they are in life. When you’re teaching children, all they have to do is make up their minds. That’s the truth. That’s the direction that they’re going to go. They’re relatively okay with that with some guidance. Adults have to change their mind. You have to get them to accept a different idea about how life is based on what the problems are that they’re experiencing and where do they ultimately want to go. The truth of the matter is some people just don’t want to change it.

Also, there are layers upon layers, years upon years that is on top of what the core issue is. It’s typically what’s manifesting those core issues. You’re right, it’s dealing with that. In adults, especially, it’s difficult. Also one thing in relation to what you said, which is this understanding where we put others first before ourselves. The connection that I made years ago and I would say I still have issues with it, which is the best way to take care of others, is to first take care of yourself. If you don’t do that, then you’re going to show up less than what you could for others. You’re hurting others regardless of whether you put them first or not. If you put yourself first, that at least puts you in the optimal position to be of most benefit to others. These are all attitudes. It’s interesting it still seems very counterintuitive to what the overarching universal belief is. I see signs of it changing and adjusting. It’s years, decades and repetition of what’s held as a social belief or an American belief or whatever. It’s going to take a lot of work. It seems from your perspective, I would agree with it that there’s a momentum there.

I was listening to Oprah in an interview one time a couple of years ago. They were talking to her about racism and where we are as a society as far as racism. It was an interesting interview. There was nothing new being said. The question was asked, “What do we do with people that are above 55 years old? They were raised in a different generation with different beliefs. How do we change their minds?” Oprah’s response startled me when I first heard it. She said, “They just have to die.” At first, I thought to myself, “That’s crazy.” Then I was thinking from a realistic perspective, there are some generational beliefs that people are not going to change.

You can tell a person that racism is wrong and it’s ignorant and it’s passed down from one generation. You can bring all the logical argument to someone. If they don’t want to change the belief, they’re not going to change it. They’ll just shut up their mouth but they won’t necessarily change it. That’s what Oprah was trying to say. If you look at other things, it will pass away as those generations of people with beliefs as they transition. New generations of people come up with a more loving mindset or a liberal mindset or however it is that you want to put it. People are becoming more aware of the truth every day. It starts to become more obvious. We’ve pushed the button so far in one direction and there’s too much information that is readily available at everybody’s fingertips. It becomes difficult for the people to try to carry the light from one generation to another to be able to continue to do so.

We’ve been talking about how individuals suppress. Once it’s a group or a collective that’s suppressing something, it’s even stronger. Going to your story and your awakening when you went through that dam, catastrophic events oftentimes disrupt that mindset. Look at 9/11 or you look at the different hurricanes and natural disasters, they tend to bring people together. In those very disruptive environments I would say is where you have this inkling of people are putting aside any differences, political, social and race to help one another. Then a month goes by and it’s back to normal. It’s interesting to see how those types of disrupted events break down those social barriers that are evident.

Every dollar that we spend or that we earn benefits the lives of other people. Share on X

We do a program that’s called Date with Your Darkside. The whole idea behind it is that if you have something in your life that is showing up dysfunctional or a problem that just keeps persisting. My belief is that the universe is always trying to correct us individually, trying to get us back on track with what our purpose is. We don’t readily see all of those signs as we’re going through life. The natural progression is that whatever the dysfunction is, it’s going to continue to get worse until we have one of those radical wakeup call moments, whether it’s the trauma in our own life or we’re seeing it as a society. I’ve told people you don’t have to get to the point where you have a near-death experience to change if you can recognize what the signs are ahead of time. Then unravel or unpack what the patterns and the roles are that you’ve taken on from your parents that are continuing to cause those problems. You can proactively change and then learn the tools and the skill sets that you need in order to literally take your life down a totally different path and have a completely different result.

We’ve been doing that for a long time with people. The results are absolutely astounding that they get from that. For me, it came out of the idea of, “What happened in my life that caused me to change and what have I watched thousands of people do to precipitate change in their life? What caused that? What were the precursors that they experienced that said, “This has got to change now. Something different has to happen.” It doesn’t have to be that somebody dies or gets hurt. It could be something proactive, following something that inspires us, a desire that we have, an inspirational person or book or art or something like that. There are a lot of things in this world that are pointing in the right direction, we just have to wake up to what they are.

What does this have to do with being wealthy? This is a topic of your book and something I think a lot about. Let me first address this notion of awareness. That’s the keyword that you brought up is when these disruptive events happen, you have a new awareness. Your perception has changed. I was having a conversation with somebody and they made an observation about me, which was fascinating. I’m still trying to process it. My parents were both teachers in the same school system that I went to school in. My middle brother and I, we realized early on that we couldn’t get away with anything. The discipline level of normal teacher-student was enhanced because if we did something bad, they went to our parents. It was an extra layer.

You’re always trying to make sure that things look good. Whether it’s the right connection or not, I just found it fascinating that we have all these experiences in the past. It’s everybody. It’s not just me, it’s everyone, where we’ve had certain experiences that we put meaning on and we’ve just continued to grow and enhance whatever that is until it exists now. It’s not like everybody was watching me then. We may have gotten in trouble or whatever. It doesn’t apply or has meaning if you’re aware of and you know how to process it, which is a whole other set of things when you approach the dark side, as you put it with your event. When you show up in life, the value you create to the world is represented in a couple of ways. One of the ways is with wealth, with money which is, “Here’s what you’ve done for the world.” If you don’t have a lot of money, you can be a victim about it and say, “It’s because this didn’t happen or this person is this way, this person is that way.” If you take stewardship and responsibility for it, it’s becoming aware that and then figuring out how to show up different, how to change your attitude and control what you can control. What does any of this have to do with being wealthy or achieving what we define as wealth?

What I believe the way that this is connected is that money itself is very interesting when you take into consideration. If everybody was aware of how to earn whatever amount of money they needed whenever they needed it, which is my definition of wealth. It’s not stacking up money in the bank or in a mattress or whatever. Not that investing or saving is a bad thing. It’s a good thing, but that doesn’t define wealth. Wealth is your ability to bring that resource in. If everybody was aware of how to do that beyond working a job, understanding how money moves and how to bring it into their life then they become uncontrollable. It is one of the ways that society still can control the masses because if they are dependent upon everybody else for the money, then they have to conform to everything that is required in order for them to earn money.

TWS 16 | Wealth

Wealth: Wealth is a mindset; it’s not something that you achieve. It’s not this end result. It’s a way of being.

 

There are one or two reasons that people look at becoming wealthy. One is so that they don’t ever have to worry about money again, which is a negative viewpoint. That’s built out of fear. The other one is, “I am born to be a success. I have a purpose. It is going to require a lot of money for the fulfillment of that purpose and that purpose is going to benefit a lot of people and money is going to have a role in that.” In our website, we have a free download that’s called You Were Born to be a Success. It starts people off in that direction. It’s like turning the corner for that individual in their life. The key is that if we come from this place of, “I don’t have to worry about money because I’ve mastered my ability to bring finances into my life,” you totally change the direction and the purpose and the capacity for a person to expand their life because they’re no longer fixated on, “I’ve got to spend this much time or trading my time for money, working in a job that I don’t like, which makes people unhappy. Working with people I don’t like.” You should do what you love with people that you love and master being able to bring money in your life so that it’s not an issue. Everybody can do it.

My belief is that everybody on the planet has the same amount of money. They’re just either ignorant to that, meaning that they don’t know that that’s the truth or that they don’t want to change to be able to do the things that are required to bring it in. Earning a lot of money is not difficult. There are homeless people that understand that more than there are people that work that understand that. Homeless people are believably resourceful. There are people that walk around free, they talk about all the reasons why they can’t do something and we have people in prisons that are able to get drugs, pornography, cigarettes, all kinds of contraband and they’re in a 9×11 cell, 23 hours a day. How is it that they’re able to be more resourceful than a person who’s free? It’s the change in your mind that binds you. If you think about it in those comparisons.

You have a person that says, “I can’t do this because I don’t have the money.” The problem is that they don’t have the urgency. If you change the urgency in a person’s life in order to get the money, everything changes. If somebody said to you, “If you don’t come up with $10,000 in the next seven days, your kid will lose his life.” That I guarantee, the person will find $10,000 in seven days. That will be the same person that won’t go out and buy a self-help book because they say that they can’t afford it. Or they’ll be late on their payments because they literally stop with the imagination in their mind or the story in their mind that they can’t do it, it can’t be done or they have toleration as to what’s acceptable and they don’t raise their standards in their lives. But if you change the circumstances, they’re able to do it. They’ll break through whatever barrier that they have in order to make something happen.

The word “can,” what an amazingly controlling word that is, which is totally false. You’re hitting on things that just resonates so well. That’s probably what you meant with the title of your book, The Millions Within. Humankind shares very similar attributes as far as who we are, maybe not the physical environment in which we live but who we are and our ability to create and our ability to think. Going back to what we talked about, which is John Locke who lived in a time where there wasn’t electricity, there wasn’t plumbing, where life was very at a rudimentary level. He saw what a human being could create with the right mindset, with the right environment and so forth. As you alluded to in the beginning, we have more opportunity now than ever. Also, you could see a perspective where people think it’s all going to end. It’s all going to end.

What we’ve been talking about here, wealth to me is a mindset and it’s not something that you achieve. It’s not this end result. It’s a way of being. You don’t have to have a lot of money in the bank to think and believe that way. I believe that true wealth is going to come about by first believing and thinking that way, which will create a specific attitude which will then bring you around the right people and get you away from the wrong people. That right there altogether is that state that people are seeking. It’s not a state that you achieve, it’s a state that you are working on all the time.

There's something to be said for finding why you're here and having the appreciation and the gratitude for that. Share on X

It is a state, it is a way of being. It is how you show up every day. Anybody can do it. It starts with this. If you’re willing to take responsibility for everything that’s in your life, you take your power back, which allows you to change your perception and see what you couldn’t previously see before. All the opportunities, everything that you need is here for everybody. It’s not to pick or choose. You don’t see the worry. You don’t see the fear. You don’t see the dysfunction anywhere in nature unless human beings get involved. Nature just flows with life and intelligence. It knows exactly what to do. Think about a beaver building a dam. They don’t go to building dams school as little beavers. That’s instinctual knowledge that they have. It’s the same with birds building a nest. Those are very intricate things if you’ve ever looked at one up-close. How did they know how to do that? We have the same guidance inside of ourselves. We’ve got to stop following the dysfunctional stories that we’ve been told that are not based on any truth and start following what is true. The truth is you have to study a little bit to get to those things. If you’re willing to do that, you can change your life for the better in a very short period of time.

David, this has been enlightening for me. This has helped me connect a few things. I appreciate that from a personal level. We’ve been talking about all of your elements of this. We brought it together well. Thank you so much for helping us do that. I know you have not just the book but there are a lot of other resources that you have that speak to practical ways of implementing some of what we’ve been talking about. Would you mind speaking about that?

All anybody has to do is go to our website, DavidNeagle.com. There is a free download there called You Were Born To Be A Success. There are also a lot of other resources. Our events are all listed on the website if you want to come to participate with us. You could give one of our coaches a call. That information is on the website and they’ll help you work through any problem that you’re having and help you with what is the next step from there.

Are you active on social media?

Yes, we’re on absolutely everything and always communicating there.

David, we’re going to have to do a follow up to this. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and your experiences with us. We appreciate it. I’m sure we’ll touch base and talk soon.

Thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Important Links:

About David Neagle

TWS 16 | Wealth

In September of 1989, what was supposed to be a rare relaxing day with family cruising down the Illinois River in a roomy boat, quickly turned into a nightmare.

David Neagle was pulled deep into the gates of a dam that shredded his flesh, broke his back, and nearly drowned him. No one expected him to survive the accident, and rescue workers even told his family he was already dead. (Entire boats had been sucked into this same dam, without survivors.)

What happened instead is that David, a high-school dropout and dock worker, awakened to the potential previously untapped within him. He made a decision that day to begin the journey responsible for changing his entire life, and now the lives of thousands of others.

David Neagle knows how to help you achieve whatever dream your heart desires – no matter where you’re starting from.

After his brush with death, David began to study his own potential. In the 12 months following his accident – despite being unable to walk for more than a month – he tripled his income. By December of 2000, David had expanded to become an executive corporate manager, a stock investor, and a business owner.

Over the years, David continually sought new mentors with each new level of success he attained. He began to study every great person in history. But it wasn’t until David began studying “The Science of Getting Rich” by Wallace D. Wattles, that he fully understood the transformation he’d undergone. Wattles’ book uncovered the exact change in David’s thinking and in his attitude that had gotten the ball rolling to create his unstoppable success.

Today, David Neagle is the best selling author of The Millions Within and is known as one of the architects of the coaching and personal growth industry itself, having worked alongside other well-known mentors like Bob Proctor, Marianne Morrisey, Tony Robbins and the like for decades.

 

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TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

Jeff Kreisler on Dollars, Sense And Behavioral Economics

December 13, 2018 Patrick Donohoe Podcast 00:38:02 Comments Off on Jeff Kreisler on Dollars, Sense And Behavioral Economics

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TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

 

It has been said that the predominant thing people think daily is money. Our financial well-being has fully occupied our lives that it dictates what we do and what we think. Getting down into the science of that is lawyer turned author, speaker, pundit, comedian and advocate for behavioral science, Jeff Kreisler. Jeff shows his expertise as he talks about economics, money, and behavior in general. He shares his own journey that led him to explore how economics is a measurement of human behavior. Moving forward, Jeff talks about his book co-written by Daniel Ariely, Dollars and Sense: How We Misthink Money and How to Spend Smarter, ultimately putting forward the importance not in the pursuit of money but the end result in our lifestyle.

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Listen to the podcast here:

Jeff Kreisler on Dollars, Sense And Behavioral Economics

What makes humans tick? Why do we look at the world rationally and expect perfection, and then behave irrationally and settle with our own imperfection? There is a whole field of economics known as behavioral economics, which is relatively new and studies the often-missing variables and economic models which is human behavior. Thank you for joining me on the final season of 2018 where we are discussing the Principle of Property. I have an awesome guest, but it’s been a wild ride. It’s been an awesome 2018. I’ve been a huge fan of Daniel Ariely. Daniel Ariely is a behavioral economist and he has some incredibly entertaining videos on YouTube. If you want a good date night movie, his documentary which is called (Dis)Honesty, which is modeled after his book, Predictably Irrational. Both the book and the documentary are some of my favorites. Daniel Ariely coauthored a book with my guest and the book is Dollars and Sense: How We Misthink Money and How to Spend Smarter. My guest is Jeff Kreisler and he is entertaining and full of humor. It’s going to be a great interview. I look forward to hearing your feedback. Thanks again for all your support of the show and our seasons for 2018. We have some cool plans for 2019. Here is the interview with my guest, Jeff Kreisler.

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TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

Dollars and Sense: How We Misthink Money and How to Spend Smarter

It’s my honor and privilege to have Jeff Kreisler on the show. We are going to be talking about a book that he wrote and about the behavior in general economics and money. Jeff is a Princeton alumnus. He studied economics and law there. He also wrote the book, Get Rich Cheating. He also is a coauthor of Dollars and Sense with Daniel Ariely. He is the Editor-In-Chief for PeopleScience.com. If that resume was enough, he also can add to it that he is a standup comedian and contributor to some news networks CNN, Fox News and MSNBC is a few of them. Jeff, that’s a long list of accolades. Thank you for taking the time.

Thanks for having me.

In doing some research and understanding the background of your book and your background in general, I find it intriguing that you have such a unique background. Someone who gets into law and economics, but also has a sense of humor isn’t something you often find. It might be good for you to tell us a little bit about your background and what your formal education background is. How you got into writing books, speaking and standup comedy. Why don’t you give us an idea of your background, if you wouldn’t mind?

I went to Princeton and I studied Economics, Politics and also Russian Studies there. I love studying and I decided to go to law school because I wanted to be Thurgood Marshall or Thomas Jefferson. As any lawyers who are reading may know, that’s not the direct career path that one takes. I chose the “traditional path” of becoming a comedian. I will admit to my privilege that I had gone to Princeton and had a law degree from Virginia Law School. It’s a great law school and I passed the California Bar, so I had a safety net of my own that allowed me to take the risks to become a comedian.

I was in San Francisco. I did political comedy. I had some success there. I won some awards. I made a little hay with it. As I was struggling to pay the bills and everything, someone approached me and said, “Do you want to write a column for Jim Cramer’s TheStreet.com about financial news and business news? A weekly humor column?” I said, “No.” He said, “It pays.” I said, “Yes.” I learned to dive into that world. Through that, I got an opportunity. It was a relatively popular site and a popular column. A publisher approached me to see if I had some book ideas. I then proposed this Get Rich Cheating book, which came out in 2009.

It was a satire. Initially, it was focused on financial crime. 2009 was a great time to talk about Enron and WorldCom and all that. I ended up going through HarperCollins and we expanded it to include steroids, election fraud, and show business. It was a fake how to book, Stephen Colbert meets Jim Cramer meets Tony Robbins. I had some success with that. That got me my first broader media attention. As far as my own career path, Dan Ariely got a copy of it. Dan is one of the leaders in this field of behavioral economics. Our audience might have heard of Richard Thaler in 2017, he won the Nobel Prize in Economics. He’s a peer of Dan’s. Dan invited me to lecture at his class at Duke University where he’s teaching graduate business.

TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions

He didn’t introduce me as a comedian but as someone with unique wealth building ideas. It was a light bulb moment for me because I did this satirical lecture. I went and I told these graduate business students at a top business school, “You should cheat cost-benefit analysis. No one’s getting caught. There’s no cost and the benefits are millions of dollars.” There was always a healthy portion of the class, a quarter to a third of them that said, “That makes sense.” For me, it was a light bulb moment because these weren’t bad people. It was money clouds are our visions sometimes. My informal research understanding was that money makes us do irrational crazy things. Through this, I discovered Dan’s work in the field who wrote Predictably Irrational that some of them may have heard of and all of his peers.

We worked together on small projects then came out with this book that came in 2017 called Dollars and Sense. It’s about the psychology of money, the way we misthink money and the psychological biases and cues that lead even the most intelligent or the most informed about finances we make mistakes. As that publication was approaching, I wanted to build on the momentum that I had working with Dan and the fact that I became a believer in the power of these behavioral sciences. There weren’t silver bullets, but there was certainly a new tool in our toolbox to solve a lot of problems.

I got the opportunity to run PeopleScience. PeopleScience is a platform where we discuss behavioral science and the future of applying it to everything from personal finance to organizational design, employee engagement and loyalty habits. We get professors and researchers talking to practitioners and people in business, and those that do know and it’s accessible. The reason why I was brought on is to bring them, whether it’s humor or that ability to speak in a way that’s not academic jargon. That’s been my obsession and talking about what I’ve learned and what the great lessons are in behavioral science. In addition, I still do comedy. I’m a traditional comedy but that’s woven together into this piece of where I’m at.

Paul Krugman is probably the most notable economist who comes from Princeton.

Alan Blinder was my Econ 101. He used to be on the Fed. Ben Bernanke, I didn’t get his class but he was teaching there at the time. He was the Fed Chair and Alan Blinder was an advisor to Obama.

There is a cultural drive to have the value in your whole life be measured by financial worth and value. Share on X

The thing that helped me understand how important human behavior is was there’s this guy that wrote for the Economic Policy Journal. He wrote an article and this was years ago. The point of the article is that you have a lot of these economic models that are principle-based, are math-based. It’s the rational measurement of irrational behavior, which is human behavior. You’re trying to essentially govern people rationally when they don’t behave rationally ever. You come from that school of thought. What was it that flipped the switch for you? Where you started to make connections that even economics is known as the dismal science but the economics is just measurements of human behavior. Where did that light bulb come on?

The short answer is it was probably around being exposed to Dan Ariely’s work and his peers. The longer answer is that I had the same instinct as you that behavioral economics was not an offering when I was in college or law school. It only emerged in the last decade or so. Even then it’s still emerging. For me when I studied traditional economics, even though I got good grades and I understood it and I could explain it, it didn’t click with me. The basis of traditional economics is if I’m in a supermarket and the milk is $0.20 cheaper at the supermarket next door, I’m going to go next door. No, I’m not. I’m a lazy human. I don’t want to be bothered. It’s not a number-based decision, it’s an emotional-based decision.

That was something I knew and felt but never necessarily articulated. I discovered behavioral economics, which is essentially not ignoring traditional economics but marrying that to human psychology. It’s about our decision-making processes and finding a balance between what we say we’ll do. We say we’ll go for that $0.20, but then what do we do? What is our decision at that moment and when emotions play into it? A great example of the difference between the traditional model and the model is anecdotal. Almost universally I’ll go to a big investment firm and they talk about their best performers, the people that advise high wealth individuals how to spend their money.

The employees who tell others how to invest their money, a large number of those employees are terrible at managing their own money. To me, it says they know what to do but at the moment they get caught off guard by emotions and needs and it makes sense. I can tell Joe X, “Here’s how you plan for your kids’ college and your retirement,” but then what I’m thinking about, “That’s my kid. That’s my future.” It feels different and we do things differently. It shows how you have to have that emotional part of it, which is unsettling to those that want things to be an easy answer. Economics can provide an easy checkbox answer, but that’s not how we live.

Writing a book, even though it was satirical in nature during the financial crisis, everything you said in that book had truth to it even though there was a humorous spin. You look at what occurred there. What were some of the things you learned during that period of time? It sounded like that occurred before meeting Daniel Ariely. Pick up on some things there were you saw like, “Why would this person do that?” What are some of the things you saw as you were preparing to write the book? What were some of the things that enlightened you at that point?

Life is not about the pursuit of how you measure with money but of the lifestyle you live that impacts others. Share on X

There was a lot and it’s stuff that still reflects in our society. On the one end, there was this cultural drive to have value in your whole life be measured by financial worth and value. Money is measurable. You can look at your salary and see a number, whereas you can’t look at happiness, meaning and purpose and put a number to it. It’s understandable. The discussion of whether American culture breeds that more than others, it’s a longer conversation. The point is it was there. At the same time, people’s ability to reach these standards wasn’t always being met. It drove people to want to try to find shortcuts.

On the one hand, there is that broadly cultural thing that why would people want to cheat? The psychology of cheaters themselves, whether they’re Bernie Madoff, Alex Rodriguez, Lance Armstrong, any number of other CEOs or people in Hollywood. Look at someone like Harvey Weinstein who maybe didn’t financially cheat, but this mentality of, “I get away with something. I don’t get caught, and then I’m going to get away with more.” That mentality of abandoning an ethical or moral core and pursuing this bottom line and power dynamic was exposed to me in a way that I didn’t expect. All of us have cheated a little bit. We fudged a number here and there, but it takes a certain special someone to go above whatever that 2% or 3% jumps are to make it all their life.

I want to get into Daniel Ariely and your experience with him. I’ve probably watched that (Dis)Honesty documentary a bunch of times. We understand that we’re irrational and emotional. Yet, we look at the world sometimes through a lens of perfection like, “This is what a person should do. This is how they should be. This is what they should have done in this situation.” The question that more applied to the Dollars and Sense book is what was your perspective on money personally, going into that first book? You’ve been writing for the Jim Cramer blog, but writing the first book. How did it start to shift and then get into the story with Daniel Ariely? How has your perspective shifted with the experience with him helping you write the book?

I would certainly say my own view of money and my own behaviors around money have changed dramatically, probably the most in the process of writing the book about the psychology of money. I’m becoming aware of my own biases and mistakes and I certainly still make mistakes. I’m not even sure if this has to do with as much of what I’ve worked on or as much as maturation, is understanding where money rates on the importance and how you value things. After Princeton Law School, I was offered these big corporate law firm jobs. I was at 24, 25-year-old. People were like, “Here’s a bunch of money. Your life is set if you want to be a corporate partner.” I turned it down because whether they call it privilege or stupidity, that was not important to me. I don’t think I ever understood why. The more that I looked at the way the money impacted people and made people skewed in their priorities, the more I realized that maybe there was some instinctive core to what I decided. It’s a little maybe more psychology, lie on the couch and talk about your mother.

I certainly had my own relationship with money involved through seeing how people acted immorally and unethically with it. When I worked on Dan’s book and I saw all these studies about the mistakes we make. The way that we fall for sale prices, the way those brand names affect us, the way that the descriptions of things and the setting of things impact our value. This concept or the pain of paying, which is how when we pay for something, it stimulates the same region of our brain as physical pain. That should make us stop and think if it’s a good decision. Instead of feeling that pain, what we do is numb it with credit cards and AutoPay and E-ZPass and Apple Pay. How all this financial technology that helps make spending easier makes spending less thoughtful. The same idea can be used to make retirement savings easier and less thoughtful, which can be positive. It provided me with a new perspective on the way that I was earning, spending and saving my own income as well as seeing what was happening and what was developing around me.

Ariely talks about this a lot in his other books, which is more of the pursuit of not the monetary side of it but more of the end result or the lifestyle, the meaning behind it like your family or a sense of stability for your family or your family in this situation. Being able to do this and this as the flagship as opposed to the money itself. Is that an accurate statement as far as one of the themes of the book?

That is something that we bring up towards the end as a big picture of you. The book isn’t advising you to not worry about money. It’s advising you to understand how you think about money so that you can identify what your own failings and biases are and then try to address those. Try to create systems and everything. Both Dan and I have in our own way an appreciation for the stuff that doesn’t involve money, that involves experiences. What’s fascinating about the work I’ve done at PeopleScience is that on the book I didn’t delve into that too deeply. There are some books about happiness that we referenced. At PeopleScience, I’ve looked more in this field about nonmonetary rewards. Essentially, it’s always been in this sense of engagement and motivation in employees, but all these studies showing that cash bonuses are not as effective as giving non-monetary bonuses. As far as making people motivated, feel fulfilled, have a purpose and connect it to their work.

A $10,000 bonus is not as effective as a $7,000 all-expense paid trip to Hawaii for that employee’s family. If you think about this, there’s plenty of reason to think from both perspectives. The company saves money, that’s the bottom line but the employee gets this unique experience. They get to anticipate the trip and then reminisce about the trip and enjoy the trip. It’s all this wealth of value to them in addition to making them feel like, “My company values me more than the check does.” In the book, there is a little comment we have at the end about like, “It’s not about money. You shout other things of value,” but since then I’ve learned that there are ways that people are measuring this and trying to think about how we can use it to impact our lives. Not everybody can be rich. If you can’t be rich in money, how can you be rich in life?

If people have financial stress, it affects their work. Share on X

Ultimately, if you were to get people to be open and authentic about it, they would describe those whether it’s experiences or trips or things with their family. Those are what they’re after, not necessarily the money. What are you seeing as, maybe not at an individual level but at any level, how people are taking what they’re learning from the book and applying that? Individual-level, business group level, how has it impacted people?

In a few ways. One, I get my own sense of value and reward when I hear from people both I know and don’t know. They’ll reach out and mention a particular chapter and the book is divided. The chapters each address an individual bias or principle the way that we make a money mistake. People respond and say, “That story connected with me.” Sometimes jokingly, personally we have a story about people that fall for sale prices and that is the one that most people reach out. Others do other ones are like, “That’s me. I recognize myself in that story.” That’s rewarding to me because what ends up happening is this isn’t a book that gives that Suze Orman type like, “Put 10% here. Put 3% here.” It shows you what you’re doing. What I’ve found is these individuals start seeing their own mistakes and maybe they still buy those sale items. Our hope is that gradually they start to change their behavior or if they realize it’s a big problem, they design ways of checking themselves.

It’s had the result on an individual level of people recognizing their own mistakes and maybe they didn’t see. That slowly but surely is helping them change those behaviors and recognize them as mistakes. On an organizational level, I’ve spoken to a bunch of organizations of all different sorts and it’s been likewise rewarding. Companies don’t often realize the impact of financial stress on their employees. Anybody reading this, if you have stress, whether you are arguing with your spouse or you’re worried about money or where do your kids go to school, whatever it is affects your work. You can’t think about it. If people have financial stress, it affects their work.

The book and the talks that I give and somebody’s advice that’s in there can help alleviate that stress and at least alleviate the uncertainty, which is often the biggest cause of these mistakes we make. It’s like, “We don’t know what to do. We don’t know how to value our retirement. We don’t know how to value a shirt at JCPenney’s. We don’t know how to value medicine or homes.” It seemed these decisions are hard. If we can provide some tools to not provide the answers, but at least help that difficulty it’d be a little easier, that has an immense potential to impact not just those people who are making that decision, but their family, their friends, their community, and their workplace. It’s been great to see that on an organizational level, people recognizing the value in that too.

The predominant thing people think about daily is money. There are studies out there that show that. It comes down to what is the underlying anxiety and fear? You have a much bigger perspective that sounds like what generally is happening with people, especially in the US when it comes to livelihood. It seems the more technology we have, the less it’s doing for people. Money was a primary concern many years ago. It’s still the primary concern now. Those concerns, those anxieties are irrational. Do you see a shift one way or the other in the general consensus that people have in regard to their financial well-being and what to do about it?

TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

Behavioral Economics: Living longer past retirement is valid and important to recognize.

 

I definitely think that the attitudes towards money are changing. There’s a cultural shift and I won’t speculate on what’s the driving force. From people not working at a company for their whole career anymore, people go for seven years as the itch, to Millennials not valuing buying homes as much as they used to and owning property. To people still feeling the waves of that financial collapse in 2008 and 2009. People are looking at the accumulation of wealth as being less of a life goal. People are starting to appreciate experiences a little bit more. When I say people, I understand I’m segmenting. There are still a lot of people who live in a scarcity mindset and who are struggling to survive. To them, their psychology of money is different. They have different needs. The idea of trading off a $10,000 bonus for a $7,000 Hawaiian vacation is not in that world.

Even they face the same psychological barriers and biases. I have spoken to some groups that serve lower-income people. In their own way, these communities have already recognized these problems and try to find ways to solve them because they have to, to survive. They can’t overspend as much as people that have more income and more wealth can. That distinction aside, and I want to make that clear. I recognize that difference. It has been shifting some. I don’t know what the source is whether it’s reality TV or Trump presidency or what. The value on wealth for its own sake has diminished. That could be wishful thinking, but there’s some truth in that.

I look at over the 100 years or so we’ve delegated lots of responsibilities to the government in regard to our well-being. I would assume comes an ominous problem or challenge of Social Security or an aging generation that has insufficient resources. You as an economist looking towards the future, do you look at the demographic shifts that are occurring? Do you see some challenges that may not be evident now, but most likely coming in the future? You can speculate at the same time. If you have a lack of resources and you’re old, you’re going to want as much help as possible. If that group is powerful, then they’re going to influence policy-making and then that sets off a course of events that could even be worse. How do you look at the social demographic shifts and how it relates to what are some of the challenges people will ultimately have? How will that impact society?

We can’t change human nature, but we can understand human nature and then create systems so that we get to a better outcome. Share on X

The idea that our demographic shift and growing an older population that’s living longer, therefore living longer past retirement is valid and important to recognize. For my own self and my own work, I tend to bring that back to the individual and the fact that we individually don’t plan for retirement as a basic. We don’t plan for the future. We don’t save. I don’t have the numbers handy, but there was one number American savings rate. People would have to work until they’re 82 to afford retirement and the average life expectancy is 78. We’re in the negative. It’s a matter of we don’t individually connect to our future selves. Part of the reason why there’s no self-control is because we’re not connected to like, “30-year-old Jeff doesn’t know or care about 70-year-old Jeff,” or figures, “A 30-year-old Jeff’s not going to worry about it, but 50-year-old Jeff will take care of it, and 50-year-old Jeff doesn’t either. 50-year-old’s like 60-year-old Jeff.” We don’t connect. There are certain tools out there to try to make us connect or there are cultural ways of addressing that if we choose.

In Australia for instance, I was once offered a job in Australia and they gave me a salary. On top of that was the automatic retirement savings. Let’s say it was $100,000 salary plus $12,000 into retirement. It wasn’t like it’s set up here, which is $100,000 and then we’ll take out $12,000 if you so choose. It would have been automatic on top. That’s framing and the fact that it becomes the default. If you can’t change the individual’s perspective, which I don’t believe we can change human nature. We can understand human nature and then create systems so that we get to a better outcome. That was a cultural and societal decision to do that. Is that the best approach? Is that the only approach? I don’t think so. Americans would have a hard time accepting mandatory retirement savings. That’s not in our nature to like that. Nonetheless, somewhere in the middle there in this particular issue is a solution that recognizes that if left to our own devices, we’re not going to save for our future. If forced to save for our future, we’re going to revolt.

As I was going through your book and learning more about you and exposure to Daniel Ariely. Being aware of your own behavior is one thing, being aware of others’ behavior is another. There are some common themes that are evident through your books but also history. I look at the future and there’s a tremendous opportunity because there are these ominous challenges we get. There are huge opportunities if you understand how people are going to react and behave in certain circumstances. Have an idea at least so that you can position whether it’s a business or a technology or some service that would help in those circumstances. As I look at PeopleScience, it’s understanding people value to figure out ways to provide value to people. Provide some service that’s going to help them.

TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

Behavioral Economics: Left to our own devices, most people develop that sense of apathy that leave them not doing anything.

 

I would agree with the caveat in the way you described it makes it sound a lot easier than it is in practice. This I bring up because it is one of the challenges facing the field is there are people that think, I’m not saying this is what you’re expressing, but people think it’s off the rack solutions. In order to apply this stuff, it’s common and text-driven. It’s a certain designed nudge that works. Let’s say even specific works for Toyota dealers that nudge probably won’t work for high-end BMW dealers. It’s these little tweaks and yes to the point that if you understand human behavior and you understand the context, you can find a solution. It’s going to provide value to all the stakeholders, but the process isn’t as easy as snapping your fingers. The process still requires that experimentation and the deep understanding of both the science, the industry and the field. There’s great promise in there. It’s hard work but yes, the potential outcome and potential impact are great.

The general awareness of people is increasing because our interconnectivity has magnified. People’s tastes are going to change. Tendencies and preferences are going to change over time. There are many variables, but ultimately if you understand more of how people operate. It gives you an opportunity to provide value in those circumstances. I’m curious, fascinated by your inner working with Daniel Ariely, having direct access, writing a book with him, picking his brain. I’m assuming there’s probably conflict in some of the stuff you wanted to write about and what he had said was incorrect or had another opinion about. Could you describe your experience with Daniel Ariely and what you’ve learned from him that was in the book, but maybe some other context as well?

The biggest problem with working with Dan Ariely was that he was not a problem at all. He’s great and giving and kind. The writing process took a long time because we had conversations. He gave me a bunch of research and a bunch of ideas. He gave it to me and said, “Go write this. Give a pass and then we’ll go through it.” In some ways, I probably would’ve worked better if he was a lot meaner and didn’t put it all. When I wrote the book about cheating, I essentially created this field of cheating and therefore became the leading thinker in it. My writing process involves me puffing myself up and being like, “I’m the greatest. What I say is personal.” I could write with confidence.

When I was writing about a field where I knew there were experts who knew ten billion times more than me and I was writing with one of them, it became hard to write that confidence. The biggest problem with writing the book was my own confidence in getting the ball rolling as a creative person. I tongue in cheek say that’s Dan’s fault because he believed in me. Once I got over that hump, we didn’t have a lot of conflicts. Moving things around, what’s emphasized, I relied on him to make sure that what I was saying about the science was accurate. That was his decision too. There was one joke that he nixed that I’m glad he nixed because I knew we shouldn’t do it anyway.

We went through four different formats of the book. At one point it was like, “Let’s write half the book as a story of a family, then go back and analyze it.” I wrote one version. I didn’t get too far but I wrote enough of it that was awesome but never held together. Basically, the book was going to be a conversation between God and the devil. On the one hand, God is the good side and the devil is the temptation and it affects our decision making. There was no way I was going to make this work, but it was a great try. Working with Dan was great both in leading up to it and in the process. Next to the word mensch in the dictionary should be his picture. He’s smart.

The more we're aware of our tendencies in how we behave, the more we're going to help each other. Share on X

We’ve all had moments of extreme lucidity and clarity where anything that comes to us, we know how to respond. We can speak clearly and distinctively. We can go on a five-minute tangent and pull it back to where we were. We had those moments. Dan seems to always be like that. It is incredibly impressive. He has a fascinating life story that your audience should check out, how he came into this. In short, he was burned over a lot of his body and then he observed the way that his nurses treated his wounds. He’s a fascinating guy and it’s been great working with him. We’ve done a few things since then and it’s been a pleasure.

What I’m picking up on, he tells the story in Predictably Irrational about his burns. I love hearing him speak. There’s so much you can detect by the way you feel about what he says, his personality and what he’s talking about. It sounds like you went in with a high bar and an environment where you wanted to write accurate but also write something that he puts his stamp on. Sometimes that environment elevates our performance or what we’re able to do as far as output is concerned. We’ve had a lot of putting yourself in an environment that forces you to expand.

Left to our own devices, most people have that sense of apathy so that they won’t do anything, but if they’re put in a situation where they’re forced to do it and either perform or not. I look at how fascinating, how amazing the understanding of human behavior, how people think, what they’re thinking about and what drives them is becoming more evident. Now you have a lot of empirical science around it as far as being able to measure the stimulus and responses. He does tons of those different experiments or case studies. In the end, money is still the predominant issue that people are having whether it’s worse, whether it’s breaking up relationships, business failure. It comes down to how people are thinking, how they’re behaving. This science is powerful and kudos to you for taking on Editor-In-Chief of PeopleScience. The more we’re aware of each other and our tendencies in how we behave, the more we’re going to help each other. I’ll leave you with the final word on what you’re doing as far as PeopleScience is concerned. What are you up to next? What’s motivating now? What is the mission and so forth?

I would certainly invite everyone to check out PeopleScience, a newsletter if you want to get bothered once every couple of weeks. It’s a place where I’m trying to make this stuff accessible and help people think about how it applies to their lives, their work, and their organizations. I don’t know the answers and even the academics recognize that their highly refined research doesn’t apply to everything. It is a powerful tool. It’s not the only tool we should use to affect change in our lives, society and work, but it’s an effective one. To understand how people are and how we make decisions. Our emotion plays into many things, even when we deny it. Financial advisors, there should just be numbers but there’s emotion there. That’s okay. That’s good. That’s what makes us beautiful creatures and not machines. The more we recognize that, the better we’ll be. My standard line is, I don’t think we can change human nature but we can understand human nature so that we can make our environment, society and systems work for us instead of work against us.

Jeff, you’re doing great work. Thank you so much. Thanks for writing your books. Go to PeopleScience.com, JeffKreisler.com. If you’re doing some comedic stuff, I’m sure you post stuff on social media. Jeff, it was awesome to have you on. Thank you so much for your time and best of luck with everything.

Thank you so much.

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About Jeff Kreisler

TWS 14 | Behavioral Economics

Jeff Kreisler is just a typical Princeton educated lawyer turned author, speaker, pundit, comedian and advocate for behavioral science. He uses humor & research to understand, explain and change the world.

Winner of the Bill Hicks Spirit Award for Thought Provoking Comedy, he runs PeopleScience.com, writes for TV, politicians & CEOs, shares witty insight on CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC & SiriusXM and tours most of this planet.

Jeff specializes in politics, money and other human encounters.

 

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Patrick Talks “Multi-Family” Real Estate With Michael Blank / Property, Episode -4

September 27, 2018 Patrick Donohoe Business, Economy, Education, Finance, Government, Health, Life, Money, Podcast, Politics, Science, Technology, The Wealth Standard, Tips 00:41:09 Comments Off on Patrick Talks “Multi-Family” Real Estate With Michael Blank / Property, Episode -4

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Patrick Donohoe welcomes Micheal Blank as his special guest for Property, Episode-4!

Michael is an entrepreneur, investor and personal development coach.  Originally, Michael made a large amount of money developing software during the dot com boom, and after diversifying is career, he found a passion for investing in multi-family properties.  His company Nighthawk Equity currently controls over $65 million in performing multi-family assets all over the United States and he dedicates tons of his time helping others become financially free in 3 to 5 years by investing in apartments buildings with a special focus on raising money.

 

Patrick Talks With Nick Vertucci / Property / Episode – 2

September 13, 2018 Patrick Donohoe Business, Economy, Education, Finance, Government, Health, Life, Money, Podcast, Politics, Science, Technology, The Wealth Standard, Tips 00:42:59 Comments Off on Patrick Talks With Nick Vertucci / Property / Episode – 2

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Patrick Donohoe talks about entrepreneurship and Real Estate with Nick Vertucci!

Nick is and educator and the founder of NV Real Estate. He came from a very humble background.  His life is “that” story.  The “rags to riches”, American underdog type story that many of us love to hear about, but wouldn’t wish on their worst enemy!

Nick hailed from a humble family, which could hardly make ends meet.  His situation got much worse and more difficult when his father died when he was only 10-years old.  He’s been running his own businesses since we was 18 and he’s been through pretty much everything an entrepreneur can go through!

Fast forward several years and his company NV Real Estate is doing fantastic and it’s for this reason and so many more that we’re honored to have Nick on this episode of The Wealth Standard.

 

About the host

Patrick Donohoe

Patrick Donohoe

CEO Paradigm Life

Patrick is the President and CEO and started Paradigm Life in 2007 after learning from his mentor Kim Butler about financial strategies outside of Wall Street.

With a background in economics and marketing, Patrick immediately realized the opportunity to teach investors, business owners, professionals and families on a large scale using modern digital media and communication technology. Since 2007 Paradigm Life has worked with thousands of individuals in all 50 states.