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That's FijiAirways.com. You deserve this. Go from here to happiness. Flying direct with Fiji Airways. Radical Personal Finance, Episode 51. Today's show, Friday Q&A, we're going to cover a lot of ground. We're going to dig into accounting, accrual accounting, and cash method of accounting. We're going to dig into double entry accounting and single entry accounting.

We're going to talk about using Roth IRAs as emergency funds, what to do and what not to do, how to do financial planning for elderly people. We're going to talk about business ideas and how to get started in business. And we're going to discuss some not so happy feedback about my recent Walmart show.

Do I have any accurate understanding of what goes on with Walmart and am I a racist? Welcome to the Radical Personal Finance podcast. I appreciate you being here. Today is Episode 51 for Friday, August 29, 2014. I'm looking forward to today's show. We're going to cover a lot of ground.

This is going to be an intense – it is going to be intense. It's going to be a show of intense variety. And I hope that you find it interesting. This is what I love to do is to mix everything up. It's been a great week on the show.

I've really enjoyed the shows that I've produced for you. I hope that you have found them beneficial and helpful. I've gotten some good feedback from them. I want to lead off this morning just with mentioning I finally, finally, finally was able to get the audio feedback line set up for you.

So if you go on the website now, you will see I set up SpeakPipe. It is evidently the best program to use if you ask all the techie people about that. So I set up SpeakPipe. So SpeakPipe. So if you go on the website, either on your computer or on your phone, you can see a little send voicemail button on the right-hand side.

And if you just click that button, it will allow you to record right with your computer and with your phone. So it will use the onboard speaker for your computer or you can use the onboard speaker on your smartphone. It doesn't have a 1-800 line or anything like that associated with it.

I hope that doesn't make a difference at this point. I thought you can set some of those kinds of things up, but it seems like this is a little bit simpler. And it seems simpler to me if you're going to -- just as simple if you're going to pull your phone out while you're driving and send me a voicemail, you might as well just do it using the Internet connection versus the 1-800 line.

So if you feel differently, let me know. If I need to set up some kind of 1-800 line or something like that so you can leave me a voicemail, please do that. But my hope is that -- I want to keep doing these Friday Q&A shows. And today I'm covering questions that I've received via email and comments on the blog.

But I want to open this up and start doing audio feedback questions as well. So you can ask a question. You'll have about three minutes to record it, although I'll try to keep it shorter than that. But let's figure out kind of what works and what doesn't when I see what kind of questions come in.

So I'm going to record the question on the site and send it in. And I will play the audio on the show. So hopefully that will give a little bit of the phone situation and allow me to continue talking about a diverse set of topics on Fridays, which is something that I want to do.

I really think that adds a lot. And I will enjoy hearing from many of you, and I'm sure that you will enjoy hearing from many of your fellow listeners. So I'm going to lead off this morning. So there's going to be a lot of topics, and I think it will be fun.

I think it will be a good variety for you to enjoy. So I'm going to start off with a question, which was a question that came in on the cash flow episode, which was episode 26. And so that episode was an introduction to the cash flow statement. And if you're interested, if you haven't heard that show, it's at radicalpersonalfinance.com/26.

But I want to answer a question from Big Dave, who commented on that episode. And here was his comment. He said, "I'm having trouble wrapping my head around the following. I put aside every month a one-twelfth portion of large annual expenses, like auto insurance. When I do the math on what my savings rate is for a given month, my savings rate would include this money that I set aside.

Then the month rolls around where that large annual expense is due. It's great because I have that money and can pay the bill in cash. But when I do my savings rate calculation, the month that the large expense came due, couldn't it actually be negative?" And he goes on to give an example and says that in month one, example, assume he has $1,000 of gross income, $900 of expenses.

So he has a surplus of $100, and so his savings rate is 10%. But technically that $100 is allocated towards the auto insurance payment, which is due 12 months from now. And then in month 12, he earns $1,000, has $900 of regular expenses, and then has $1,200 of auto insurance costs.

And so it looks like he has a deficit of $1,100 and a messed up savings rate. So he says, "If I had a statement of cash flows over a one-year period, everything would equal out. But looking at some one-month period, it looks bad." Now, when I use this question, it's a good question, and I want to use this as an opportunity just to introduce you briefly to two important concepts from accounting.

So I think in this question, Dave, you made the point at the end that if I do it over a one-year period, everything would equal out. But if I look at it in the same one-month period, it looks bad. And so this is an important concept for us to understand.

Accounting is a science that has been developed to help us understand how the numbers are flowing a little bit better. And in some ways, it's somewhat arbitrary and it can be manipulated. That's why it's important to understand accounting. Otherwise, you could be manipulated. If you were an investor and you were looking at a company and you were trying to analyze what that company were worth, you need to understand what the numbers are on the page and what those numbers mean and what they signify.

And this would be the same if you're running your own business or if you're analyzing publicly traded companies or you're looking at a private company that you may invest in. And so you need to understand the language of accounting. And unfortunately, in our society, the language of accounting is not commonly taught.

I think personally, if I had my druthers, I would throw out trigonometry in high school and teach accounting instead because it's just far more useful than trigonometry for the majority of people. I think very few people will solve trigonometry. I don't remember anything that I studied in trigonometry, but I do remember the things I use accounting for, whether it's for personal accounting or not.

So the problem that you've pointed out, Dave, is why something called accrual accounting was developed. There are two methods of accounting. Excuse me, there's actually three, but there's two primary methods of accounting, and the third one is a hybrid, some hybrid between these two methods of accounting. The first method of accounting is what's called a cash method of accounting.

And this is the way that you're currently managing your personal financial accounting. This is how most people manage their personal financial accounting for their personal finances. Some businesses will also use this method of accounting, but the types of businesses are limited under the tax code. But in a cash method of accounting, you recognize an expense when you spend the money, and you recognize income when you receive the money.

So in the example that you gave me in your question, you are recognizing the expense for auto insurance in month 12, and you're recognizing the income each month with your $1,000 of income. Now, that's different from what's called accrual accounting, and in accrual accounting, you recognize the expense when it is incurred, regardless of when the cash flows out of your checking account.

And this is very important, and so the example would be if you were running a business. Let's say that you were -- well, let's use a job. It works exactly the same in a job. In a job, you provide services every day, and what happens is that let's say that you're paid once a month, for the ease of my own personal example.

If you have a once-a-month paycheck, you provide those services every day, and then that income accrues, and then at the end of the month, you're provided with a paycheck. Now, it's not always like that. You could be paid every hour. You could be paid every day. A day laborer would be more likely to be paid every day, but we usually -- it's more convenient for us to accrue the earnings and have them paid out under a regular period, every two weeks, bimonthly, monthly, whatever the situation is.

But what if you were doing something under a contract relationship? So let's say that you provided consulting services, and you provided those consulting services in the first month and the second month and then the third month, and then you went ahead and billed your client in the fourth month, and then your client went ahead and paid you in the sixth month.

So do you recognize the income in the sixth month, or do you recognize it in month one, two, and three when you did the work? Well, under a cash method of accounting, you would recognize it when you actually receive the income. So you would recognize it in month six.

But under accrual income, you would recognize the income in month one, month two, and month three. So in accrual accounting, you would have an account for your auto insurance, and if you were keeping financial statements, personal financial statements, under a method of accrual accounting, then you would mark in January, or let's just say month one, you would mark auto insurance expense $100.

And then in month two, auto insurance expense $200. And then in month three, auto insurance expense $300. And then if you performed your savings rate calculation in month one, two, and three, it would show a 0% savings rate because you're not actually saving any money. You're just accruing the expense, the money for the expense in a separate account, and then you'll actually send the money off in month 12.

And that brings us to another accounting concept that has been developed called double-entry accounting. And I'm trying to use very plain language to explain this so that it's clear. I went through accounting in college, and I never understood it. I never got it, even though I went through the accounting classes, because no one's took the time to explain it to me clearly and explain why it should matter to me.

So that's what I'm trying to do. If any of you are accounting wonks or gurus, please correct me. Come by the show notes and correct me if I get something wrong. But I'm just going to keep plain language and try to ignore some of the oddball examples. So in double-entry accounting, what you do with a double-entry accounting is that you have a series of accounts.

So single-entry accounting would be--an example would be your checking account, where you have one check register. And as the cash goes in and the cash goes out, you're just simply tracking that. But in a double-entry system, you would have a series of accounts. So picture in your mind, for your auto insurance example, picture in your mind your checking account register, and then imagine that you had set up a second checking account register that was marked car insurance or auto insurance.

Well, in month one, then what would happen is you would enter a transaction, and you would deduct an amount from the checking account, and you would add an amount to the car insurance register for the $100 expense. And you would accrue the money in the car insurance register each month.

So for every transaction in a double-entry accounting system, you have a transaction on what's called either side of the accounting equation. And so let me give you the accounting equation. The way that I was taught it is this is the iron law of accounting equation. Assets equals liabilities plus shareholders' equity.

So if you're going to deduct an amount from the assets, you have to also deduct an amount from the liabilities. If you're going to add an amount to the liabilities, you also have to add an amount to the assets or also to the shareholders' equity side. So endeavoring to keep this simple--and by the way, you could--if that doesn't make sense to you, sometimes it's easier for people to think about this--equity equals assets minus liabilities.

So that's kind of how we're used to thinking of it because it lines up with net worth equals assets minus liabilities. So equity equals assets minus liabilities. You can just do an algebraic rearrangement of that formula in any way that you want. But the point of this is that you are always keeping multiple accounts.

So you have in double-entry accounting system, you have various expense accounts. You would have an auto insurance expense account. And then when you made a deduction, when that money was accrued in the auto insurance account, and then when you were ready to pay that, then you would go ahead and make a deduction from that account, and that money would flow over and would go out in an expense category.

So the answer to your question is you probably don't need to get that in depth with your personal financial statements. Most people don't. What I would encourage you is, A, if you're going to look at it over an account-- if you're going to look at it at your finances over a one-month period, you would need to go ahead and establish an accrual account for something like a car insurance expense because you're not saving the money.

And this is one of the things that happens. And I'll give you--many people automatically assume, "Okay, if I'm saving this money for car insurance, I know that that expense is going to come up and they're going to have to write the check." But what many people will do is they'll say, "I'm saving money in a savings account every month, so I have--every month I put $500 over into a savings account." But that savings account is actually going to be spent on something like a new couch or a vacation or a nice dinner out or a daughter's birthday party or something like that.

So although we use the word "savings account," that money is not savings. It's just simply--what would be a better word? I'm kind of going over to where this technically isn't correct. It is savings. It's more like accruals. You're accruing money for a vacation fund. You're accruing money for a car fund, for a car repair, things like that.

And so it's important that you understand it because unless--the only money that you're actually saving-- saving, saving--is money that's not going to be spent. And you could modify that and say it's not going to be spent forever, which would--you know, most-- it doesn't make a lot of sense to not spend money forever to me.

I'd rather just spend all the money when I'm alive. But it's at least going to be over maybe a 20-year period or a 30-year period or a 10-year period or a 5-year period, something like that. So I would encourage you do some studying about accrual accounting versus cash method of accounting and do some studying about double-entry bookkeeping versus single-entry bookkeeping.

What I find is that the cash method of accounting and single-entry bookkeeping is limiting because once you understand the value of double-entry accounting and of accrual accounting, once you understand the value of that, it's hard to go back to the more simplified version. I find that frustrating. One of my personal frustrations--and this is not--I want to be clear.

I would not give this recommendation to the majority of people. But I find single-entry accounting methods, which is what basically all personal finance accounting methods are, very frustrating. So I--for my personal accounts, for example, I use a double-entry accounting software that is-- I use something called New Cash, G-N-U New Cash, which is a double-entry method of accounting that's developed for businesses.

And I just have my accounts in there customized under personal accounts. I'm thinking about switching to QuickBooks because of the factor of being the QuickBooks online system, but--so that I can have access to their cloud-based services, which New Cash doesn't support. But that's far too complicated for most people.

I remember I used to--years ago I tried using QuickBooks and I couldn't understand how it worked. Now I understand how it works and I get frustrated with Quicken because I want to establish more accounts and I want to establish better bookkeeping for myself. So make it a point of study for yourself.

That's the technical answer to your question is you are right, and that's why you would need to accrue the expense each month. That would be the way that you would look at it. And what I forgot to say, as I was trying to drive at, is that you should probably keep using single-entry accounting just like you're doing now, but you should just probably look at it over a one-year period of time.

Or if you pay your auto insurance every six months, just look at it over every six months period of time. That gives you enough of a perspective. I mean, you don't need to produce audited financial statements for your personal finances. You're just trying to get a general idea of where you're going.

And frankly, looking back is only useful to give you information about where you're going to go. So it's not that big of a deal. You don't need an audited financial statement. So there is a technical answer, and then there's a practical answer to your question. Now, this mental model of accounting--I want to make one more comment on it.

This mental model of accounting, using double-entry accounting and using the idea of different accounts and using the idea of the accounting equation, I find this to be very useful in every aspect of life. This is not--what I'm about to say is not technically correct. I've never heard anyone speak about this.

I've never read anybody speak about this, but this is something that I think--one way that I think about it. I think of the accounting equation, which again, the one that's in my mind is equity equals assets minus liabilities. I think of this far beyond money because I think it's a powerful way to understand how life works.

Accounting was developed--the science of accounting was developed to try to understand how money works and money flows within a business. So the development of the income statement, the development of the cash flow statement, the development of the retained earnings statement, the development of the balance sheet, the four basic financial statements of any business, the development of these statements was-- these were developed to explain what's going on inside the business.

And I like to use this model to understand what's going on in my mind and in my life because I think in life we have an iron accounting statement in many ways. We have a certain amount of time and we have a certain amount of energy that is here in our lifetime.

Now again, this model will break down, but let me just tell you how I think about it. Let's use a very simple example of work versus family time. If I am--or let's use finance versus family. If I go and I work more hours, I will earn more money, but I will also have less of a time with my family--less time with my family or with people who are valuable to me.

That is a tradeoff. And so I can't alter the fact that an additional amount of money is going to require a reduction in time. And so I need to be careful to make sure that I'm balancing the time and the money and the value of them. I think about how can I accumulate equity in life?

How can I accumulate equity in every way? So how can I accumulate more love, more family relationships, more joy of life, more experiences, more fun, more things that matter, more things that are eternal? I think how can I accrue more of this equity into my life? Well, I have to do it by investing.

And so what happens is I think the financial method of accounting--like when people talk about this person is successful, I cringe when I hear people say, "Well, that guy is really successful," because my question would be on what standard, on what metric? I don't have any interest at all in being the richest man in the world.

Now, the richest man in the world might be successful. The richest man in my town might be successful. But success is measured based upon our own internal values, and to me, money is merely a tool. It's a method to achieve freedom. And the freedom is what I count as success, and there are many ways to do that.

So the number of zeros on my bank statement is not a major factor in my life because, in my opinion, it all stays behind me when I'm dead. But I can develop equity that continues past my lifetime. Now, some people try to--let me not be pejorative of them. Some people develop equity through the use of money that does continue past their death.

So there are a variety of ways to do it, but the point that I'm trying to make is that I think of something like my health. That's an account that I need to put money into. So if I'm going to spend financially on better quality food for my family, that's going to be in the expense, in the financial expense category, but that's an investment into my other account in my double-entry accounting, internal mental double-entry accounting system.

That's an investment into my health account, and I'm willing to make that decision if I have that account. Now, if I don't have a health account, then what happens is that everything is judged on the basis of finance, on money. And then in that situation, then why would you ever purchase higher quality food?

Why would you ever purchase--I'll give you an example. Let's say that I choose to purchase food from a local producer instead of from a large, mainstream, mega producer. That aligns well with my values, but I may spend more money to do so. But I'm willing to do that if that's an investment into the social equity or into the moral equity account, that I think I would rather do business with a local producer and spend more money than to do business with a big producer that I believe is harming the environment, and I'm not willing to do that with my values.

So for each one of us, the accounts that are in our head are going to be very--are going to be different, but that's how I think about it. Maybe at some point--I've thought about doing a show on this. I've never heard anybody talk about it, but it's a little hard because you do need some background in accounting to understand the different accounts.

It's a little hard for me to communicate, but right off the cuff, that's just my answer to your question. Thank you for the question. I hope that you're developing your--I hope that in developing your own personal cash flow statements that it's helpful for you. Again, I feel it's an incredibly powerful place to start and grow from.

A couple of quick questions that I received in an email. Moving on, an email from Micah, and Micah wrote me some very complimentary things, and thank you to all of you who have written. It's taken me some time to respond to everything just with how busy it is, but I want to tell you it warms my heart, and the comments that you make on the show, and the emails that you send, and the reviews, and those comments, that's my compensation for doing the show at this point, and it's really heartwarming.

It encourages me to keep going, so thank you. He asked me a few questions. I answered these in an email back to him, but I thought they would be good questions to elaborate on the show. First question, "I recently saw the technique where you use your Roth IRA as an emergency fund since your contributions can be withdrawn without penalty, but I've not had the time to investigate it further.

Is it a good general strategy, or is it only appropriate in some situations? And if you do use it, what type of assets are appropriate to invest in?" So I want to answer this question. I mentioned this, I think I mentioned it in passing, but the Roth IRA, I want to elaborate here.

The Roth IRA is a very useful account. So fundamentally, as far as how the Roth IRA works from a tax perspective, you can establish a Roth IRA, you use after-tax money to go into the account, so you don't get any kind of current tax deduction. You fund the account with after-tax dollars.

You put the money in. The money can grow over time, and you won't pay any tax on the growth of the money. And when you withdraw the money, you withdraw the money income tax-free. There are some other advantages and disadvantages of the account, and I have a show planned where I will talk through everything you've never wanted to know about the Roth IRA.

But that's all we need to cover for today. Now, the unique part of a Roth IRA, unique to many other retirement accounts, is that you can always withdraw your original contribution to the account without paying the IRS penalty for early withdrawals from a retirement account. Across all retirement accounts, if you withdraw money before the age of 59 1/2, you will incur a 10% excise tax, a 10% penalty on your funds.

That's not an income tax. It's a pure penalty. So if you withdraw $10,000, regardless of your income level, you're going to pay a $1,000 penalty. With the Roth IRA, you can always withdraw your contribution from the account without paying that penalty. Now, this is dramatic because, let's say that you put $5,000 in, and you need $5,000 in a month, you can take the $5,000 back out.

Now, if the $5,000 bucks--assume you had a good month in your investments, and it grew from $5,000 to $5,500, if you tried to withdraw $5,500, you would pay the penalty on the $500 of growth. So if you withdrew the whole $5,500, you would pay a $50 penalty on the $500 of growth from the account.

But the key is you can always get out your original contribution without paying penalties. So this is useful because if you are not so sure about whether or not you're going to need the money, it's nice to know that, "Okay, I can at least always get my contribution out.

I can't get interest out, but I can get my contribution." So to me, starting from a young age, there is little reason not to use the Roth IRA as a primary account to accumulate some cash in. At the beginning of life, it's likely that income is going to be fairly low, so we don't need to worry too much about the higher tax deduction that we could get from an IRA versus a Roth IRA.

And if we can always get our contributions out, this can be a very flexible account for us. Now, there are some problems. So number one is it's usually a little bit unwieldy to get money in and out of an account. Depending on who your custodian is--maybe it's a bank, maybe it's an online brokerage company-- you can get money in and out, but it's not quite as easy as just, boom, write money right out of a savings account.

So I wouldn't start here. I wouldn't accumulate all of my money in a Roth IRA. I would start with other savings. I would start with physical cash. Physical dollar bills are probably going to be more useful. I would do that before I would do money in a savings account because it's a good idea.

Number one, you can always get deals to have physical cash. Number two is then I would start with some money in bank accounts and how much is very situationally dependent. For some people, $1,000 in a savings account is a big deal, and they're excited to get to that. For some people, $100,000 in a savings account--if they have less than $100,000 in a savings account, then they'd be nervous at night.

So you've got to figure out what the right amount is. But if you were trying to accumulate additional money from there, even just getting started at relatively low dollar figures, then I would go ahead and use a Roth IRA. I don't see any reason not to. The trick that you would have to avoid is you would have to--if you were using it as a cash reserve, like an emergency fund or a cash reserve fund, you would have to avoid investing the money into something that had the possibility of short-term loss of principle.

So it would be inappropriate--if this were your cash reserve fund, it would be inappropriate to buy stocks because you may, in any random month, have a 20% decline in the market value of your stocks. Well, if you put $5,000 in and you go and you can only get $4,000 out, that wasn't a good move.

And if you anticipate needing the money, that wasn't a good move. So if you were using this, I would just keep it as a cash investment in the short term. And whether that's with a brokerage company and just use one of their cash accounts or money market accounts, or whether that were with the bank, you'd have to deal with that with your custodian.

So I would steer away from using an investment account if you're just getting started and accumulating. Now, if you've done this for a few years--let's say you put $5,000 in, put $5,000 in, put $5,000 in, you've built up other cash, you have other sources, then yes, go ahead and start investing the money.

And frankly, there's no reason not to if you can get to the money quickly. And if your situation looks like this, there's no reason not to keep some portion of that in cash as allocated for your emergency fund. And then if you need money, cover it with a credit card or something, take the distribution from the custodian, from the brokerage account, or however you have it structured, and move it over into your other accounts.

So for each person, that answer is going to be different. And it's going to be different based upon your situation, based upon what you can save, based upon what you need the money for. It's going to be different to say, "How much money am I going to keep in my wallet?

How much money am I going to keep in a checking account, in a savings account, in a brokerage account?" And those answers are going to be extremely dependent on what your actual situation is. So I don't want to go any deeper than that, but the answer is yes, you can do it.

I would be careful if you were using that as a buffer account. I would be careful about investing it. His question number two, "You mentioned that permaculture has really changed the way you think about other subjects. Do you have a recommended reading list of permaculture books?" No, I don't.

Where I would start, if you're interested in permaculture, the video that I originally saw that got me completely intrigued is a video on YouTube called "Greening the Desert." I'll make sure to link it in the show notes. If you go online, go to YouTube, and search for "Greening the Desert," that is a project that was designed and implemented by a man named Jeff Lawton.

He was called in to the Dead Sea Valley in Jordan, and he was given, I think, ten acres to work with of horribly flat, arid, salted land. By applying some design techniques, he took the desert and he greened it. It's absolutely amazing to see. When I saw how quickly he had done that transformation with desert land, it shocked me because I had always assumed, "Well, desert, you can't do anything in the desert." That sent me off into a world of research on YouTube.

That's the best place because you can see some of these transformations on YouTube, and it's very visual. Once you go through the visual aspects of permaculture, and you start to see some of the good design techniques and what can be done, then you can move into books. There's a bunch of books.

I'm not an expert on the academic side of it. I don't know what's the best, what's not. I've read a bunch of books on it. Permaculture is basically fairly simple. There are three ethics. It's a design science based around three ethics. Then some--how many design principles are there? I'm not even going to mess up the numbers, but there's three ethics and some design principles.

Once you understand them, then it's just basically a working framework towards which you can apply on any landscape. It can be applied in many other things. The best videos I have seen are done by Jeff Lawton. Go to his website at jefflawton.com. If you put in your name and email address--he has a name and email screen, but it's worth it-- then on the right hand side and click enter, it'll take you to a bunch of videos that he's done on different aspects of permaculture design.

His videos are really awesome. He uses that as a landing page to sell an occasional course. He does a permaculture design course, which is the basis of permaculture education. He does that about two to three times a year, but it's really good. He's got a lot of really great free emails, which are kind of the teaser to get you involved.

Those are two questions from Micah. He asked a third question about doing planning for older people. I'm going to skip that for right now. I answered him in an email, but let's go on. Next question. I had a question from a listener named Nick. He said, "Joshua, you have me thinking about starting a business for myself, but I'm stuck on what to consider.

I've tried various online businesses, but I'm not really interested. I'm thinking something more local like leasing out porta-potties or construction site dumpsters, maybe starting an insurance agency, something like that. We make about $300,000, but we want to build something bigger, maybe put down a few thousand bucks. Can you do a show on scalable small business ideas you can start while earning a great living already?

I work about 20 to 30 hours a week, so I have time. Please help, especially for those who can fork over some cash to get started. Thanks." It's an interesting question, and the reason I bring it up here is because I have a few ideas, but frankly I don't know how to answer this question.

That's what this show is about. So I'm going to do a lot of shows over time on great business ideas and try to interview as many entrepreneurs as I can find from different subjects and different backgrounds. But I don't have a list of great small businesses that can be started on the side.

My conviction, my answer to this question, is probably just about any business might be able to be started on the side, but you need something more to go on than just, "I want to make money." It seems to me, from everything that I have read and learned from other entrepreneurs, it seems to me that you need some reason for doing a business that goes beyond making money.

It seems to me that running a business and being an entrepreneur purely for the sake of money, it's too hard. It's too difficult. Now, I think there are probably exceptions to that, but if that were the only reason, I think it would be too difficult. I'm sure there's lots of scalable businesses that could be started on the side, but you kind of have a difference there between a little bit of time and a lot of money versus a lot of money and a little bit of time.

I would start with, what are the other reasons why you would start a business? It would seem, and Nick in other comments on his question, he said that they're saving a good amount of money. So it would seem to me that if you already have a good income stream established with a minimum amount of time and you're able to save a lot of money, that's a pretty sweet setup.

So then the question would be, well, what kind of business would you actually want to start? Are you starting a business for joy, for impact? I think you've got to give some thought to what are your natural inclinations. It seems to me that most people should be drawn to something.

It's always been hard for me to answer career questions because I'm a little bit flummoxed when someone says, "What career do you think is a good career?" I've got a list of a hundred ideas, and I constantly am thinking, "Hey, this would be interesting. That would be fun. That would be a cool adventure.

What if I did this? What if I did that? What if I did the other thing?" I think one of the big steps that you could start, Nick, is just start by being aware of what you're interested in. So keep a list. If you don't already have one, keep a list of anything you think would be cool.

This show came out of that list. I've always loved listening to people that were--I've always loved listening to radio. I've always loved listening to speeches, and I thought, "There's a place for this, but how could I do it?" It integrates what I'm naturally gifted with, what I love to do, and what I love to consume, and it integrates with my knowledge base.

So make a list of ideas, and then start to research that list and see what clicks for you. To this day, I have a file of ideas that, to me, I think there's at least 150 different ideas for jobs or businesses that I think would be fun, and they range all across the board.

They range from as simple as the fact that I've always thought it would be fun to be a barista at Starbucks. I like coffee. I love the coffeehouse atmosphere. I always thought that would be really fun. Or Panera Bread. I always thought that would be really fun. I like the atmosphere.

All the way to I've thought of building a real estate investment empire. I've thought about opening a school. I have some ideas for a more effective way to do school that I think would be better for students, better for teachers, and better for parents, and in a for-profit way.

I've got some ideas about that. I've thought about opening a grass-fed cattle operation. I live in Florida. I'm really interested in agriculture, as you can tell by some of the guests that I've brought on. I've thought about doing an international tour guide company. I like to travel. I love to help people experience things, and there's a lot of people that can benefit from that.

I've got a list. I've thought about working in a hotel. I think that it would be fun to work in the hotel industry. I've always been interested by that. I've thought about building out franchises. To me, every one of these things has good things and bad things about it.

This show is just simply the thing that made the most sense on that list based upon things that I would like to do. But there are many other things on that list. I would encourage you to spend a lot of time getting to know yourself. Maybe you already do this, but to me, to ask a question in a general way—and I appreciate the question.

It's good to ask a question. I'm not insulting the question. But to ask the question in a general way would imply that you don't exactly know what you want to do. Leasing out porta-potties or construction site dumpsters. Maybe that's a good, lucrative little business. I don't know. But again, I'm always a little bit bum-fuzzled by how people don't know what they want to do.

So I would say start with just spending a lot of time thinking, "What do you want to do?" I personally—and again, I have not made millions in a large business that I've sold for $20 million. But I personally am turned off from the idea of, "What can I do that's going to make the most money?" And I'm turned on by the idea of, "How can I design my ideal lifestyle?" I think of two different kinds of businesses.

And these are not mutually exclusive. I recognize the problems with this thinking. I'm just telling you how it works in my head. I think of lifestyle businesses and ego businesses. To me, a lifestyle business is a lot easier to create than anything else. And a lifestyle business is just simply, "How can I do something that perfectly integrates all of my own skills and abilities with something that the market needs, wants, and values?" And an ego business is, "How can I build a great big business, put my name on the side, and sell for a lot of money so everyone will be impressed with me?" I don't care to invest the 30 years that I would need to invest into building an ego business.

I would rather spend that 30 years doing something else. So I'm very much attracted to lifestyle businesses. But there are a lot of people who go exactly the opposite. They just love the thrill of the ego business. And again, that's not a pejorative statement to say ego business. That's just how I think about it in my mind.

So I would say spend a lot of time with a journal. What do you want to do? What makes you tick? And a lot of times, making a list and say, "What are 30 business ideas that I think are interesting? What are 30 different industries that I'm attracted to?

What are 30 jobs that I would like to do? What are 30 ways that I could make a million bucks?" I remember, I've read various stories. What was the example? I read a story recently. And the guy said, "I need to make $100,000." And he was trying to--because he wanted to do something else--and he was trying to brainstorm that.

And so he said, "How can I do it?" And he said, "Well, if I can write a book and I can sell 100,000 copies of it, then I can make my $100,000." Maybe this was--you know what? I think I'm thinking of the example of the lady who--or the lady or guy-- who did Buns of Steel or Buns of Steel, something like that, workout videos, and a book.

Oh, that's what it was. It was a book. It was a lady that wanted to make--I'm going to pause for a second. I'm going to go find the book I was reading. Just a moment. Okay, found it. It was--I read this, I don't know, a couple months ago, a month or two ago.

I can't remember. I was reading Jack Canfield's book, The Success Principles, which, by the way, if you want one book that is the best place to start if you're interested in personal development literature, of all the books I've ever read, The Success Principles is probably in the top five as far as personal development literature.

But it's a story in his chapter, and it's called Ask for What You Want, and it's used--no, excuse me, it's used feedback to your advantage. And it's one short story here, and there's a lady, not a guy. One of the best-selling weight loss books ever published was the book Thin Thighs in 30 Days.

What's so interesting about it, though, is that it was developed solely using feedback. The author, Wendy Stelling, worked in an advertising agency but hated her job. She wanted to start her own agency but didn't have the money to do so. She knew she would need about $100,000, so she began asking, "What's the quickest way to raise $100,000?" "Sell a book," said the feedback.

She decided if she wrote a book that could sell 100,000 copies in 90 days, and she made $1 per book, she would raise the $100,000 she needed. But what kind of book would 100,000 people want? "Well, what are the best-selling books in America?" she asked. "Weight loss books," said the feedback.

"Yes, but how would I distinguish myself as an expert?" she asked. "Ask other women," said the feedback. So she went out to the marketplace and asked, "If you could lose weight in only one part of your body, what part would you choose?" The overwhelming response from women was, "My thighs." "When would you want to lose it?" she asked.

"Around April or May, in time for swimsuit season," said the feedback. So what did she do? She wrote a book called Thin Thighs in 30 Days and released it April 15. By June, she had her $100,000, all because she asked people what they wanted and responded to the feedback by giving it to them.

So I got a little distracted in the time it took me to go get the book. But the point was, I think the point I was trying to make is that there's got to be something. There are a lot of things that can be done, but there's got to be some reason for it.

So starting a business, you need to have some specific reason. If you want to make more money, why do you want to make more money? And I think that this is where it's much more of a self, like get-to-know-yourself issue than it is "Here's the greatest business idea." There are lots of things you can do for money, but I think consider what you-- consider what you--or what your natural inclinations are.

I think you've got to be drawn to something for some reason. And it may be you want to own a McDonald's franchise because you believe in developing people. And you can start with entry-level fast food workers, and you can teach them how to develop themselves in the McDonald's system.

I've worked with a number of clients who, within McDonald's, started as front-line minimum-level workers and make six-figure incomes plus now. Do you want to run hotels because you like working with travelers? Do you want to invest in horse farms? I don't know. Do you want to promote something that you're committed to?

For example, I would be inclined to go work in agriculture because I want to promote those things that I think are important as far as agriculture and the types of values and the types of approaches that make sense to me. Where do you see opportunity? Looking for opportunity and trying to find it.

That's what I'm doing with this podcast is I see opportunity. I see a burgeoning market. I see a number of market conditions that are going to be changing substantially within the next 12 to 24 months, and that this opportunity is increasing largely. So that's what I'm trying to focus on.

What are the risks that you personally have that you're concerned about? Can you leverage your current career? Is there something--if you are in an area of expertise, can you leverage that career into making more money? The example of writing a book. If you're in a career where you can just take your knowledge and write a book, can you use that to make the million bucks that you need on top of the salary that you have right now?

I would look for what are you interested in investing in? Do you want to be a venture capital investor? Do you want to be a trader? Do you want to do local real estate deals? Are you looking for passive income or active income? For example, if you've got money, you can invest that completely passively, buy securities, publicly traded companies, sit back and collect that money.

You don't need to do a thing for it. Now, on the other hand, you can go very active, and you can go work in-- venture as a--if you've got cash, you can go and build out a real estate portfolio and be very hands-on, flipping properties. That's a good place if you've got cash, and if you're drawn to that, it's very active, but you can make an excellent rate of return if you're skillful at that.

What I would do is I would personally just simply focus on taking some money and investing it, and frankly, taking people to lunch and building out things and talking to people. For example, make it a target to take two business people in your town out to lunch, two independent entrepreneurs, whether you rate them in the newspaper or something, and take them out to lunch and find out--learn from their success and find out what opportunities they see locally.

If you mention that you have capital to invest, you will have plenty of people pursue you. That's an example of--I don't know how to answer the question exactly, but that's how I would think it through. Then the last plea I would say for the audience, if you know of guests that would fill this listener's question, that would be a good point.

Again, doing a show on scalable small business ideas that you can start while earning a great living, email me, joshua@radicalpersonalfinance.com, or comment on the blog, and let me know what those things would be. Let me know who you think would be good, and send them a note, and I'd love to have them on the show and interview them.

That would be awesome. Next question. I want to get into a little bit of the feedback that I got on the Walmart show. Overall, the feedback has been really great. That show has been well received. But I did receive two comments on the show that I would like to address, and I think this will be useful to talk through.

The first comment was a comment about-- was what I said accurate about the reasons for success at Walmart, a fairly lengthy comment. I'm going to read that one. The second comment was directed towards my mentioning of dress code in a comment I made that is perceived as racist. So I'm going to address both of these, and I've got some thoughts that I want to use as a good example.

Some thoughts I want to share with you on these comments. So I'm going to begin with a--I'm going to begin with-- I'm going to begin with the comment here from John, which is a very thoughtful comment, and I replied to it, but with my issues with the commenting system, for some reason my replies don't seem to be showing up.

But I did want to honor the comment. It's a very thoughtful and very lengthy comment, and so I'm going to read it. He said, "When you state, 'There's a reason minimum wage is what it is,' it sounds like you're implying that the worker just doesn't bring that much value, so the wage is naturally low.

I think it has more to do with the weak bargaining position the worker has. Think of it this way. Walmart doesn't hire anyone unless the value they bring exceeds the cost of employing them. That's how capitalism works. Hire someone that brings value X, compensate them at a rate of X minus Y, and the difference Y is profit.

Walmart is very profitable, so they are obviously hiring people for much less than the value they produce. That's how you make a profit." Pause for a second. If you haven't listened to the Walmart show, you may want to go back and listen to the Walmart show. It was entitled, "My Plan for How I Would Become a Millionaire with a Minimum Wage Job at Walmart." It was episode 43.

It can be found at radicalpersonalfinance.com/43. The last two questions of the show are about that, so it will make more sense to you if you haven't heard that show to go and listen to that. How is Walmart able to do this, making such a large profit? "They are effective at preventing unionization.

If people are organized and speak with one voice, they have a stronger bargaining position, and they naturally get better compensation. They take a larger share of the value they produce. This is why we have a middle class in the U.S. Unions did exactly this and produced a middle class with purchasing power.

That purchasing power fueled further consumption and stronger economic growth." "The other thing Walmart does to reduce compensation is destroy local industry. You say that nobody chooses to work at Walmart. You are free to leave. But because the local hardware store and local grocer is now out of business, some people find themselves with fewer options.

If you are free to choose, but one alternative brings a lot of suffering, no weekly paycheck means hunger pains, is staying really a free choice?" So his point, "If you're free to choose, but one alternative brings a lot of suffering, is staying really a free choice?" "Walmart management exploits this reality to squeeze further concessions from employees, driving profits further higher." "You say the CEO of Walmart makes what he does because of the value he brings.

This once again ignores the bargaining position he is in with regards to his compensation. The board of directors of various companies typically follow a sort of incestuous pattern. They each serve on one another's board and ensure good compensation. It's not necessarily that they are bringing real value in terms of improving the world or providing a better quality product at a better price.

In fact, often they cause a lot of harm. They can make choices that harm the long-term success of the company. This is a very typical phenomenon. Stockholders don't typically care about the long-term success of a company. If they can extract the value quickly and move on, then they can generate high returns on investment." "I thought your overall plan was good, but I believe you have come to accept a lot of assumptions that reflect beliefs preferred by the rich that are false.

These are beliefs rich often use to justify in their own mind their riches." So I thought this was a thoughtful comment, and John, I appreciate you making the comment. And I'm going to respond to some of your points and just give you the audio version of what I responded, and use it as a good example for us to go and to go into to research things.

Now, you could be right in all of your claims, and I could be completely wrong, or I could be wrong and you could be right. Chances are probably it's somewhere in the middle. I'm probably wrong about some things, and you're probably wrong about some things. We're both probably equally right about some things.

But I'm just going to go through and just respond because I do want to thank you for the good comment. First of all, when you state there's a reason minimum wage is what it is, it sounds like you're implying that the worker just doesn't bring that much value so the wage is naturally low.

I'm not only implying that, I'm saying that specifically. A minimum wage worker does not bring a lot of value. They're easily replaced, and that's why the wage is low. And so the key to escaping poverty is increasing the value so that you can earn higher wages. So I'm not only implying it, I'm specifically saying it.

The key to escaping poverty is increasing the value delivered. Let's use a generic example. You can destroy this as a generic example. Let's use a generic example. Let's say that I hire somebody to sweep the floor. If all that's required for sweeping the floor is for me to give somebody a broom and say, "Sweep the floor," and they know how to do that, and I can train them how to do that in about five minutes, it is impossible to command a very high wage for that.

I think about this when I see sign spinners on the street. That's all the rage down here. I think it probably is where most people-- how much do you have to pay somebody to stand on the street with an iPod, earphones in their ears so they have something to listen to or a book to read, and hold a sign on the street corner about minimum wage?

And the reason you can pay them about minimum wage is because there's no value that they can't replace one with another. If I'm hiring a sign spinner, it doesn't matter to me what color you are, how big you are, how not big you are. All I need is someone at 8 a.m.

to go out and sit on the side of the street with a sign. That's the whole point. Now, how can the sign spinner command a higher wage? I don't remember exactly where, but I read an article a few years ago, and it was talking about this guy who had built a sign-spinning company.

But what he did was he built a company that trained people on how to spin signs for greater effect. So the entire reason that a business owner is hiring somebody to hold a sign on the side of the road is to get people to see that sign and to draw attention so that they know his business exists, so that they can come in, darken his door, and buy his products.

This guy built, first of all, his own income source based upon being a sign spinner, throwing the sign up, spinning it around, doing it in a way that attracted a lot more attention, and he was able to command a higher wage from the business owners that hired him because of his extra antics that drew more attention.

He went on and built it into a business where he was training other people on how to spin signs. And that's an ideal example of, yes, the minimum wage worker does not bring much value, and my proof for that is because the wage is low. The guy who was having sign spinners that worked, that stood there and spun the sign and danced and did all these extra things to bring attention, he was charging higher prices for his sign spinning than was the other person that spun the sign.

Demanding that a business owner pays you more when you are in a weak position of not bringing up much value is a path to poverty. If all I do is stand there with an iPod in my ears-- and that's what I would do. I would sit there and listen to my podcast every day and learn how to get rich.

But if all I did was stand there with an iPod in my ear and demand a higher wage, guess what? I'm going to be fired, and the guy is going to replace me the next day with someone else who wants it. Now, if I work and I develop my value, and while I'm listening to my podcast all day long, I'm working on how can I design some technique of dancing and looking like a fool or wearing a costume or spinning the sign so that I'm helping the business owner in that direction, then that would actually drive business, and now I'm actually far more valuable.

I'm not as easily replaced. Now, you're right. Walmart doesn't hire anyone unless the value they bring exceeds the cost of employing them. That's how capitalism works. Hire someone that brings value X, compensate them a rate of X minus Y, and the difference Y is profit. Walmart is very profitable, so they're obviously hiring people for much less than the value they produce.

That's how you make a profit. That's your comment. That's exactly right. So the point is that if somebody brought a higher value, then they could pay a higher wage. Now, I'll go on and read because I want to fairly represent your argument. How is Walmart able to do this?

They are effective at preventing unionization. If people are organized and speak with one voice, they have a stronger bargaining position, and they naturally get better compensation. They take a larger share of the value they produce. This is why we have a middle class in the U.S. Unions did exactly this and produced a middle class with purchasing power.

That purchasing power fueled further consumption and stronger economic growth. Now, I actually would like to study more of union history, and if I can make the time to carve out, I would love to study this. If you've studied this and you have some books that you would recommend on it, great.

I personally struggle with what I was taught about unionization, so that's my caveat to say that I could be completely wrong on this, but I'm not quite sure. So, A, I disagree with your point that says that the middle class-- so this is why we have a middle class in the U.S.

because unions did this and produced a middle class with purchasing power. That does not jive with my understanding of the economic history of this country. I would say that the time at which the middle class was destroyed was at the time of mass unionization in industrial America. Prior to that point in time, everybody was farmers.

The vision of the founders of this company was to have a society that was built up of independent people. I'll give you two pieces of proof for this. Go back and study what the early founding fathers did and who they came from as a class, and go and look at what Abraham Lincoln said about Google mudsill theory.

Let me pause and let me find his quote. Just a moment. Okay, I'm going to read--at the risk of losing listeners to my reading-- what's going to be challenging to listen to, just due to the fact that we have a difficult time with language that-- with intricate language because we're so--we struggle with English language.

I'm going to read the last third of a speech of Abraham Lincoln, and this speech was delivered September 30, 1859, an address by Abraham Lincoln before the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I'm going to use this as proof of my point. I'm going to read through this.

Try to stay listened. I'm going to read it somewhat slowly because the language is complex. By the way, if you think that we're getting smarter and smarter as a society, consider that this was common--compare this speech and what he was actually saying with the speech of any presidential address that you've heard from any recent politician.

I'm only going to read the last about third of it. It's about seven paragraphs--no, about nine, excuse me. "The world has agreed that labor is the source from which human wants are mainly supplied. There is no dispute upon this point. From this point, however, men immediately diverge. Much disputation is maintained as to the best way of applying and controlling the labor element.

By some, it is assumed that labor is available only in connection with capital, that nobody labors unless somebody else owning capital somehow, by the use of it, induces him to do it. Having assumed this, they proceed to consider whether it is best that capital shall hire laborers and thus induce them to work by their own consent or by them--slavery-- and drive them to it without their consent.

Having proceeded so far, they naturally conclude that all laborers are necessarily either hired laborers or slaves. They further assume that whoever is once a hired laborer is fatally fixed in that condition for life and thence again that his condition is as bad as or worse than that of a slave.

This is the mudsill theory. But another class of reasoners hold the opinion that there is no such relation between capital and labor, as assumed, and that there is no such thing as a free man being fatally fixed for life on the condition of a hired laborer, that both these assumptions are false and all inferences from them groundless.

They hold that labor is prior to and independent of capital, and that, in fact, capital is the fruit of labor and could never have existed if labor had not first existed, that labor can exist without capital, but that capital could never have existed without labor. Hence they hold that labor is the superior, greatly the superior, of capital.

They do not deny that there is and probably always will be a relation between labor and capital. The error, as they hold, is in assuming that the whole labor of the world exists within that relation. A few men own capital, and that few avoid labor themselves, and with their capital hire or buy another few to labor for them.

A large majority belong to neither class, neither work for others nor have others working for them. Even in all our slave states, except South Carolina, a majority of the whole people of all colors are neither slaves nor masters. In these free states, a large majority are neither hirers or hired.

Men with their families, wives, sons, and daughters work for themselves on their farms, in their houses, and in their shops, taking the whole product to themselves and asking no favors of capital on the one hand, nor of hirelings or slaves on the other. It is not forgotten that a considerable number of persons mingle their own labor with capital, that is, labor with their own hands and also buy slaves or hire free men to labor for them.

But this is only a mixed and not a distinct class. No principle stated is disturbed by the existence of this mixed class. Again, as has already been said, the opponents of the "mud-sill theory" insist that there is not, of necessity, any such thing as the free hired laborer being fixed to that condition for life.

There is demonstration for saying this. Many independent men in this assembly, doubtless a few years ago, were hired laborers, and their case is almost, if not quite, the general rule. The prudent, penniless beginner in the world labors for wages a while. Saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land for himself.

Then labors on his own account another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him. I'm going to read that sentence again because to me that's the crux of my point. This is the American dream. The prudent, penniless beginner in the world labors for wages a while.

Saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land for himself. Then labors on his own account another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him. This, say its advocates, is free labor. The just and generous and prosperous system which opens the way for all, gives hope to all, and energy and progress and improvement of condition to all.

If any continue through life in the condition of the hired laborer, it is not the fault of the system, but because of either a dependent nature which prefers it, or improvidence, folly, or singular misfortune. I have said this much about the elements of labor generally, as introductory to the consideration of a new phase which that element is in process of assuming.

The old general rule was that educated people did not perform manual labor. They managed to eat their bread, leaving the toil of producing it to the uneducated. This was not an insupportable evil to the working bees, so long as the class of drones remained very small. But now, especially in these free states, nearly all are educated, quite too nearly all, to leave the labor of the uneducated, in any wise adequate to the support of the whole.

It follows from this that henceforth educated people must labor. Otherwise, education itself would become a positive and intolerable evil. No country can sustain in idleness more than a small percentage of its numbers. The great majority must labor at something productive. From these premises the problem springs. How can labor and education be the most satisfactorily combined?

By the mud-silt theory, it is assumed that labor and education are incompatible, and any practical combination of them impossible. According to that theory, a blind horse upon a treadmill is a perfect illustration of what a laborer should be. All the better for being blind, that he could not kick understandingly.

According to that theory, the education of laborers is not only useless, but pernicious and dangerous. In fact, it is, in some sort, deemed a misfortune that laborers should have heads at all. Those same heads are regarded as explosive materials, only to be safely kept in damp places, as far as possible from that peculiar sort of fire which ignites them.

A Yankee who could invent strong-handed man without a head would receive the everlasting gratitude of the mud-silt advocates. But free labor says no. Free labor argues that, as the author of man makes every individual with one head and one pair of hands, it was probably intended that heads and hands should cooperate as friends, and that that particular head should direct and control that particular pair of hands.

As each man has one mouth to be fed and one pair of hands to furnish food, it was probably intended that that particular pair of hands should feed that particular mouth, that each head is the natural guardian, director, and protector of the hands and mouth inseparably connected with it, and that, being so, every head should be cultivated and improved by whatever will add to its capacity for performing its charge.

In one word, free labor insists on universal education. I have so far stated the opposite theories of mud-silt and free labor without declaring any preference of my own between them. On an occasion like this, I ought not to declare any. I suppose, however, I shall not be mistaken in assuming as a fact that the people of Wisconsin prefer free labor with its natural companion, education.

This leads to the further reflection that no other human occupation opens so wide a field for the profitable and agreeable combination of labor with cultivated thought as agriculture. I know nothing so pleasant to the mind as the discovery of anything which is at once new and valuable, nothing that so lightens and sweetens toil as the hopeful pursuit of such discovery.

And how vast and how varied a field is agriculture for such discovery! The mind, already trained to the thought, in the country school or higher school, cannot fail to find there an exhaustless source of enjoyment. Every blade of grass is a study, and to produce two where there was but one is both a profit and a pleasure.

And not grass alone, but soils, seeds, and seasons, hedges, ditches, and fences, draining, droughts, and irrigation, plowing, hoeing, and harrowing, reaping, mowing, and threshing, saving crops, pests of crops, diseases of crops, and what will prevent or cure them, implements, utensils and machines, their relative merits, and to improve them, hogs, horses, and cattle, sheep, goats, and poultry, trees, shrubs, fruits, plants, and flowers, the thousand things of which these are specimens, each a world of study within itself.

In all this, book learning is available. A capacity and taste for reading gives access to whatever has already been discovered by others. It is the key, or one of the keys, to the already solved problems. And not only so, it gives a relish and facility for successfully pursuing the unsolved ones.

The rudiments of science are available and highly valuable. Some knowledge of botany insists in dealing with the vegetable world with all growing crops. Chemistry assists in the analysis of soils, selection, and application of manures, and in numerous other ways. The mechanical branches of natural philosophy already help in almost everything, but especially in reference to implements and machinery.

The thought recurs that education, cultivated thought, can best be combined with agricultural labor, or any labor, on the principle of thorough work. That careless, half-performed, slovenly work makes no place for such combination. And thorough work, again, renders sufficient the smallest quantity of ground to each man. And this again conforms to what must occur in a world less inclined to wars, and more devoted to the arts of peace than heretofore.

Population must increase rapidly, more rapidly than in former times, and ere long the most valuable of all arts will be the art of deriving a comfortable subsistence from the smallest area of soil. No community whose every member possesses this art can ever be the victim of oppression of any of its forms.

Such community will be alike independent of crowned kings, money kings, and land kings. But, according to your program, the awarding of premiums awaits the closing of this address. Consider the deep interest necessarily pertaining to that performance. It would be no wonder if I am already heard with some impatience.

I will detain you, but a moment longer. Some of you will be successful, and such will need but little philosophy to take them home in cheerful spirits. Others will be disappointed, and will be in a less happy mood. To such, let it be said, lay it not too much to heart.

Let them adopt the maxim, "Better luck next time," and then, by renewed exertion, make that better luck for themselves. And by the successful and unsuccessful, let it be remembered that, while all occasions like the present bring their sober and durable benefits, the exultations and mortifications of them are but temporary, that the victor shall soon be the vanquished if he relax in his exertion, and that the vanquished this year may be victor the next, in spite of all competition.

It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words, "And this too shall pass away." How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride!

How consoling in the depths of affliction! "And this too shall pass away." And yet, let us hope, it is not quite true. Let us hope, rather, that by the best cultivation of the physical world beneath and around us, and the intellectual and moral world within us, we shall secure an individual, social, and political prosperity and happiness, whose course shall be onward and upward, and which, while the earth endures, shall not pass away.

That was only the second half of the speech, and hopefully I did that justice. It's a little bit humbling to try to read the words of Abraham Lincoln in a way that would be appropriate, and yet inspire a little bit of thought. And it makes me feel rather ineloquent when I come to try to figure out how to talk when I read.

Speech is as eloquent as that. But the point that I was drawing from it, and the major point, is that this is what the United States... This is why the United States was so powerful in the past. It was built upon production, and upon the fact that the American dream was not to go get a job and buy a house with a white picket fence.

The American dream was that sentence I emphasized. I'll find it again here. "The prudent, penniless beginner in the world labors for wages a while, saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land for himself, then labors on his own account another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him." That was the American dream.

That was why people were prosperous. Now, I think there were legitimate problems that were solved. I think there were legitimate abuses by the "robber barons," so-called. It's on my reading list. I'm reading a...I don't know if I'm going to be able to get through it. I need more time to read.

But right now I have a biography of John D. Rockefeller that I'm looking through, and it's a thick one and a good one. But the point is that there's a lot that I don't understand about that period of history. And maybe unions in that day and age did solve a lot of problems for people.

But it was the shift from that egalitarian agricultural society to the industrialized society that allowed people to be exploited. Now, were people exploited? Absolutely. But just going based upon your comments, unions did not produce a middle class with purchasing power. They may have helped--maybe they helped people to recover something of that, but they didn't produce it.

You can't get rich by demanding. If I were running a company and I had people try to unionize-- I mean, I'm from Florida. I don't understand. Some of you guys are from the states and the countries where unions are a big thing. I can't imagine myself not firing anybody who tried to unionize just because you're trying to take control away from my business.

But I don't understand how some of these publicly traded companies, what they have to deal with and the labor issues and all of that. It doesn't make any sense to me. So I don't want to pollute the words of Abraham Lincoln except just simply to point out that that was the American dream, was that through education, you worked for somebody else for a while to save a stake, to build a stake that you could then use to buy tools and land.

Now today I think that's exactly as applicable as it was back then, except tools and land are different. There is--back to my interview with Curtis Stone-- there's an opportunity for people to make an amazing living in agriculture today. There are people all over the world doing it. But yet maybe that's not what you mean by tools and land.

Maybe there's something else. But that's what I'm trying to promote. A couple of other things on your comments here. The other thing Walmart does to reduce compensation is destroy local industry. You say that nobody--that comment--Walmart has not destroyed local industry. Walmart has competed with local industry. Sam Walton was local industry.

He ran five and dime stores. Go back and read the history. And he had the idea that, hey, if I could lower my prices and sell more money and sell more prices at a lower profit margin, I would make more absolute profit. That's what his idea was. He had no cost advantages.

He had only a little bit of money, and he had no special relationships with anybody. He was the little dog. Kmart and Sears were much bigger than his was. He had an idea. He had a business model. And he went out and he focused on serving underserved and non-served rural towns that the Kmart and the Sears didn't want to do.

So he went and competed. Competition is how all of us survive. Walmart didn't destroy local industry. It brought a new model and competed, and the local industry failed. And that was unquestionably--it was difficult for the local merchants. But on the whole, it clearly shows the value is there. It is a lot easier today to get in a rural area to get more goods for cheaper than it ever was in the past.

Not a huge fan of Walmart. Again, like I said in another show, I don't enjoy shopping there. I think they've done some stuff I'm not happy with. That's what happens, but I think those allegations are unfair. You say no one chooses to work at Walmart. You're free to leave.

But because the local hardware store and local grocer is out of business, some people find themselves with fewer options. If you are free to choose, but one alternative brings a lot of suffering, is staying really a free choice? Yes. That was the whole point of the Matt Walsh essay.

Yes. Guess what? You can still go. You say Walmart management exploits this reality to squeeze further concessions from employees, driving profits further higher? Prove it to me. Give me some proof. I guarantee you that somebody could start off at minimum wage with Walmart and make $100,000 as a store manager in less than 5 years if they applied themselves using the plan that I sketched out.

There's not a doubt in my mind that it could be done. All right, there's a doubt in my mind that it could be done in 5 years. 10 years, go from minimum wage to $100,000. Show me the exploitation. I'm going to skip the stockholder stuff. I think it's just one point, and I want to go on because I want to address the other show.

By the way, John, I know I'm using this as an example. It's probably going to feel like a personal attack on you. I appreciate the comment. I think that we need to be able to debate this stuff, and you can judge whether or not I make any sense or not, and it's fine either way.

If I don't make any sense, I've got to learn, and I'll learn just by people saying, "That doesn't make any sense." But if I do, then we need to be able to debate this stuff in our society. We've lost the ability to intelligently debate without getting upset at each other.

I just want to make one point. Stockholders don't typically care about the long-term success of a company. The Walton Foundation is controlled by Walton's kids. They own almost 50% of the stock. That means that more than anything else, the Walton Family Enterprise-- it's not the Walton Foundation. What was it called?

Their business name, I can't remember. I think it was the--it was like the Walton Enterprises Holding Company, I think is what it's called, the Walton Enterprises LLC. Yeah, Walton Enterprises LLC. They own a lot, almost 50% of the firm. In the past few years, Walmart has been buying back stocks, substantial amounts of stock.

So their industry, their stake has grown as the stock buybacks have occurred over the last few years. Are you telling me that the Walton kids who control the majority of-- almost the majority of Walmart shares don't care about the long-term success of a company? That they're just interested in extracting the value quickly and moving on that can generate high returns on investment?

Now, undoubtedly, there are many people trading the stock that are just simply saying, "Hey, I'm going to profit on the move." You've got everything in the market. You've got everything from flash traders owning the stock for a few microseconds. You've got day traders. You've got swing traders. You've got fade traders.

You've got long-term investors. And you've got the Walton enterprises. But I agree that--and this is where these conversations are nuanced. I agree with you that it seems to me, like many times, Fortune 500 CEOs and Fortune 500 boards of directors are often short-sighted because of the short-term focus. But I don't for an instant believe that that's the case when you have the Walton family controlling almost 50%.

So hopefully that was a good feedback. I spent a long time--I didn't plan to read Lincoln's speech, but it's linked in the show notes. It's worth reading the whole thing. I find it inspiring to read some of the stuff from back then and just to see how different it was from today.

If you ever want to have a question about-- Remember, Lincoln was making a speech at an agricultural fair in Wisconsin. An agricultural fair. It was the farmers. Can you imagine today--that was the average person at that time. Can you imagine today the average person sitting down and saying-- sitting down and listening to a speech that's that involved?

I guarantee I lost probably 20% of you guys. You're like, "I can't take this audio." If you've made it to this point, you made it through that speech. But that was the average at that point in time. I want to address one other comment that somebody made on that show.

The name here is Mindful Riot. And this person's comment was, "Hey, could you just not say things like, 'Let's leave Civil War history behind and dress for success.' I want to be able to recommend your podcast to people because I think you have a lot of good things to say about personal finance.

But I'm not sure I can do that when you casually drop racist ideas like that one. You do realize you are incredibly privileged as a white man, right? I actually agreed with much of that episode, but that one comment has me thinking about unsubscribing. Blacks don't have a hard time today because they are choosing to hold on to the Civil War." That was the comment.

I went back and I didn't remember making the comment about leaving the Civil War behind. And I asked this commenter, I said, "Did I say anything about race?" And I knew what I had said. And I went back and listened to it. And I found out I did say, "Let's leave Civil War history behind." And in the context, I was saying something as simple as smiling or something as simple as pulling your pants up can make all the difference in the world.

And in the context, it was a little bit surprising to me because I was trying to make a point as like, "Stop this whole stupid race crap. You've got to get beyond this argument." I went back, I don't know what I was thinking with this, "Let's leave Civil War history behind." It didn't come out right.

So I actually edited the audio file and removed that. And I just said, "Let's dress for success," because that was my point. And it was a good reminder to me that-- it was a good reminder to me that just sometimes what's in my head doesn't come out clearly. My entire point was an anti-racist point.

The whole point that I was trying to make was get over the racist stuff and get over race stuff and think past that. And it came out in a way that evidently ticked off this person. And I get that. That's fine. And I went back and again, it was a poorly worded comment.

So I actually--again, I edited the file and I pulled out, "Let's leave Civil War history behind," because it didn't make any sense in context. And I just said, "Let's dress for success." But I do want to talk about that. Because--so I did that because I don't want to unnecessarily offend people.

But the point I was making is that people judge you by the way you look. It doesn't matter whether they should or shouldn't. They do. People judge you by the way you look. And I'm going to come back and I'm going to address this. You realize you're incredibly privileged as a white man, right?

That comment really annoys me. But I get why this person says it. I'm going to address that in a minute. But that wasn't my major point. The major point was that people judge you based upon the way you look. It's 100% irrelevant whether you think they should or whether you think they shouldn't.

They do. And the whole point I was making with "Dress for Success" was go back and research how people judge you based upon the way you look. There's a story in "Dress for Success." If you've never read it, it's worth reading. You can't implement many of the recommendations from the book in today's world.

Maybe somebody's modernized it. I don't know. But you can't implement the recommendations because we're in a different culture now. But the author of that book, whoever the author was, went out and did surveys--did studies on the streets to see how different people responded to the way that people dressed.

And the one that I always remember--I think it was the first chapter-- he talked about the color of someone's raincoat. So the author--I think it was a guy--he set up this story--excuse me, this scenario. And it was a busy street going into a busy office building where you had to open the door.

And he wanted to see whether the color of the raincoat that you chose mattered. And so he tested--and his whole point was he said that people perceive you based upon the way that you look. And there is a look of power that you can cultivate that will enhance the way that you look, and that will help you to be successful.

And so he identifies in very granular detail in that book how to dress to cultivate that look of power, to cultivate that upper-middle-class look, without looking high upper-class and without looking lower-middle-class, the upper-middle-class look. So he had set up this experiment with raincoats. And he had an actor walk along the street, and this person would arrange to arrive at the door of this office building at exactly the same time as someone else, where they each reached for the handle at the same time.

And then what he tracked--he stood up back and observed and tabulated the results-- he tracked the number of times that the person would step back and defer to his actor and say, "Oh, sorry, excuse me," and let his actor through first and defer to them, or how many number of times the person would look at the actor and give him a dirty look and say, "Yeah, I'll go through first." Now, is that imperfect?

I think it is. I'm more inclined to let people go, and I don't care whether they're lower-class or middle-class or upper-middle-class or anything, but that was the test, as I remember it off the top of my head. I learned the book 10 or 15 years ago, so forgive me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty close.

And then he had the actor do it maybe 100 times wearing a tan raincoat, and he had the actor do it--I don't remember--100 times wearing a black raincoat. And what he discovered was that there was a dramatic statistical difference between the tan raincoat and the black raincoat. And the person with the tan raincoat was allowed through a dramatically higher percentage of the time allowed to go through first, and people deferred to them based upon the fact that they were wearing a tan raincoat instead of a black raincoat.

And the inference from that, the conclusion that he drew, was that you should wear a tan raincoat, because people assume a tan raincoat is a mark of wealthier people, upper-middle-class, and a black raincoat is a mark of the lower class, the working classes. And the whole book is filled with these little interesting examples.

I had people go in for a job interview doing certain things. And the point was, if you don't know that something small that you do is going to affect the results that you get, that's cruel. You need to know. And the way that we dress is a big deal.

People dress the way they do because they're trying to give off an image. So my point was that a rap star dresses the way that a rap star wants to dress because they're trying to portray an image of what they're into. People who wear camouflage baseball caps and camo t-shirts, or hunting t-shirts, are doing that because they're trying to portray the image that they want to portray.

Rock stars have long hair and wear weird leather pants because they're trying to portray a rock star image. Lounge singers wear tuxedos. It's all costuming. And it works. People are usually perceived based upon the way that they dress. Now, when you're coming to something like job success, unless you're a rap star, unless you're working in the rap industry, that's a problem.

Now, if you're working in the rap industry, I would wear baggy pants and whatever, big gold chains. I don't know. I'm not a rapper. I have a family member who's a rapper. He's white. He dresses like a thug. Now, I've learned over the years not to judge people so much by how they dress because he's a great guy.

But he dresses like a thug. And he puts off this image because he's trying to cultivate the image of being a rapper, a hip-hop rapper, whatever it's called. And so, if you're not aware of that and if you're not doing it intentionally, you've got to think about who to give up.

But if you're looking for success, especially with something with financial success, how big of a deal is that? My point was, look at who the leaders in the industry are. And that was the point I was trying to make with Russell Simmons. As I said, look at how Russell Simmons dresses.

Or look at how--who's the other guy I looked up? Sean John. Look at how they dress. Look at how these people dress. They're not dressing in thug clothing. They're wearing a suit. They're taking themselves seriously. There's good academic statistical research that's done that based upon the way that you dress affects how you feel.

So the way that you feel for work is affected--about your work is affected by how you dress. So it's a big deal to recognize those things. Now, I don't have a racist bone in my body. I don't care about the color that someone is. I do get uncomfortable with the way that certain people dress.

There are certain people that I wouldn't be inclined to seek out based upon the way they're dressed. I've learned over the years to push past that, because some of the most interesting people that I've met and spoken with are some of the most unique. Whether it's the color of their hair, or the pink hair, or the number of tattoos, or the number of piercings, I enjoy talking to unique people.

And I enjoy--fit me personally. I try to fit in no matter where I am. I can comfortably go into a black tie ball, and I can comfortably talk hunting around the back of a pickup truck. And there are some places that I fit in better than others. So I try to speak past that.

But the thing is, the color of someone's skin doesn't matter. It's all about the way that they dress. And that does matter. There are people who dress in a way that makes other people uncomfortable. And that goes with every single color of skin. I am very interested in race stuff.

What's the term for that in academics? Sociology? I don't know what it's called. But I'm interested in that. So two stories. I don't have a racist bone on my body, but I'm interested in how that interacts. I went to Egypt some years ago. And while I was in Egypt--I'm a big guy--and while I was in Egypt, I grew a beard.

I grew a pretty decently thick beard. I grew a beard while I was there. And while I was there, I bought a--it's called a galabeya. That's the traditional Egyptian--I don't know--smock. Basically, it's like a knee-length robe type of thing that is traditional in the Muslim-Egyptian culture for men to wear.

And I bought a turban. And I was interested to see what it would be like. And at this time, this was 2006, something like that, 2007? It would be 2007 or 2008 maybe, something like that. And I flew from Egypt to West Palm Beach via New York City. And I was interested to see what it would be like, how I would be treated if I-- because at this time, racial profiling is all in the news.

I wonder what it would be like to be perceived as a Muslim, as an Egyptian Muslim. So I had a thick beard. I wore the thick red beard. I'm a big guy. I wore the galabeya. I wore the turban. And I wore it the whole time from Cairo into New York City, got off the plane in New York City, and walked around the New York airport, got back on the plane, and flew to West Palm Beach.

And I did the whole time wearing the turban and the galabeya. It was a fascinating experience. And undoubtedly, I was pretty uncomfortable getting on the airplane, especially in New York City. I was pretty uncomfortable getting on the airplane, walking from the front of the plane to the back of the plane without smiling, just trying to stay in character because I was just interested to see.

It had a lot of eyes on me, and I felt very conspicuous. Now, how much of that was racial profiling by other people versus how much of that was just my own uncomfort of wearing a dress through the airport? I don't know. So I'm interested in that stuff. I went to--to cry out loud--I went to Haiti on my honeymoon because I was interested in seeing Haitian culture.

I went to the Dominican Republic and stayed at a resort, and then we went and traveled around Haiti. So I don't care what color someone is, but I do care what you do. And regardless of what the color is, what good does it do to complain about this? I had an experience.

As I was deciding to--and this is why I feel qualified to talk about this stuff because I've been through it. I've experienced it. And I'm not an expert on everything. I'm not an expert on every aspect of life or of finance. Of course not. There's a lot of things I haven't experienced.

I don't know what it's like to grow up in Manhattan. I don't know what it's like to grow up in Spanish Harlem. I don't know what it's like to grow up in the Bronx in New York. I don't know what it's like to grow up in Montana. I grew up in West Palm Beach, Florida.

But my point is that--I guess what offends--it offends me to be accused of making a racist comment, and that's why I'm spending time on this. I don't think race has much to do with it in today's world. I think that there are a lot of ways that--there are a lot of places maybe where race still does have something to do with it, but I don't think it has much to do with it.

When I was thinking about closing down my financial planning firm and coming to and starting this podcast, I was brainstorming businesses that I could do part-time that would allow me to financially make the transition. I had some savings, but I made mistakes and put too much money into my house before I planned to leave my financial planning firm.

When I walked away from my financial planning firm, I walked away from a lot of money and a lot of passive income that was providing a pretty nice lifestyle for myself. And I had some savings, but I needed to start a new business. And I was trying to say, "Well, I think I'd like to make this podcast into a business, and I'd like to figure out a way to get compensated for doing this, because I feel I can really help people.

I feel I can bring value to the marketplace, and if I can bring value to the marketplace, then ultimately in time, the compensation will follow." It's the iron law of compensation. So I said, "What can I do? What kind of birdbrain thing can I do where I just earn some money?" And so I was trying different things, and I decided, "You know what?

I'm going to go and deliver pizzas." Because I'd heard you could make a lot of money delivering pizzas. I live in a fairly affluent area, and I said, "Hey, I could deliver pizzas four nights a week." I've always wanted to do it, because I always heard Dave Ramsey say, "Go deliver pizzas to pay off your debt." And I was curious.

I would read blogs of how much people were making. I said, "This could be a win-win-win. I could earn enough money to pay my bills. It's kind of a dead-end job, and I don't want to do it long term. This would be a fun thing to do for six months, three months, something like that, and I would learn a lot.

And it would give me a chance." I've never worked in a minimum-wage job. I never have. I was always fortunate to work in more skilled job positions. So I went, and I got a job delivering pizzas, and I was being paid minimum wage. And I learned so much. I'm so glad I did it.

I learned so much in that job. And I was working with a lot of minimum-wage people. We were all minimum-wage people. But you know what? We were there from every race. There were white people, there were black people, there were Spanish people. And I learned in the week. I got to be pretty good friends with some of the people that were there.

And I learned a ton about life. And the thing is, I found a lot of people that were working there. They're actually doing very well financially. I won't betray anybody's anonymity. But there was a girl that was working there. She was a teacher during the day, and she worked managing the pizza restaurant at night.

And she'd started at the ground level, and she was making a ton of money in her race, and she was black. Her race had nothing to do with it. But she had a remarkably different attitude, and she took herself remarkably differently than another black pizza delivery driver who didn't have the same attitude.

And there were some white people there that had a horrible attitude. And there was a Pakistani guy that was awesome. He was just a hustler. He worked hard. So I had my own opportunity to get in for a week and have this insight into that environment. And I was convinced that anybody, anybody in that situation that took just a little bit of care, there's not a doubt in my mind that anybody who focused and learned, everything was being taught to you.

There was a curriculum about every single thing that you could learn, and you could be manager of that restaurant in a year. Now, tip to the wise, I made no money. And I did it for a week, and I was done. You can't make $30 an hour. I figured if I made $30 an hour, I figured, "Eh, it'd be worth it.

It's kind of a bird brain thing. I can just go and do it." You can't make $30 an hour, $20 an hour. I averaged it out. I think I made like $11 an hour. So I did it for a week, and then I quit. And now I have a far more lucrative deal that pays my bills while I make this business transition.

But that's the point. So let me wrap up here. The point is you can't change other people. You can only control ourselves. So I can't change all the issues with race. I don't really care about someone's race, but I do care about who they are. And who they are is important.

Martin Luther King said he had a dream that people would be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin. You can change the content of your character. You can't change the color of your skin. But even if there is dramatic racism, adjust the way you look.

I've got a ton of friends who are all different backgrounds. But I don't hang out with people who look sloppy. Because there's something about the inner character that reflects in that way. So change things. If you're black and you're worried about this being a racist thing in Civil War history, copy Sean John or Russell Simmons.

Dress like Shaquille O'Neal or Ben Carson or Walter Williams or Thomas Sowell. These are guys. Look at the way they dress. Respect yourself. And this is for if you're white, don't dress like a thug. Dress like someone who takes themselves seriously. And is it a costume? Absolutely. And that's why I like Dress for Success.

He says if you want to wear--I think this book was written in the '70s-- if you want to wear shiny--I have the impression in my mind--disco suits, that's what they call it. Shiny disco suits on the weekend, fine. Just don't wear it during work hours. Racism is a tool that's used for dividing people.

It really is. All these allegations and inferences of racism is used as a tool. Even slavery was a political tool. Slavery was on its way out before the Civil War just due to the economic forces. Slavery had already been banned in other countries. Human slavery that existed in the U.S.

Abraham Lincoln himself said he didn't care about slavery. He wanted to keep the Union together. Go look up the speech. It says if I could keep the Union together and not do anything about slavery, I would. If I can keep the Union together and free some people and keep others enslaved, I would.

If I can keep the Union together and free everybody, then I would do that. He cared about keeping the Union together. And slavery was a political tool that was used to give him the support. Slavery was already on its way out before the Civil War just simply due to the economics.

The northern people, the northern factory owners, had discovered it was far cheaper to get somebody to come and work for you for eight or ten or twelve hours a day, pay them a wage for their hours, and force them to take care of their own housing, their own food, their own shelter, all that stuff, than it was for a southern slave owner to support the whole family.

Now, I'm not for an instant--don't you dare misunderstand me-- I'm not for an instant condoning enslaving people. I think it's horrific. I think it's horrific and it's horrific. But guess what? We're all slaves now. We're all wage slaves. And as far as the quality of life, for a lot of us, it's a lot worse as a wage slave than it may have been for some people as a human slave.

Freedom is only good if you take advantage of it and free yourself completely. Take all that stuff out of context if you wanted to, but it's very much in context. We all have problems and we all have privilege. White privilege--I hate that crap. I can't do anything to change the fact that I'm a white male.

Is there privilege? I don't care if there is. Guess what? If you can type on a computer, that's privilege. That means you're educated. You were born in America or wherever you were. The fact that you're listening to this right now indicates that we're privileged. We all have problems and we all have privilege.

And it's to none of our good if we deny the talents and the abilities and the privilege that we have. We have to do something with it. I always go back to the parable of the talent. If you read Scripture, "To him who has given much, much is required." So if you have privilege--and I've got a lot of it.

I've had a pretty good life. I was raised in a family that loved me. My parents are together, have lots of wonderful siblings. My parents worked hard and sacrificed to ensure my success. I'm blessed with a decent level of intellectual ability. I've been blessed with a decent level of academic ability.

I've had a lot of opportunity. I've had a very privileged and very wonderful life. And I hope to do exactly the same thing for my son and hopefully future children-- to give them as much privilege as possible. But there are people who have come from a far worse situation than I have, who have achieved greatly.

Privilege is a gift. It's given to us so we can do something with it. If you're a white male and you have a lot of privilege, do something with it. If you're a black female or whatever--I don't even know. If you're a black female, you have the privilege of being healthy.

If you're stuck in a wheelchair because you've got muscular dystrophy or ALS, do something. Do what you can. No matter where we're born, we've got to do something. They don't write history about people who sit around and complain about, "Yeah, we're full of--a lot of white privilege." Do something with what you have.

I absolutely guarantee that I am privileged. And what's the point? I'm trying to do everything I can to help everyone I can because that adds value to the world. And that's the model--add value to the world. Take the privilege that you have. Take the abilities that you have. If you have money, use it.

If you have physical talent, use it. If you have intellectual talent, use it. If you don't have any of those things and you have labor, use it. Go read a book. Go read the book "The Richest Man in Babylon." It's a fable. It's my favorite personal finance book. It's written as an allegory, I guess would be the right technical classification for it.

But it's written as an allegory, and in this allegory, the greatest thing about it is a couple of the stories in it were people who were slaves. Slavery's been around since long before 1776, and black slavery in this country, it's been around since the beginning of history. And guess what?

It still exists. Do something about it. There is sex slavery all over this world. Do something about it. Don't support it. Whether that's pornography, addiction, or whether that's supporting organizations, I won't get off on that tangent, but guess what? Slavery still exists in a lot of ways, and it's up to us to free ourselves and free other people.

But get back on track, and I've got to wrap up, but go read "The Richest Man in Babylon." Two of the characters specifically that I can remember in that, in about the last half, were slaves. It talks about what their slavery was like. My favorite thing about it is that the author didn't go into a moral equivalence about slavery.

I think there's a lot of stuff that's immoral. I am outraged by human slavery, human slavery as it has historically existed throughout history. I'm equally outraged by wage slavery as it exists today. I'm equally outraged by academic slavery and control and manipulation and the things that occur today. Why do you think I have this show?

But the point was that you can't solve those things by sitting around and complaining. Go and read. I'm not going to spoil the story. Go read what those slaves did. Now, is it an allegory? Is it a fable? Is it fictional? Yes, it is, but I think the points are true.

My show is all about manipulating and controlling everything that you can control. So you can go somewhere else. If you can go somewhere else because Wal-Mart took all the jobs, you don't want to work at Wal-Mart, go. If you can't, then make sure that you're doing the best job you can at Wal-Mart.

If you need to learn a different language, learn a different language. If that means you came to the United States and you don't speak English, learn English. If that means that you need to learn Spanish because most of your co-workers are Spanish, learn Spanish. If that means you need to learn Mandarin so that you can take advantage of the growth in Asia and move to Singapore, do that.

Control what you can and take responsibility for your life. If people are prejudiced against you, you can't do anything about that. But you can try really hard to put them at ease. I'm a big guy. I'm 6'6" and I weigh almost 300 pounds. I'm a big dude. Guess what?

I'm aware of that. I try to make sure that I don't intimidate people. When I'm speaking to you, if you ever speak to me, one of the things you'll probably find-- and now that I say it, I'm not going to do it and someone's going to catch me on it-- but one of the things I've learned to do over time is I very rarely stand face-to-face with people and speak directly to them.

Because of my size, I've learned that that's an intimidating way for people to speak to me because they kind of train their neck up and they don't feel like they have any kind of exit opportunity. What I've learned over the years, when I'm speaking with somebody and I'm standing, I usually will look for--I'll open up my body so they have an escape route and I'll stand at a slight angle to them.

I usually will pull back and I give a little bit more personal space than most people do because of my size. It puts people at ease. Or I'll look to sit with someone. I'll sit directly and face you if I'm sitting there because then I'm not so intimidating. But the point is, who cares if people are prejudiced against me or not?

I've got to deal with what I am. So if you're brown or black or white or whatever color you are-- and if I'm white--for example, when I went to Haiti, I'm the only white guy around for miles. I do everything I can to fit in. If you're the only black guy and you're in a white community, do what you can to fit in.

But, hey, if you want to stand out, that's fine. Go ahead. That's actually a good thing. So who am I to tell you what to do? My point was that sometimes you should adjust the results you get. When I've been in sales situations in the past, I learned to make people comfortable.

That's how I've learned not to make people uncomfortable. I'm a big dude. I'm an intimidating guy. I can be an intimidating guy. So I don't shave my head. And I don't shave my head, grow a goatee, get covered with tattoos and wear white sleeveless T-shirts when I'm going on a sales presentation.

That's a pretty stupid thing to do. I comb my hair and I wear low-key clothing, and I try to make people comfortable. So, ranting over. Last thing, and then I'm going to play one piece of audio and we're out of here. Long show. I met a guy a couple of weeks ago at the podcast conference.

I was so inspired by this guy. He is from Venezuela. He came to the United States 10 years ago. I think he said 15 years ago, something like that. He came when he was a young man. He arrived here with literally $10 in his pocket. I think he told me it was $8 or $7 or something like that.

Like $10 in his pocket. He did a lot of stupid stuff, but he worked hard. Guess what? This guy was telling me he and his wife together, he makes over $100,000 a year now in the U.S., something like a decade or two later. I don't remember the exact details.

He blew a ton of money and did some stupid stuff. But then he figured it out. He started listening to Dave Ramsey, and now he has a podcast. He's trying to encourage other people. If that guy can do it, he didn't speak a word of English. His English was still heavily accented.

We actually spoke, his English was still heavily accented. If that guy can do it, there's no reason why a white kid from the slums or a Spanish guy just over the border from Venezuela or a black guy from the slums or whatever. Who cares? The point is that you've got one life.

Don't sit around and deal with it. I know that's super popular, but hopefully this came out well. I hate the philosophy behind that, and I get it. Again, to be clear, I think it's dumb to make people upset unnecessarily. I try to be very inoffensive. But on the other hand, we can't walk around on tiptoes about this stuff.

You've got to say what's actually true and say what works. That's everything that I wanted to finish up with today. I'm going to play one video, and this is from Darren Hardy's video series. This one was part of his a couple weeks ago. But I just thought this was amazing, and the video was entitled "This Time." Darren Hardy is the publisher of Success Magazine, and he publishes a show.

He publishes this series that's every day with a tip for today. I'm going to skip the closing music, and I'm going to end with this because I think it's a good lesson to end with. I just want to thank you for listening. I hope that what I said came across.

Frankly, it's uncomfortable to me to talk about some of this stuff because when you put yourself out there as a public figure, you bring the criticism. But I feel like it's one of those things I have to force myself to push myself out there and be courageous enough to share things that I think are true and trust that people will find the real message.

I'm going to close with this video. Thank you for listening to today, and I wish each of you a lovely weekend. Go away from here with a message from this show, and I hope that this show was helpful. I'll be back with you on Monday for another exciting week of awesome, comprehensive financial planning knowledge.

Thanks, everybody. Someone related a story to me recently about a man in his late 80s who was asked if he could come back and live the life of anybody at any time in history who he'd wanted to be. His answer was, "I'd want to come back as the man I could have been but never was." He said, "This time I'd act with more courage.

I wouldn't allow my fear to turn me away from opportunities that I didn't take. I'd risk more. I'd take the chances I wish I had. I'd allow myself to fail more, love more, and laugh more. This time I'd be sure to live more." Well, it may be too late for him, but not for you.

But you have to stop the insanity. It's time to get serious. So here's your action for today. If you died today, what are the three things that you wish you would have done? Gone, become, tried, and risked. Just three thoughts. Jot them down. Then do something today to move on one of those ideas, even if only in a small way.

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