The more I think about the president’s plan to make payroll taxes permanent and pay for Social Security, Medicare and other disability and insurance programs with the general fund, the more I think the president might be a secret Democrat.
Follow me here.
If we’re SO against having taxpayers pay for everyone’s healthcare because Universal Healthcare is socialism, then we should also be against having taxpayers pay for everyone’s Social Security, Medicare, disability and insurance programs too, shouldn’t we – because that is also socialism.
The general fund IS taxpayer money – so the president’s plan to pay for Social Security, Medicare, etc. with the general fund? It’s a debt to the public.
That is EXACTLY what democrats have been trying to do with healthcare, except it’s WAY more.
Democrats only wanted general healthcare. The president’s plan will add to the taxpayer burden Social Security, Medicare, disability, and other retirement and insurance programs that the payroll tax covers.
The president is giving democrats a HUGE win as I see it.
I don’t think the president thought this one all the way through. Up front it sounds like a nice plan – we’ll defer payroll taxes until the end of the year, put money back into the employee’s pockets, etc. etc.
It’s a nice pitch, but if you really think a few moves ahead, more money in your pocket means you pay more in taxes, and you’ll still have the burden of paying for Social Security, Medicare, and the other programs because they’ll be paid for out of the general fund.
Of course, instead of paying it just for yourself when you retire, you’re paying it for everyone else too.
How is that not socialism?
What I think will happen is that this that they’ll use this as an opportunity to phase out all of those programs.
One of the most effective strategies the republican party uses to cut a program they can’t just cut without facing outrage from the public is to defund it.
The programs are still there. They just aren’t being funded. Same difference.
For decades the republican party has been to brand programs like Social Security and Medicare as entitlements so they can cut them under the banner of “cutting entitlements to reduce deficit spending” and prop up themselves as the party of fiscal responsibility.
The problem is that nobody was buying it. These programs are paid for with payroll taxes, which means that they don’t add to the deficit or to the national debt, and people were paying for them directly, with matching funds.
That’s not an entitlement. It’s a savings and investment.
This makes it pretty dicey territory when the programs get cut, and/or when Congress spends from it, because neither are supposed to happen; and if they do spend from it, they should pay it back.
What the president’s plan will do is make Social Security, Medicare and other programs that payrolls taxes currently pay for entitlements, by shifting the burden of costs to the taxpayers.
Those programs will then be counted as deficit spending and add to the national debt. What they’re doing is making those programs “entitlements”, and “the party of fiscal responsibility” will, I think, use that to defund those programs.
Of course, are they doing to refund the money that hard-working Americans have paid into those programs their entire working lives? I highly doubt that.
On of my friends, a Trump supporter, says the president has this and will figure it out, but right now I can’t help but think that this was the plan all along.
The deficit is out of control, and the crackdown on immigration has cost the government untold millions of dollars, because one of the things about the programs payroll taxes cover is that immigrants pay into these programs and they’ll never be able to collect because you have to be a citizen.
There is a surplus of money, or should have been, but Congress couldn’t keep putting their hands into the piggy bank.
That’s YOUR money they’re spending…
Listen to the Mnuchin explain on the Fox News Sunday interview.
https://youtu.be/Fhqrl7ihcWg
As I said… I can help but think this was the plan all along.
It’s an interesting question isn’t it. Would you rather be an instant millionaire, or take $10k per month for life?
It was asked in a group I belong to and a lot of people chose the $10,000 per month option. Very few said “instant millionaire” like I did, and many were curious as to why I would.
So here is my initial response.
First, no one knows when they’re going to die. Planning for the future is great and all, but 10k a month would take you 8 years to make a million.
That’s a lot of missed opportunity.
Instant millionaire gives you cash flow options, and a bit of freedom to take action on some things. Also, if you become an instant millionaire you don’t go right into investing.
You would invest with 10k a month to build a million dollars. You become an instant millionaire, you look for cash flow and capital gains to safely retain and grow your wealth.
A lot of people who win the lotto and get inheritances go broke trying to invest.
Then I recounted a real life story of a friend who got a $3m inheritance and he’s grown it to over $35 million in the past 10 years. The only thing he invested in was himself. Education, knowledge…
A lot of people wanted to learn more, but there is a character limit on replies, so I’m writing this blog post. Enjoy.
Have you read the book Money: Master The Game by Tony Robbins? Or listened to wealth builders like Warren Buffett, Grant Cardone, Tai Lopez and others?
The first time I heard about that piece of advice is from Mark Cuban. He was doing an interview – and I don’t remember with whom, but that’s the BIG nugget I got out of the whole thing.
They were talking about immediate wealth, specifically people who win the lotto or come into a big inheritance and how a few years later a surprisingly large amount of them are broke.
The reason is that they have not been prepared or educated to have wealth, because they’ve been raised up in a system designed to teach the masses how to work.
The most common advice to build wealth is to invest, but when has the masses ever been taught to invest?
What happens is, they get a lot of wealth and they suddenly become investors without any knowledge or experience of how money works on that level so many of them lose it. They aren’t investing, they’re gambling.
On top of that they’re buying all of this stuff that are essentially liabilities if they’re not handled properly. Houses, cars, etc.
Instead of staying frugal, they become big spenders, without any accountability.
So they’re spending out of control, they’re gambling, and they’re taking on more liabilities, (things that require money to maintain), and the inevitable is that sooner or later, they end up broke and even in debt when the money runs out.
So what should you do with lump money when you become wealthy instantly?
This is would be MY plan if I became an instant millionaire, based on everything I’ve learned so far, and I will say that disclosure this is NOT intended to be financial advice.
I’m just sharing what my plan would be and what my thoughts are.
Why I Chose Instant Millionaire And What I Would Do With It
Instant Millionaire or $10,000 Per Month? What I would do…
1. Remain Frugal.
I would continue to live as you’ve been living. By all means, pay off your debts, maybe move into a bigger house if you need it, but be reasonable.
Paying off your debts would be something like school loans, arrears, maybe pay off the car, even the house if it’s not an exorbitant amount.
For example, let’s say you’ve got a $300k house and you still owe $200k or more, just hold off on that one for a bit because you really don’t want to use up too much of your money all in one shot.
Or pay off and close all but the oldest line of credit with any cards so as not to ruin your credit score.
You remain frugal to a. keep your monthly liabilities low and b. maintain/build your credit score.
Most people will increase their living expenses, you want to stay the same or decrease it.
2. DON’T quit your job
After paying off your debts, something interesting happens. Your job becomes an asset.
Most people live paycheck to paycheck because their job is a liability. Their living expenses is either just enough to maintain their lifestyle, or not enough to and they need “creative financing” to stay where they’re at. Miss one or two paychecks and they lose everything.
However, large influxes of money give you an opportunity to reduce your monthly liabilities.
For example, an opportunity with large cash influxes is doing a refinance with a principal payment and dramatically bringing down the monthly payment.
So let’s say the monthly mortgage is $1500 per month, you do a refinance to preferably a fixed rate, NOT taking any money out, but instead put down say $50,000 or $60,000 on the principal, and suddenly you don’t have $1500 per month to pay anymore, you have like $800 or $900 per month.
You just freed up $700 or $800 per month.
So, if you make $5,000 per month and you were having trouble keeping up, take away the student loan payment, excess credit card payment, the car payment, etc. and include a reduced mortgage payment, suddenly $5,000 isn’t a liability anymore, it’s an asset – a stream of income.
3. Set aside 2 years of living expenses.
For most people, they maintain a home with $5,000 per month. For some it’s more, for some it’s less, but set aside 24 month of expenses. Not bills, but expenses.
Eating out, hanging out, Netflix, Hulu, etc. Include the misc. stuff you spend money on each month, and put yourself on that budget.
So set aside $120,000, ($5,000 x 24) in an interest bearing account and leave it alone.
I would look for the highest available interest rate return, and an account that eliminates fees by maintaining a certain balance, and just let it appreciate over time, and let the interest compound.
4. Business-like banking structure.
This is something I actually adopted quite a while ago. I used to have a problem with overdrafts and stuff when I was younger, before I learned about money management and how to protect my money from predatory practices.
All of my money is held in a high-yielding interest account, that I call my holding account.
My goal with doing that is to make sure my money doesn’t lose value over time. There are no fees on the account and the interest compounds over time.
The more money in it, the more options become available, including higher returns which allows my money to continue to make money over time.
I have a separate account where I get paid. So my clients, gigs, etc. when I get paid, all deposit to that account. That’s my accounts receivable.
From there, the money that I make gets divided up into other areas.
The first, is another bank account with no overdraft protection or overdraft fees. The reason for that is because nobody should have access to or drafting back where I keep large sums of money.
This is accounts payable, a.k.a. bills and debts.
I calculate my monthly expenses for the following month and transfer the money to that account. Mortgage, car payment, insurance, cc payments, etc. Anything I need to pay the following money will be there, plus the minimum balance so that the monthly fees are eliminated.
You know how a lot of companies think they own you, like it’s their money? They don’t want a card, they want a bank account and routing number? That’s what this account is for.
Never give anyone direct access to your source. It’s bad enough that the bank has access to it.
Then I have a personal savings and a personal checking. The money for my personal savings go first, and what’s left over goes into my personal checking.
I grow my savings with programs that allow me to do things like forward the cash back to my savings, or roll over the amount up to the nearest dollar to my savings, and I have a monthly commitment to add to my savings.
Savings are for emergencies. Car breaks down, refrigerator stops working, etc. I’d take a part of what’s left over and continue to contribute to holding too.
If I followed the steps, all of my money is growing slowly over time and not losing value, and because I have less monthly liability I have a bit of money freedom to do things.
After I’ve contributed to everything to make sure my money grows and doesn’t lose value, the rest of the money is for whatever I want, but more importantly, it’s for investing in myself. finding a mentor, buying books, taking classes, learning and growing.
I’d learn about finance, business – maybe even start one.
THEN I would look at becoming an investor.
I know the cashflow quadrant says the goal is to become a business owner and investor as fast as possible, but the CQ assumes progression from employee and self-employed to business owner and investor. It assumes time for learning and experience over a period of time, usually years.
If wealth is just dropped in your lap though, ASAP is dangerous. There’s no way to skip learning and having experience.
So if it happened to me, MY GOAL would be to first make sure that my new wealth continues to grow and is protected, second turn my existing income into as asset by reducing my monthly liabilities, third create an income buffer to hedge against economic disaster.
I chose 24 months, because the ’08 ’09 crash was pretty bad and left me out of work for 18 months, and it took about 4-6 months for me to get a business going to where I didn’t have to worry about immediate money problems – so 24 months.
Fourth? I would focus on growing as a person and learning finance and business.
If time was a problem, I would go from full time to part time hours with my clients and free up that time, but I wouldn’t quit my clients. This will prevent me from relying on my holdings to live on.
The 5th step would be to then start investing, and I would invest in cashflow opportunities primarily to rapidly grow my holdings.
I’d want to not lose money at all, but grow it.
I would let go of my clients ONLY when I have another income stream that would maintain my lifestyle, and I needed the time freedom to do other things.
Even then, I would probably incorporate, and hire someone to do the work for me so that I don’t lose that income stream. And after incorporating I’d restructure my banking to further protect my wealth and lower my tax footprint.
Come June 12th 2020, I will have been working from home full time for 8 years. That’s from not knowing ANYTHING about business or finance at all, so I’d probably maintain for 3-5 years before moving away from doing the fulfillment for clients personally.
I’m 41 right now – will be 42 in November. So by 47, life would be my oyster. I’d be able to do what I want, go where I want, help who I want. Pursue other passions.
$10k a month isn’t enough for me to pursue my calling in life. I need to grow wealth in order to fulfill that which I see as my purpose and help those that my calling will help.
I was involved in a brief conversation with a group of people online, when one of them said something odd; rather, it was odd to me.
He’s a slightly-above minimum worker, and after taxes he takes home around $1200 per month. He said, “working from home and making $1200 per month isn’t a lot“.
PS: No, this has nothing to do with the 1-time $1200 stimulus that some people are going to get. Some people tried to make a connection because of the number 1200, but that is unrelated.
Traditionally, he’s right, but here’s something to think about – $1200 per month when you work from home goes a lot further than when you make the same amount on a regular job.
That’s because working a regular job comes with overhead expenses that working from home does not.
The big one is commuting, specifically gas money.
Come June 12th this year, I will have been working from home for 8 years, and when I transitioned to working from home, I saved about $250 a month in gas instantly.
When I no longer had a car, I saved even more money because I didn’t have car payments, auto insurance, tax and tags, or maintenance.
A good friend of mine who made the transition to working from home? He sold his car and bought a motorcycle. He says that saved him about $500 per month.
There are also little things that add up that most people don’t think about. For example, when you work from home you do less laundry, and you for those who have dry cleaning, that bill goes away.
Also, working from home people tend to spend less on food. Some people only spend money on restaurants, vending machines, and so on because they’re at work.
The only up-tick in spending would be for utilities. Maybe an upgraded internet plan or phone service plan.
The other big saving is time.
Most people don’t realize how much a traditional job impacts their schedules, so let me ask you a question.
Would you go to bed the same time you do, or even wake up in the morning at the same time you currently do, if you didn’t have to get enough sleep, or wake up in time to get ready to go to work?
For many people, the answer to that is no; and if you’re one of those people who can’t wait for the weekend so you can either stay up later or sleep in the next morning, you’re one of those people.
Time is a valuable asset; the only one you can’t get back in fact.
Added to that, if you no longer have to commute, depending on how long your commute is, you can get some of your time back immediately.
My longest commute was 2 hours in one direction.
I was working on a construction site and there was always heavy traffic in the heart of the city. Not commuting gave me back 6 hours!
That’s four hours travel time to and from the job, and then the extra hour I used to got to bed, and the extra hour I slept in because I didn’t have to wake up early.
Then there was the passive time in between. I didn’t have to get dressed, eat a fast breakfast, then rush out the door.
Getting rid of that morning rush and sleeping in that extra hour was well-worth working from home.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying settle for $1200 per month.
What I am saying is, don’t be blind to the benefits and possibilities of what working from home.
If you didn’t have to commute for your job, would you even own a car?
I know some people who only own a car for there job. In fact, I know a few people that don’t even like driving, but they have to for work.
Also, who doesn’t want a little bit more time during the day, even if it is to sleep in an extra hour every morning.
But here is the opportunity.
I know people who took that extra couple of hours a day to do things like upgrade their certifications, get a degree, learn a new skill, or start a business on the side.
Not having the time to do something is one of the biggest set backs people face, and there are decent opportunities out there for people who want to go get it.
There is freelancing and consulting, (both of which I do), and there are business opportunities ready to go with monthly costs, (which I also do).
Some of them can cost anywhere from $25 to $200 bucks per month, and I personally know people who is making and extra $1,000 per month or more from them.
Big disclaimer here… I’m not saying you will make money from any opportunity. Let’s be real here.
Nothing is guaranteed, and if you venture out and start your own business, there are both risks and circumstances beyond your control.
That being said though, the opportunities out are there for the taking if you want to pursue them. Just make sure and do your homework.
Anyway, with $1,000 per month, you can see we’re not talking about making big 6-figures or 7-figures that you’ll hear people talking about. Even smaller amounts can be significant success.
For most people, an extra $500, $600, $700 a month is a whole new lifestyle. That’s their car payment + insurance, a chunk of their rent or mortgage, their health insurance.
I know two people who were finally able to pay off their credit card debt and start saving the way they always wanted to, all because they had one monthly debt covered with a little bit of extra income.
I even know some people personally, who are living like proverbially kings on just $60,000 a year.
They were able to afford the lifestyle they wanted, and it started with them working from home and using that extra time and money they were saving wisely.
This pandemic.
If you’re one of the people blessed enough to work for a company that keeps you employed and you’re working from home, for all of the bad happening, this can be an amazing opportunity for you and your family.
If you’re one of the people out of word, this can still be an opportunity for you. You may not want to jump into any kind of paid business opportunity, but there are some really great ways you can take what you know and turn it into an income stream.
Whether you’re working from home or unemployed because of the pandemic, think about this.
What did you do for your job? All of your skills, your talents, and your knowledge. What did your job entail? What did you have to do? What did you have to know?
Mindset: A new perspective
If your employer was willing to pay you money to do what you do and leverage your skills, talents and knowledge for themselves, how many other people would be willing to pay you to do the same for them too?
That’s big, right?
I mean, there are hundreds, even thousands and tens of thousands of entrepreneurs and small businesses all over the country that can’t afford to hire people or keep a staff, but they are still willing to pay every day people just like you for your skills.
If you were able to take your skills, your talents, and your knowledge, package them up a little bit differently – catering to those people, (the entrepreneurs and the small businesses), you can start making money.
A lot of freelance sites like Fiverr, Upwork, and Funnel Rolodex, (one of my personal favorites), allow you to register, create jobs, (what we call gigs), set your price or hourly rate, then list them for entrepreneurs and small businesses.
You will have to learn a little bit how about to present yourself to be more appealing, maybe even learn how to create irresistible offers, and even go through some trial and error to start making progress, but when you do get it, you’ll start seeing little hits of cash come in.
For me, when I started, it was $5 bucks here, $10 bucks there. Then I’d get $25 here and $50 there. A quick $100 bucks one day, $250 another.
It doesn’t sound like much, but trust me when I say it ads up.
I kept at it. I kept working and improving, and soon enough I was landing $1,000 per month clients.
Here’s Some Proof
I am not one for flashing cash. I think it’s “gimmicky” and a bit dangerous even, however, I also believe in transparency and integrity, which means, if I am going to teach you how to make money from home, I better well be making money from home myself using the same exact methods I’m telling you about.
Also, a bit of a disclaimer (again). What you’re about to see are my personal results and it in no way guarantees that you will get the same results.
That being said, I wanted to share some results from my PayPal account – where I invoice and receive payments from clients.
The first thing you’ll notice is that I blacked out the names of the clients, for obvious reasons. The second thing you’ll notice is that this is all from this year.
This first one is payments received from January to March, ($2,290.40).
These two are invoices paid for February and March, (another $1,910). Notice that these were paid and there were no fees taken out.
And finally, this is an invoice that hasn’t yet been paid, (and I’m confident that it will be), for $1,885.00
If you’re doing the math, just from freelancing, that’s $6,085.40 in three months, which is a little over $2,028 per month.
Another way I make money is with affiliate marketing; that is selling other people’s products and services, and earning a commission when the customer buys.
Because I’m a programmer and an engineer, I resell hosting plans for the company where I host my stuff – again, integrity is important to me so I won’t sell anything I don’t use myself.
It doesn’t happen very often, but when a client asks me for hosting I recommend them. Check this out.
There’s only one customer there, but it’s almost $50 bucks per month recurring – and that is just one affiliate program I am a part of.
Obviously I’m not rolling in deep pockets, but an extra $2,000 per month ain’t bad at all considering I literally work on my bed with a laptop and a cellphone, putting in 20-30 hours per week.
… and remember. I don’t have a car payment, or car insurance payment, have to fill up every week, or anything like that.
Anyway, there are other ways I make money too, and as the year goes by there will be more clients, more gigs, and more commissions and my income will increase, but more importantly…
I hope you get the idea; or at least starting to.
Just because the pandemic has you working from home, or even out of work, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t opportunity to make money, or even get ahead.
All you really need is a little bit of knowledge and maybe some guidance to help you get started.
How Do I Learn More & Get Started?
This is the cool part.
There are two really great resources that I’ve brought together to help you make the absolute most of making money education, and strategy that you can actually use to start making money right now.
And they’re both free…
The first one is a free book that will teach you all about what you were just introduced to – how to take your knowledge, your skills, and your talents, and turn them into money.
It’s perfect for those who need to make money from home and it is a treasured resource in my personal library. Yes – integrity – this book has been invaluable to helping me get where I am.
The second one is a free guide that I’ve written to help you accelerate the process so you can start making money sooner.
The first book isn’t that long. It’s about 300 pages and you can read it in a weekend if you so desired, but, I know first hand that it may take longer for some people.
So the guide that I wrote is kind of a “crash course” in how to make money from home, complete with a big picture overview of freelancing and entrepreneurship, coupled with some powerful advice, as well as simple ideas you can use to start making money from home very quickly.
Here’s how you get both of them.
Step 1: Follow the link and get your free book, (all you have to do is pay for shipping).
Did you know, that you can download this article as PDF for free? If you gotta go, or would rather read it later, you can! It’s a great reference too!
Was Jesus A Buddhist Monk?
After watching the documentary, I have
to admit that yes, it is intriguing, and a great exercise in thought. The BBC
put in a lot of work to use similarities between what Jesus believed and what
Buddhists believe, and even a bit of history between them to tie the narrative
together, but it’s total nonsense.
People say it’s controversial, but
it’s really not.
It’s only controversial to people who
don’t know the truth of what they believe.
If we compare, Jesus vs Buddhism, the
similarities, (for example, forgiveness), are all superficial at best.
When we get down to the meat of it,
the fundamentals, what Jesus believed and what Buddhism teaches are incompatible.
In fact, Buddhism would have rejected
Jesus, and Jesus rejected Buddhism on their core beliefs alone.
Here’s what I
mean.
Jesus called himself God, (as part of
the Triune God), that saves, but Buddhism is largely non-theistic in that no
deity can “save” a person.
Buddhism also rejects the notion of a
Creator that provides value for the world.
This means that Buddhism would have to
categorically reject Jesus from even starting the path to becoming a monk,
because not only did He identify Himself as God, but He identified as the Son
of the Godhead who is the Creator and moral lawgiver for all of creation.
And just as Buddhism would have had to
reject Jesus, Jesus would have rejected Buddhism.
Buddhism, while it is non-theistic in
the saving role of God, it is a polytheistic faith.
On top of that, Buddhists believe that
there is more than one path to enlightenment, which is actually an internal
fight in Buddhism, because there are many forms of practice and they all
disagree which one leads to Nirvana.
Jesus would have rejected Buddhism
because polytheism is idolatry and if God brought judgement on His own people
for that, why would He embrace it and become a monk of a belief system that
makes Him to be a liar?
Answer. He wouldn’t.
Jesus would have also rejected
Buddhism because He made it clear that there is only ONE way to salvation, and
that was Him.
There are many biblical sources, but
all of those points can be summed up in these verses.
John 14:6-7 – Jesus answered him, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No
one comes to the Father except through Me. If you had known Me,
you would know My Father as well. From now on you do know Him and have seen Him”.
[This is actually one of the biggest
differences between Christians and Buddhists.
They can’t make up their minds on how
to reach Nirvana, but Christians, for our many disagreements all believe that
there is only one way – Jesus.
We have freedom to work out our own salvation, but all roads lead to Jesus.]
Continuing on, Buddhism teaches
enlightenment and reincarnation, which is fundamentally different from what
Jesus believed and preached – salvation and redemption.
Even the destinations of heaven and
Nirvana are different.
Nirvana is a state of desireless-ness,
and heaven is a place; a destination where a person reaches their most
fundamental desire, eternity with Jesus.
The fundamental beliefs of Jesus and
Buddhism are consistently opposed to each other.
The very essence and nature of Jesus
Christ and His claims can be summed up with three verses.
John 3: 16-18 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
For
God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world
through him might be saved.
He
that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned
already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of
God”.
The book of John is
only one of many examples that highlights why Jesus could not be, and
ultimately would not become a Buddhist monk.
We cannot just look at superficial
similarities.
Finally, I’ll add this.
All religions are superficially
similar, but fundamentally different.
When it comes to matters like
creation, sin, heaven and hell, God, salvation, origin, and the very nature of
human beings, (to name a few), we begin to see where things like the
documentary is only relied on the superficial and completely ignored the
fundamental.
People have been trying to discredit
Jesus for thousands of years. Fake bibles, fake interpretations, fake accounts,
fake teachers, fake doctrines, and more… They all failed.
The documentary is a modern version of
the same old attempt at deception, and I wholly reject it as such.
It’s a lie. A well-crafted,
thought-provoking and interesting lie.
Do not be deceived.
Did you know, that you can download this article as PDF for free? If you gotta go, or would rather read it later, you can! It’s a great reference too!
John Wooden‘s incredible TED Talk from March 2009, speaking on the difference between winning and succeeding. With profound simplicity, Coach John Wooden redefines success and urges us all to pursue the best in ourselves. In this inspiring talk he shares the advice he gave his players at UCLA, quotes poetry and remembers his father’s wisdom.
Backstory. This article stems from a reply on a video by Beau of the Fifth Column sharing his thoughts on Patty Hearst, the homeless, and pitchforks.
In the video he uses an example of Jeff Bezos and what he could accomplish if he used his net worth to directly affect homelessness, and I disagreed with the premise itself because it failed to consider a few things, for example the 300,000 plus employees that would be out of work at just one of his companies.
The conversation turned toward financial intelligence and wealth inequality and I took the time to explain a lot of the things that I learned on my journey to achieve financial freedom (wealth).
I’ve included the video here for you to enjoy, but most importantly, I decided to share some of the financial advice that I learned along the way, and I hope that they will help you as much as they helped me.
Leave me a comment below and let me know what you thought. Which piece of advice was most relevant to you?
Financial Rules I With They Taught Me In School
1. Stop caring where your money comes from. There are many ways to make money, but people tend to limit themselves to making money only from one way.
We hear it all the time, for example, “you want to make money? Get a job“. That is absolutely ridiculous thinking that leads to poverty.
As long as it’s legal and ethical, I don’t care where my money comes from. That was the hardest lesson for me.
2. The wealthy are wealthy because the find two or three ways to make money doing what they’re already doing.
This is a really important one because most people only get 1 paycheck. What if you could make 2 or 3 or more?
For example, I run a music business. I was teaching music privately. That was one paycheck.
Then I wrote a book teaching music theory. I did the work once and it pays over and over again. That’s two paychecks.
Then I started a music blog syndicating news from other sources and I earn money on advertising AND I receive a commission for music sales.
That’s two more paychecks.
I’m in the process of creating different products and services to sell. That’s two or three more paychecks.
I do the work ONCE and I get paid over and over and over. I turned one paycheck into many paychecks, and I didn’t have to take on any large time commitments.
That skill is important because of this next one.
3. The game of wealth boils down to having more assets than liabilities. To simplify this, at the end of the day an asset is anything that puts money in your pocket, and a liability is anything that takes money out of your pocket.
Owning a home is a liability. It continues to cost you money. Maintenance and upkeep, mortgage, taxes…
The value, (financially speaking), is the equity, which isn’t worth anything until you sell your home, (there is an important lesson about this coming up).
Your car is a liability too.
Your home and car are obvious liabilities, but there is also a liability that most people don’t recognize – their jobs! That’s right, your job can become a liability.
Your job is an asset as long as it pays more than the liability.
It costs money to have a job. You have to pay for clothes, (some people pay for uniforms), some have union dues, gotta pay for gas and maintain your ride, transit if you don’t have one, you have withholdings for taxes, etc.
In order to have a job, you need a place to live, and a working telephone, and a way to get there. This by the way is why homeless people can’t just go out and get a job. It takes a lot more than a shower, a haircut and good clothes.
All of the things needed to find and maintain a job are liabilities.
This is why companies will lay off employees. When productivity drops, employees are still costing them money, (maintaining safety standards, retirement and health insurance contributions, and more).
TIP: If you have a job, the BEST way to keep it, or get a raise, is to show your employer that you’re an asset, not a liability.
So, at the end of the day, if you are making MORE money than the liabilities you have, your job is an asset.
If it’s not covering everything, it’s a liability. You still have to pay to keep your job, but it’s no longer covering everything.
The solution most people have is to decrease their lifestyle. They’ll cut back, try to save. Those are SHORT TERM solutions. The long term solution isn’t to decrease your lifestyle, it’s to INCREASE your income.
Getting a second job, putting in more hours… those are also short term solutions because you’re trading time for money, and you only have so much energy and so much hours in the day, and if you fall sick or die?
Game over.
You have to create more income. This is where #1 and #2 come in. You have to stop caring where the money comes from, only that it’s legal and ethical, and you have to find more ways to make money doing what you’re already doing.
The game of wealth is this. Have more assets than liabilities.
Addressing the previous point where I said there is a lesson coming up, here are three guidelines the wealth use for HOW they spend money.
4. They understand that all money is someone else’s money. The only reason to build wealth is to spend it. It’s not your money. You’re only holding on to it to give to someone else for something of value.
You have to start thinking in terms of, “what will I trade this money for?“. If you’re saving for retirement, the money belongs to the people you’re going to trade it to for what you need – the electric company, healthcare, etc.
ALL money is someone else’s money. We have to lose the idea that it’s “my” money.
Jeff Bezos for example, has a huge net worth. But that’s not his money. That’s his employee’s money, and the power company’s money, and his investors’ money, and his affiliates’ money, and everyone else that he spends money on. That is their money. It’s not his.
Divorce from the idea that we own money. We don’t. Money is just a tool that we hold on to for someone else.
5. This is the big one – Money only has value when it’s used.
You got a million dollars in the bank? You don’t have anything of value until you spend it. Until then, it’s just ones and zeros on a screen, numbers in a register, or numbers printed on a piece of paper.
It will do nothing for you until you use it. And if you just let it sit there, it devalues over time, so you end up with less money than you started with.
You have to put money to work. If you don’t use it, you will lose it.
Like your home. Equity does you no good until you use it. If your home is a liability, one of the best ways to turn it into an asset, is to rent or lease it out.
You’ll learn this about the wealthy. They rent where they live, and own what they rent.
Did you know, that for the same cost as a traditional home, you could get a commercial building?
A lot of real estate investors start out, not buy buying a home, but buying a small apartment complex for roughly the same amount of money. They will live in one of the units and rent out the others.
They still got their mortgage payments, except now they have tenants, and they’re making more money than the payments on the building and if it’s done correctly, they essentially live in their own building rent free.
Each rented apartment is a stream of income, and they continue to work their jobs. So if instead of a house you get a duplex, live in one, and rent out the other.
I’m not saying go out and do that. I’m using that as an example. There’s a whole LOT to learn about real estate investing that you should learn.
Okay, I lied. I’m sorry. You’re not getting 5 rules. You’re getting 6.
6. Outside of necessities, don’t spend money unless there is a tax benefit, makes you money, or has the potential to make money.
That third one is a book when you break it down. Bottom line, you have to become money smart, and apply the strategies that opens the door to new opportunities.
In other words, before you spend money on something, ask yourself, “is this a liability or an asset? Can it become an asset?“.
When you think in terms of assets and liabilities, and only spend money when it benefits you, (a tax benefit, makes you more money, or has the potential to make money), you’ll find that you have a lot more resources than you think you do.
As a BONUS, I’ll share with you something that literally changed my life.
It’s a financial lesson that I received on a Monday night call with someone who I watched make over a million dollars over the course of 8 months to a year, from scratch. It’s always stuck with me.
He said, “Your bank account doesn’t reflect who you are, but who you are being and your thoughts about money“.
Wealth is a mindset and money game that anyone can play, and quite frankly, should play.
Recommended Reading
On the topic of money, there is a book I highly recommend. It’s called Money Master The Game by Tony Robbins. It was instrumental in helping me transition from working a job to running my own business at home, and is continuing to help me as I work toward building wealth.
As of late, I’ve been involved in some interesting financial debates, and from the progressive point of view, billionaires have become a dirty word, something evil to be banished.
I wanted to address the topic of money, but before I do, take the time to watch the video below. My response, as I would have responded to them is below it.
The ideas they have are actually really wrong, and while I understand the progressive point of view, but the pitch isn’t exactly objective.
Let me show you something cool.
According to financial experts, (quoting from the Wiki page):
“Essentially, the wealthy possess greater financial opportunities that allow their money to make more money. Earnings from the stock market or mutual funds are reinvested to produce a larger return. Over time, the sum that is invested becomes progressively more substantial. Those who are not wealthy, however, do not have the resources to enhance their opportunities and improve their economic position. Rather, “after debt payments, poor families are constrained to spend the remaining income on items that will not produce wealth and will depreciate over time.”
What gives the wealthy those opportunities is a results of differences in income.
Again quoting, “Economic inequality is a result of difference in income. Factors that contribute to this gap in wages are things such as level of education, labor market demand and supply, gender differences, growth in technology, and personal abilities. The quality and level of education that a person has often corresponds to their skill level, which is justified by their income”
When we actually dig into all of the causes, there are productivity and compensation gaps, market factors (including globalization, education, incentives, etc.), and tax and transfer policies.
There are other factors on top of that too like the decline of unions, immigration, corporatism, and so on, but what we know for sure that impacts wealth inequality are the ones that I first quoted.
Actually being wealthy isn’t a cause of poverty.
To give you a perspective of that statistics, there are about 3.5 million homeless people in the US. That is about 0.5% of the population – and don’t hold your breath yet.
While there are some states experiencing a rise in homeless rates, overall, it’s been decreasing since 2007. 2017 was the first year the numbers ticked up in a while. Source.
Here’s something else that is interesting. There are 14.5 million millionaires in the US. That’s about 12% of the US households.
And according to the census bureau, about 12.3% of US households live in poverty.
So the number of households between millionaires and poverty is about the same, or relatively close).
And, there are 540 billionaires in the US.
So to recap:
1. billionaire isn’t a dirty word, since being wealthy in and of itself isn’t the cause of poverty. Lack of opportunities are. 2. Homelessness is actually decreasing not increasing.
The solution progressives are looking for isn’t to take away the money billionaires have and give it to everyone else. That’s literally theft.
The solution is to correct the bad policies and faults in the system that create wealth inequality.
And I say that because while taxation has an effect on budgeting, just taking away the money from billionaires will have a devastating effect on the economy.
For example, if we take away Jeff Bezos’ money, the 300,000 plus families that rely on a paycheck from Amazon will be unemployed and lose their health insurance. Because he wouldn’t be able to keep the company afloat.
Not only that, but the money he invests in companies that change our lives every day will be gone.
Also, he’s a philanthropist that funds companies that research and develop life extending treatments. That will be gone too.
To give you an idea of how much value Bezos puts into the economy, without him, Amazon wouldn’t be the only company that disappears. Without Bezos there wouldn’t be Amazon, Alexa, Juno, Audible, Twitch, Zappos, Whole Foods and HomeTown Grocer, Twitter, Business Insider, StackOverflow, IMDB, LivingSocial, Twilio…
Oh yeah, there probably wouldn’t be a Google either, because Bezos helped invest to get them off the ground.
Just him operating his businesses pours millions every year into the economy.
How much does he spend buying resources to run the company? Office supplies, furniture, building maintenance, utilities.
There are a few hundred thousand people working because they buy cars. That private plane he has, they didn’t built it themselves. There’s a manufacturer out there with employees getting paid to build those, and maintain them.
There are thousands of families in the energy sector that has to drill, process and distill the fuel.
There are shipping companies that have to move the stuff they buy from point A to point B.
He has a multi-million dollar home and estate. He didn’t built it himself. A lot of people went to work, and a lot of people still work to keep it up. That’s the thing about being wealthy. They put a lot of money directly into the US economy just to maintain everything they have.
And the elephant in the room?
We take their money away – what happens after the money is gone? They can’t maintain everything they built so there is significantly less money they will be making. It’ll run out in a couple years.
The problems that cause wealth inequality will still be there.
And you know who will benefit? The people with the skills and education to capitalize on making more money, and make more money. Everyone else will still be in the same boat.
As someone who was working as a farm hand and living in a plywood shack for a time, and is working his butt off to become one of the wealthy, let me share three rules about how the wealthy spend their money.
1. All money is someone else’s money.
2. Money has no value unless it’s traded for something else.
3. The only time the wealthy spend money, outside of necessities is when it falls into 3 categories.
There is a tax benefit
It makes them more money
It has the potential to make them more money
That’s the only time they spend money.
If you don’t understand how money works, it doesn’t matter how much money you take from the wealthy. The problems that cause inequality will never be solved.
And yes, I hear you. “They’re hogging all the wealth!“
That’s also factually wrong.
They employ people by the hundreds of thousands. They are they investing in other businesses, and they are funding charities and research. That’s not counting the amount of money that goes directly into the economy to maintain their lavish lifestyles.
They aren’t hogging it.
The mindset that wealth can somehow run out, is wrong as well. That’s thee lack of financial education rearing it’s head.
Do you know how our government works?
The US Treasury decides when to print money, but the Federal Reserve controls the supply, and it uses a balance of credit and interests rates to moderate supply and demand, backed by reserve requirements.
You know what determines the value of the dollar? Supply and demand. There is no direct mechanism for establishing the value of the U.S. dollar, which means the whole thing only works because people believe it has value.
The Federal Reserve can, at any time increase their balance sheets and increase the amount of money available to be borrowed by increasing their reserve requirement.
That means the amount of money made available has no set limit. When things tend to get out of hand, banks intercede to stabilize it. That’s how the whole thing works.
There is no limit on how much money there is or can be as long as people believe it has value. What they use as collateral? Gold, silver and precious metals.
Take gold for example, we aren’t running out of gold anytime soon. Right now, as collateral backing for our currency, the US has 8,000 Tonnes of gold.
It is estimated that there is about $35 BILLION tons of gold on dry land, which means in all of human history, we’ve mined roughly 0.00047% of the world’s surface gold.
AND as long as there are stars in the sky, there will always be gold for as long as the universe exists.
And that’s just gold. We’re not talking about the other things we use as collateral backing for our currency.
Money can literally never run out. As I said, it’s just an idea. If the dollar disappeared today, it would be replaced by something else that we assign value to and trade in that.
I get this was a ridiculously long post.
I took the time to write it because the focus on billionaires *is* the distraction, and a pointless one at that.
As long as the US constitution exists, nobody can tell anyone how much, where, when or how to spend their money. It’s just not going to happen.
What we need to focus on is Congress. They make the laws. They are the ones that will have to change it.
Hopefully those of you who really care about wealth inequality will learn from the post about how money works.
CREDIT: Super Yacht Concept image by Digital Trends feature.
