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I always considered his show entertaining, and yes he has a great radio voice! I always felt validated as he handed out answers identical to the same advice I would have given. He also has a very personable personality.
My parents did well in educating me in personal finance, a subject that was taught dismally poor at my schools. From what I see today I wonder if they teach personal finance at all in today's schools.
They don't teach PF in most schools, and I don't think that's an accident.
They don't teach PF in most schools, and I don't think that's an accident.
LOL, and no further comment.
As far as cursive writing, I think we are nearing an era where all transactions are electronic (such as Apple-pay, Google-pay) and signatures will become obsolete, thumb prints replacing them where necessary.
It's been months or years since I saw somebody use a personal check at a grocery market. These days I write fewer than 10 personal checks/year.
In the last few months point-of-sale terminals are in the process of deleting the signature screen, since any squiggly line will work fine. With chipping the need for any signature is obsolete.
By some time next year at the latest you'll never have to sign at a point-of-sale terminal, although you may still need to sign restaurant charge slips when they bring them to your table. Some restaurants (e.g. Chili's) are now putting the POS terminal right on each table.
I predict the last generation who remembers signatures has already been born. I also predict that cursive writing is going to be almost Sanskrit or Mandarin very soon.
I'm rather skeptical our bodies will ever be "chipped." In Los Angeles all adopted dogs ARE chipped.
To me, "retirement" starts the moment my investments and passive income start making enough money every month that they cover all my expenses.
If my outgoing bills are $3,600 and I have $4,000 coming in every month between rental property and dividends I'd consider myself "retired", even if I am still working, because at that point I'm doing it 100% by choice, and I can walk at any moment without worry... That has to be an amazing feeling.
This is one of those feelings that's utterly amazing in anticipation and abstract beholding, but upon its realization, becomes humdrum and quotidian. One reason for this, is that with a large taxable portfolio, one incurs large annual taxes, even if making zero redemptions. Why? Dividends, and turnover in mutual funds (even index funds). Your biggest expense may become taxes on your portfolio. You may find yourself working, not to pay for food or entertainment or travel, but just to "support" your portfolio.
Quote:
Originally Posted by grouse789
How is Dave Ramsey just above snake oil? He basically tells people to spend less than you earn. Pretty simple formula.
The "snake oil" is in peddling the tale that good personal habits are sufficient for building wealth. They're not! Thrift and self-control alone won't make you wealthy. They are generally (but not always) necessary for reaching affluence (as opposed to wealth), but almost never sufficient, even for that. One needs to have viable ideas for how to generate a good income... and then, figure out how to sustain a high percentage of savings. Dave and his ilk get that second part right, but completely miss the first part.
The complementary prevarication and charlatanism, is from the more flamboyant investment-gurus (as opposed to personal finance gurus). That is conflating affluence with wealth. The recipe for an engineer or a lawyer - people who earn good money - to eventually arrive at a couple million dollars, is a Boglehead-style of investment conservatism, and Dave Ramsey-style personal thrift. All good. But... that's not how to arrive at outright wealth - say, billions of dollars. The latter requires gross and extravagant speculation... which in turn is inimical to the slow-and-steady building of mere affluence.
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Originally Posted by mysticaltyger
It could be, but Alzheimer's is also highly preventable. People seem to love to talk about the 30% of issues that are beyond our control and ignore the 70% that we have control over and I, for one, am tired of it.
I lack the medical education to legitimately argue this, but it seems to me, as a layman, that Alzheimer’s is one of those things that is overwhelmingly genetic – as in, nature, instead of nurture. Additionally, I’ve seen anecdotal evidence that people who exercise their minds in an intellectual-type of career, and then retire, are especially prone to developing the disease (example: scientist retires at 65, and comes down with the disease at 75 or 80). The point, ultimately, is that our bodies and brains have an expiration date. If we delay the expiration date of the body, through careful attention and avoidance of toxins, through steadfast habits and the like, then we’ll be waylaid by expiration of the brain.
We also ought to mention, that the highest medical cost for healthy people, is not paying for doctors' visits or other treatment, but rather, for their health insurance. It's not the receipt of care that's costly, but the "healthcare tax" of day-to-day living as a healthy person who needs no recourse to the medical profession at all. For this to change, vast masses of people must in aggregate become healthier, so that the healthcare profession itself shrinks. Even if 10s of millions of Americans make themselves healthier by adopting a better lifestyle, that won't much dent the cost of health-insurance. For such costs to appreciably fall, the number has to be in the 100s of millions of Americans. And even then, it is unclear how the medical profession may adapt. They may just raise costs for services, if fewer such services are needed, because the population as a whole is healthier.
This brings me to my other point on this subject: to really cut healthcare costs, we have to knock down the prestige of what it means to be a medical doctor. If in America we regarded medical doctors as we do say car mechanics - repairmen of broken machines, who follow canned recipes and charge according to a fee-schedule in a book - healthcare costs would fall precipitously, even if we all remained fat, sedentary and disease-ridden.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lovehound
As far as cursive writing, I think we are nearing an era where all transactions are electronic (such as Apple-pay, Google-pay) and signatures will become obsolete, thumb prints replacing them where necessary.
...
I predict the last generation who remembers signatures has already been born. I also predict that cursive writing is going to be almost Sanskrit or Mandarin very soon.
There’s ample evidence, that students can’t properly absorb lecture material from powerpoint. The better professors therefore still write on the blackboard. Cursive writing is just faster and more elegant than printing. I predict that this practice won’t cease, until we reach some paradigm-shifting scheme, where students learn not by listening and watching in a lecture-hall, but by some sort of telepathic absorption.
One thing the tax cuts did is take what were corporate taxes and sneakily pass them off to shareholders. The tax savings went right to the bottom line for companies .
That increased shareholder equity . Now the capital gains distribution is higher from mutual funds . You may owe an even bigger tax bill without even making a profit .
Some fidelity funds had whoppers of a distribution a few weeks ago . One of my funds had a 30k distribution that is taxable
There’s ample evidence, that students can’t properly absorb lecture material from powerpoint. The better professors therefore still write on the blackboard. Cursive writing is just faster and more elegant than printing. I predict that this practice won’t cease, until we reach some paradigm-shifting scheme, where students learn not by listening and watching in a lecture-hall, but by some sort of telepathic absorption.
Oh God. I had one professor who merely stood at the lectern and read from the textbook he wrote. When I realized they weren't taking attendance I quit attending. What a blowhard! Another professor required we purchase his textbook... but it was never mentioned nor did we have any reading assignments from his book. He was milking the cash cow of his privileged position.
My senior project professor knew less about practical engineering than I did. I actually ended up leading the class, and my part of our senior project (to receive and display signals from a 136 MHz weather satellite) was the only part of our senior project that ever worked. I told everybody the rest of the project was faulty in design. Nobody believed me until the end of the class. This is why I hate tenure. BTW my part worked because I was a ham radio operator at the time. My part was the receiver. I was polite to the rest of the students (about 10) by not laughing. I got the only A grade in the class. At least he was fair.
Telepathy? Sorry my scoffing.
I envision more of a shift to online education, at first by teachers/professors via video but eventually entire courses canned, and perhaps holographic teachers/professors.
After all, the trend since the beginning of the industrial age has been away from labor and towards technology.
In an ideal future of education the basic material would be taught by computer, and students would have access to human tutors and teaching assistants.
Many classes in my lower division were taught more by grad students as TAs than by professors. I only got smaller classes and right-in-the-room professors mostly in upper division.
I'll pick to continue consuming oxygen as long as I can. If I have to kiss up to the Big Medicine Cartel and the other choice is to die, my choice is clear.
Actually there has to be medical reform within the next several to 20 years. Otherwise medical will occupy 100% of our GNP.
Unfortunately, we don't have much choice in the matter. I've known many elderly people, and not one thought they would ever need assistance or extensive medical care in their latter years. Unfortunately, almost all have/did, some more than others.
Unfortunately, we don't have much choice in the matter. I've known many elderly people, and not one thought they would ever need assistance or extensive medical care in their latter years. Unfortunately, almost all have/did, some more than others.
I have taken possible medical need or assisted living, factored in to my net worth.
I have taken possible medical need or assisted living, factored in to my net worth.
I have seen firsthand the suffering of elderly friends/relatives who needed assistance, but could not afford it. Really sad. Unfortunately, we are living in the age where many can no longer depend on their adult children for such assistance.
I have seen firsthand the suffering of elderly friends/relatives who needed assistance, but could not afford it. Really sad. Unfortunately, we are living in the age where many can no longer depend on their adult children for such assistance.
I hate the idea of saddling the younger generation with their elders' debts. Today's youth already have it bad, with paying off student loans, etc.
Maybe this worked in the days when three generations lived together in the same house.
The last thing my wife and I would ever want is to blow our family apart because that is how these situations end up when one steps up to provide care and the others step back.
It happens over and over .
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