Welcome back to the number one financial literacy podcast in the world.

This is the higher standard on a Saturday.

Let's go.

It does not feel the same on the Saturday.

It does.

It's early, too.

Yeah.

And.

What.

Your dress is throwing me off.

I know.

It's a whole.

I know.

Sitting in front of me is my partner in crime, Christopher Nahibi.

Sitting across from me is my.

I guess, church attire wearing partner, man of faith, Omar, everybody.

Thank you.

My man is sitting behind the desk in the production suite, if you will.

Nobody.

Because it's a Saturday and my guy.

Has plans and, like, six jobs.

Yeah, all the jobs.

Yeah.

So it's a challenge.

Would now be a bad time to bring up that quarter zips are.

No.

Have been in your wardrobe for so long, they're cool.

Again, not because you.

You're wearing.

I played the long game, my friend.

I'm not gonna buy a whole new wardrobe.

And first of all, if quarter zips are in, this ain't.

This is half zip.

This is.

It's longer.

This thing goes.

This is deep.

It's like those deep.

Remember how when deep V necks were a thing for a long time?

I'm not gonna wear.

Back in the American Apparel days, I. I had a couple of those.

Yeah.

We got a lot to get into for everybody today.

We're gonna get into why home prices have gone negative.

We're gonna get into some layoff numbers.

But first, what we're gonna dive into is we had a fed rate cut, but mortgage rates are rising, and we're trying to understand why.

Yeah.

So if you didn't happen to catch the live stream, I. I did a little bit of that.

I apologize again for the technical.

Gl.

We're testing new elements of what will ultimately be a live show for the higher standard in the coming months.

But actually coming month, I should say, by January, I hope to have it rolled out.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

We'll start off doing that probably two days a week is probably where I think we're going to start up, and then we'll go from there.

But in addition to the pod.

Yeah.

The podcast will remain exactly what it is for everybody.

I think that's been the biggest emotional.

Like, oh, my God, you guys are living.

No, no, no, we're not.

Yeah.

So that's gonna be real.

But so we did the live show, and that was a big kind of visually apparent theme throughout the day is that everybody in the markets, all the talking heads were like, why are the treasuries rising?

Even though we know there's a pretty much a guarantee, almost 100 probability, according to Chicago Mercantile Exchange, of a rate cut.

Why is this happening?

So I thought we would cover some key takeaways from the market from the rate cut that day because we are recording this on Saturday, December 13th.

And you will get this on just a couple days from now, on Tuesday.

Yeah.

So, number one, the decision to cut rates was very divisive.

Several officials expressed opposition to the move in favor of standing exactly where they are today or where they were prior to that.

Jerome Powell, the Fed chair, said intense debate reflected what a challenging position the Fed is in.

The labor market is weakening while inflation has moved further above the central bank's 2% target.

So some interesting things in that statement that most people didn't catch.

You and I both know the central bank's Target inflation was 2 to 3%.

Historically.

Yeah.

Your boy Bernanke.

Yeah.

And then we changed this to 2% not too long ago, which I still.

Don'T fully understand why.

Which if it were 3%, we would be in line with inflation right now.

You'd be in line with employment right now, and you would just hold, I guess, your fed funds rate.

But you're seeing unemployment rise 4.2%, 4.3% now, 4.4%.

You've got this whole AI rhetoric on the side, which is scaring the hell out of people for jobs and longevity.

You've got data that's coming out in unorthodox ways at a cadence that usually the government provided pretty regularly.

And now because of the shutdown, they weren't.

And you've got a lot of unknowns.

But then what do you have?

You have inflation, which seems to be going back up.

So if you have unemployment approaching a healthy number, which they have also changed recently.

It used to be 5%.

Now it's about 4.5%.

And for those of you asking, well, why is 4.5% the target?

You need to have a certain amount of transitory migration from one job to another job in a labor market, which means that employees think that they have opportunities to grow personally at other companies who are also hiring.

Having a certain amount of that transitory migration really, really helps the job economy.

Because if you, if employers know that you can't leave and find another job, they can pay you less because you're more concerned with stability and the fear of finding another job.

Absolutely.

That 4 and a half to 5% range tells the employers in the market, like, hey, like if you play F I, F O, you're, you're gonna, you're gonna find out Right.

That these guys can go other places in.

Generally the fastest way to move up in any company is to change companies.

Right.

You, you can get labeled and positioned in one.

Oh say he's the analyst.

Yeah, yeah.

They're not gonna give you the opportunity to grow because they just see you.

As what you came in at pigeonhole you.

Yep.

Yeah.

It's a little bit of human nature.

We're gonna talk a lot about that particular element of the job market at the tail end of the show.

And there's some, I would call it revolutionary.

It's an opinion revolutionary.

Things happening that I think are going to be really, really palpable in the next year or two about how we work with one another.

Right.

And look, we're all, we're all for people getting a little bit of relief.

And it's no secret with, with Fed rate cuts Even at a 25 basis point level, the, I guess there's more optimism in the market that things are going to be, do better and maybe companies will be willing to expand and grow and spend, spend more money on that.

Right.

Versus like holding tight.

But it, I thought it was really interesting because in the postgame press conference somebody asked Jerome Powell asked him, well, oh, mind you, this was one of those special meetings where we got the summary of economic projections along along with the Fed's decision.

We're going to cover some of the dots from that where you see where the Fed members are voted a little bit coming up here as well.

Yeah.

But one not notable point in the SCP is they kind of show you where they see the economy going a year from now, two years from now, and what their projections are and part of their projections were that they see there being growth in the economy.

However, unemployment was going to stay the same and, and that to me was.

Illogical and I don't see that.

And then when they ask, and then when they ask Jerome Powell why, why do you think that is?

He's like oh, it'll, it'll likely have to do with more productivity, probably the help of AI and if you're watching.

The live stream and I know that you, you couldn't.

Cause you had some stuff at home you were dealing with.

But I lost my mind when he said that to me.

Cause I thought okay, number one, you're, you're assuming that companies are going to get more and more efficient, which they have historically, and then keep employees.

That isn't the way that works.

Right.

If you're getting more efficiency from Saeed.

And you're eventually getting to inflection point where Said is doing the work of one and a half to two employees.

You let the excess employees go.

Cause that's salaries you're paying for that.

You don't need to the same amount of production as you had historically.

There's a couple of ways companies can really increase their productivity and their bottom line income.

Number one.

Right.

You increase efficiency of employees.

But number two is you cut cost expenses.

And the largest expense for many, many, many companies is their full time employee FTE cost of paying salaries.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's what comes next.

And for Jerome Powell to ignore that, and I only know that he's ignoring it, he's just saying they haven't materially seen the impacts yet, even though they've seen a lot of rhetoric around it.

And that's a fair assessment.

But I don't know that it's going to sound ageist.

I don't want to sound aegis, but I don't know that the FOMC is equipped from a technology and cultural understanding perspective to understand that the historical data as it relates to jobs going backwards is not going to be what it is going forward.

And I think they're vastly underestimating the impacts of what this technology could do.

Mm.

Granted that might not be how they feel comfortable making a decision like hey Chris, like we understand there's revolutionary technology coming, but the Internet was supposed to revolutionize things.

And I would say that the Internet created more jobs than it cost.

More jobs.

Right.

People thought the Internet and email was going to have the USPS go out of business.

Well, it didn't.

Yeah.

Right.

So I guess I understand a little bit of the narrative, but I think it's disconnected to say that, that if you have inflation creep up next year 2 to 3%, that, that you're going to see unemployment stay stable.

I don't think that's right.

Right.

And we know just from recent history with the Fed rate cut, that's inflationary in and of itself.

Right.

So if the target rate of inflation is 2%.

Right.

And according to the job numbers by this time next year, unemployment is going to theoretically stay the same.

Yeah.

Right.

What is a Fed rate cut going to do?

It's only going to cause more inflation if you're going off of your own data.

And they also did something really interesting too, which, and I didn't put this in the show notes, but they did like a non QE QE quantitative easing.

And for those of you going what the hell does that mean.

Let me explain it to you.

They're going to put liquidity into the markets by buying more product.

So I have that for you here.

I had a quote, so maybe you can elaborate.

They released in a statement the committee judges that reserve balances have declined to ample levels and will initiate purchases of shorter term treasury securities as needed to maintain an ample supply of reserves of on an ongoing basis.

And I think what they have agreed to for the first several months at least is buying about 40 billion.

Right.

A month in securities.

Yeah.

When pinged about this, Jerome Powell said that this was largely in anticipation of tax season coming up in April.

So they were going to start putting money into the ecosystem that is giving banks more liquidity to tap into.

So there is a Fed repo line which the banks borrow from, from the Fed.

That line cost the banks very little money.

So they can use that money and deploy it and make an arbitrage.

So they can borrow, let's say at 3%, 4, and they can lend that money out at 5 or 6% overnight.

They borrow overnight.

As a matter of fact, the Fed actually tells banks to do this.

So their usage of that has been, I guess, a little bit of fraught for this doom and gloom.

Like, oh my God, the market's going to fail because the repo line.

No, no, no.

The Fed is encouraging it and banks make money off it.

So it's highly utilized.

He argued that he was putting more money into the market by buying Treasuries to build up the Fed repo liquidity position to bolster banks who are going to be tapping into that because their end clients are going to be paying taxes, they're going to be withdrawing deposits to pay tax.

He referenced April 15th is coming.

April 15th.

Exactly.

He kept saying that.

Now the pundits, the mirrors or Myrons.

I don't know how to say his name.

Right.

I probably should figure that out.

We do a show where we mention his name a lot who talk about this stuff would come out and say, okay, well that's tantamount to getting a 25 basis point rate cut plus like 10 or 15 basis points in actual impact to the economy.

So in, in real impact, it's arguing that effectively you're getting, you got like a 35 or 40 basis point rate cut when you, you know, factor in this non.

Qe.

Qe.

Right.

Kind of announcement they made, which was a little bit surprising because you, you know, they're calling me to do it.

Yeah, they're calling it reserve management.

They're not Calling it quantitative easing.

Yeah, because they know that's right.

They know what, what that signals.

Now, we talked about it on the show recently too.

Okay.

It's, it's one thing when you're, when they're buying securities and, and flooding the market with liquidity.

Right.

It's another thing too.

There's shorter term Treasuries that are running off and then they're buying enough to stay right where they're at.

Maybe go up a little bit higher.

Right.

In that case, that use case.

I understand.

Yeah.

This, this to me, being proactive about tax season seems weird to me, to me, as if I were one of the Fed heads, I would say, look like, let me have the banks, you know, taper off this teeth a little bit.

I know how you like teat references in the show.

Teeth.

Yeah, taper off a little bit.

And, and this would be the opportune time to have them prepare themselves for tax time because they need to make sure their liquidity position is in place rather than let them continue to leverage the Fed line.

The Fed line was really pushed and utilized during the contagion period post Silicon Valley banks failure.

The Fed was saying, hey, use this, use this, use this, use this.

It's here for this kind of stuff.

And now I think banks have relied on it because they have this arbitrage.

It's economically beneficial to them.

I think you got to start pulling that back a little bit, saying, hey, this is more of an emergency function.

This is a reserve function.

I don't know that you necessarily need it.

You shouldn't be bolstering it pre tax.

And they, and they very well may begin to do that.

Right.

So why this is all so important, why we're even diving into all this stuff is because, you know, the Fed creates those reserves, like electronically.

They use those reserves to buy the securities from banks and other financial institutions, which now allows banks to hold on to more cash and the Fed holds more bonds.

So essentially there's increased demand for bonds that ultimately pushes yields down.

And how many, how many things are benchmarked, you know, against these yields, like things like mortgage rates.

Right.

Things like, you think auto loans.

Right.

So it, it's a trickle down effect to all of us.

So let me give a little spoiler alert now on what I think this means and why I think the economy did what it did.

So going into this particular rate cut, we saw the Treasuries react different than it had to the previous two rate cuts.

This being the third of them.

The treasury is the, the Long end of the curve.

The 10 year started to rise and it rose enough to where it piqued the market's interest.

Going like okay wait a minute, what's going on?

If we are anticipating a rate cut, why is the 10 year going up, not down?

I think there's a couple factors at play here.

Number one, I think that there is and we'll get into somebody else's experts opinion, not mine later on in this but I think number one people are going this is the last rate cut that we're sure of, that we're confident in because right now we don't know what we don't know going forward.

Number two is the last FOMC meeting of the year and the next meeting is some time off, 45 days.

Right.

And number three I think the, the market was saying okay look at some point in time we're going to have to have a return to normalcy and the Fed funds rate as much as we've been hyper focused on it is not indicative of mortgage rates over time.

You should have the curve start to normalize.

2, 3, 5 year treasuries should yield less than the 10 year treasury.

And it's always been this, if you're going to put your money to work in a bond for a longer period of time, you should get more of a return for it.

Yeah, right.

You should get more back of your money.

So the 10 year should be a little bit higher irrespective of what banks cost of borrowing is which again never before in history has the focus on Fed meetings been so significant by the general consumer.

Yeah, most people historically did not care.

Didn'T even know about it.

Right.

And now you have a situation where Jerome Powell has made this, I don't want to say mockery of it but he's made this big.

We come out every 45 days barring two holiday breaks and we have these meetings and oh it's a press conference and I cover it.

I mean I'm not saying that I'm not buying in, I'm all for it.

It'S a big deal.

Yeah, it's the only sports I watch now.

But it's just, it's strange.

He's a commissioner.

Right.

And look, and the reason why this is, I think this does get covered especially right now.

Look, earlier this week we saw and it's come down since then but all time highs again in the stock market, S&P 500, the Dow again, again like.

How many times have we.

It's at the point now where I'm so numb to it.

I know.

And I'm convinced like the ones that we're experiencing as of late are, have in large part been due to what we covered on the show is there's a Fed rate cut right now that means automatically, you know, and you could speak probably better this than anybody else.

Savings rates on your high yield coming down that day.

They're coming down that day and they're not even telling you about it.

You're just gonna find out on your statement.

If you look at your statement, some.

People will send you an email.

But generally, yeah, you look at your statements.

Right, you're just gonna look at your statement.

So those are coming down now eventually it's going to get to the point where, man, I'm no longer earning enough on this statement to where I can reasonably justify, you know, losing out on the 3 to 5 extra percent I could get if this was invested in the market.

So I'm going to start pulling some of this out.

I'm gonna start investing some of it.

More people going into the same top heavy investments.

Right.

That those are the only ones that everyone feels comfortable with.

Think of the Max 7 that's ultimately going to push the S P500, the Dow up, everything up.

That's just, that's my opinion.

And if, if it's true, and I know we're going to get into this later in the show, the SCP predicted that there's only going to be one Fed rate cut in all of 2026.

Guess who's calling BS?

Probably you.

No, I think the administration because they got a little say with who they put in the chair next.

Yeah, that's going to change dynamically.

I think as this all comes down and unfolds.

Call it by May, you're going to see a very dynamic level of conversations and a very different dialogue from the fomc.

Yeah.

So if those rates continue to come down and it makes borrowing a whole lot cheaper, what do you think people are going to do with their money?

They've learned they're going to go back to investing in more.

So it just creates an even bigger asset bubble.

Now I'm not saying to not capitalize on that asset bubble.

These are, this is all information for everybody to make, but you have to.

Be able to afford assets.

Informed decisions.

I read an article last night which I was, I don't think I put in the show last night, but the private credit markets have gotten a lot of stigma as of late.

And this is one of those things where I don't really talk a lot about on the show because I have personal professional history in this space.

So what's an example of private, private credit markets?

So instead of going out to like public markets like a bank, you'll go to individuals that are wealthy or like.

Hard money lenders, hard.

Oh no, no, no.

You'll go to individuals that are wealthy or funds that are not publicly traded.

I see.

Okay.

And those are the quote, private credit markets.

Right.

Banks are what I would call not private credit markets.

But generally speaking, a company that doesn't operate like a bank under the same kind of guidance will provide lines of credit that a bank can't do because of their regulatory control.

But also, and there's another element of this people don't talk about the wealthy will often get pulled together to be private credit.

And it used to be like when Apple went public, they would tap into the public markets, take their company public, use that money to grow and scale their company.

Because they've gone, they've now got liquidity because they've taken the company public.

And now those people have bought into the company and as a result of that they have this extra money they use to buy in to go grow and scale the business.

Amazon did this within three years.

Right.

And this is a very common trend.

Well now what's happening is you have this uber wealthy elite class that has a private stock market effectively kind of evolving where you'll.

If I'm somebody who's got a company.

Right.

A great example of this.

OpenAI recently, Sam Altman did this.

You'll go to your rich buddies and say, hey, I'm doing another round of a capital raise.

We're valuing the company at X. I need money from you, you, you and you, you actually pick who you want to invest versus you going out to the public market saying anybody who wants to, you go, you put together a, a BFF secret society of investors.

Yeah.

And then they invest in you privately as like a last round before you take it public.

By the time the public gets the opportunity to invest in it, you're just picking up the table scraps that are left over after these ultra high net worth individuals already had the opportunity to buy in way cheaper than you did.

Yeah.

And that's why you want, you would want to pay attention to the.

Which one of those ultra high net worth people are investing.

It's like, oh man, if, what's his name?

Larry Ilson Ellison.

If he's invested, you know, I'm in.

Like he's gonna, he's gonna try to he's gonna make sure it's not gonna fail or.

Here's the problem though is you're also giving a great example of the, you ever heard of like the Stripe Mafia?

So everybody who was at Stripe has spun off.

Like there's a huge cohort of people who've spun off and created their own companies and they've all become billionaires known, right?

Yeah, yeah.

Some of which went up at like OpenAI, for example, some of which have started their own companies that are, that are pretty notable.

There's a whole like mafia of people from the tech sector that have branched out because Stripe was all about customer focus and delivery and execution.

Is really good cultural value system that got really, you know, I guess imprinted on the employees.

And those employees then went out and started their own companies with that same mantra and they've all started.

Right, right, right, right, right.

Tens and millions of dollars in worth in some of the lower level ones.

Some of them up to billions of dollars of companies that these people have started who are former employees of Stripe.

Incredible.

Right, right.

Which is what I'm trying to do with the show with you.

You know me, I mean, just a.

Fraction brother, you know, I'm just trying.

To get a zero or two trying.

To make a dollar out of 15 cents.

Yeah.

But so what's happening is these people are then calling their friends, they're investing but their investment dollars.

When you start, when you're so seed round initial, right, you're going to buy the most, you're going to buy the most amount of the company you can for a little money.

And as you start to develop more growth in the company, each round values the company a little bit more and the buy in is a little bit more expensive.

The time you get to the ipo, public markets where you go to the stock exchange, you ring the bell and the public, it's an opportunity to buy in.

That's going to be the highest price because you've got this proof of concept and it's the lowest amount of risk.

Yeah.

At the very beginning, the seed round, you're taking the highest amount of risk.

So you're buying more of the company for less dollars.

By the time you go public, you're buying less of the company because it's going to be millions of shares for more dollars because it's going to cost you more because it's a proven commodity.

That's why it's going public now.

And you have faith in this business model.

There's some exceptions like, like Uber for example.

Which was an untested model in the markets and profitability was kind of questionable.

But SpaceX is happening.

Yeah.

In not too long, at least in theory.

And it's arguably the most valuable private company in the world right now.

Oh, and all I'm seeing lately is like, you know, articles or things getting pushed out saying, hey, this is going to, this is going to go public next year.

Yeah, get ready.

But everybody who's invested prior to you along this way.

So these super wealthy individuals is going to get in cheaper.

Now granted their money was tied up longer, but they also don't have the same usage of money as you.

The individual consumer does.

So an interesting thing is happening where you're seeing, okay, how do I get these investments to other people?

They're creating something called SPES, special purpose entities or special purpose structures or SPVs in some case.

Special purpose vehicles.

But they're all the same thing.

Somebody creates an LLC which owns the interest of the stock and then sells a private offering in that llc.

This spe.

Two individuals.

Right.

And this infuriates the people like Sam altman over at OpenAI, because if I'm calling you Saeed Omar to invest because you're an ultra high net worth individual in my company and then you package and take that and sell that to somebody else as interest in this speake.

Now a consumer is buying into this LLC which then in turn owns my company in a private offering I've given you.

Yeah.

And that's the risk in the private credit markets that nobody's talking about.

Right, interesting.

So individuals who are not invited can buy in via these spees, which these uber elite are making money on.

So Sam Altman and some other companies recently have decided to put a stop to this.

I was going to say again, by.

Limiting in contract, hey, you want to buy in, in this round before we go public?

You can.

But you're not allowed to use SPVs.

Right.

Or sell it for any fraction of your ownership interest.

You're not allowed to sell that interest.

So it locks them in, but guarantees them that, that nobody else in the ecosystem will be doing that to dilute their value shift.

Okay.

Value ownership.

Right.

So what's the, I mean, why would somebody like Sam Almond not want that if, if this person is packaging it and like they're saying I can back, I can back this on my own.

Yeah.

If somebody wanted out, I'll buy them out myself.

There's a number of reasons.

Yeah, Number one, you can buy it out yourself.

Number two, if I'm selling to you side Omar.

I know Site Omar as a known quantity.

I've invited you.

I brought you in.

I know what I'm dealing with.

Yeah, right.

You bring in somebody else via their ownership in this llc, right?

You don't know who you're getting.

You don't know what their interests are.

You don't know their motivations.

You don't know how they're gonna vote.

You don't know all those things.

Right.

Some of these things don't even have voting rights.

When you go to the public markets and you go public as a company, people forget that Sarbanes Oxley comes in.

If they go like, what the hell is that?

You ever heard of SOX controls?

And if you haven't, let me explain.

You can't just have like Sayyid Omar board a loan in a system anymore.

It has to be said Omar boarding a loan in the system and somebody else checking his work to ensure that there's no fraud, manipulation or deceit.

He's scrubbing it out.

These little accounting rules and controls, rules are all over publicly traded companies because you need to ensure that the SEC reports that get there follow the same protocols in the.

Follow FASB for accounting.

They need to follow Sarbanes Oxley for these controls and have their reporting be very homogeneous.

You're reporting regardless of what company you're in and somebody else is reporting to the public markets, to Wall street need to be based off the same principles.

This is kind of the argument that people are taking with Scion Asset Management.

You just saw recently.

Michael Burry left the asset management business and is now doing it via his family office.

And he shut down his fund.

People were arguing.

Well, his major criticism of companies was a lack of understanding around the accounting rules and capital expenditures going into things like AI.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

People are like, oh, he's not doing the accounting.

Right.

He's not doing the accounting.

Right.

These rules are in place so that that argument shouldn't happen.

Right, right.

But it also puts a huge toll on these companies because they're now required to follow all this guidance because they're public.

And you have to follow all these same public rules so that we're all somewhat situated.

Well, if you're Sam Alt OpenAI or your Elon Musk at SpaceX, you're not a public company yet, so you don't have to follow those rules.

So you've got a lot more flexibility and freedom in how you run your company.

Yeah.

So having SPEs and private investors is advantageous to them.

But at the same Time those investors are going to want to be liquid at some point.

So they're going to want you to go public.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So.

And well that is the end goal, right?

It is the end goal.

But by the time it gets to the general consumer, you don't have anywhere near the upside that they did.

You see what I'm saying?

Makes sense.

Makes sense.

So now it used to be like okay, venture capital will get in and they'll come in the very ground floor, they'll come in with seed rounds and everybody else will come in multiple rounds and they'll make money.

And those are these big companies and now individuals are coming in and doing it.

So by the time it, the companies, companies are so fleeced by the time they get to market that you're just not getting the same upside.

Yeah.

If anything you get downside.

They're so overhyped and the companies and the people that are buying it can overhype them.

Right.

So, so explain.

So back to what we were talking about originally.

Right.

Yeah.

Why, why are we stuff that's going to impact our everyday listeners.

Right.

Why are we seeing again for I don't know how many times in a row this is, we had a Fed rate cut.

Yeah.

And why are we seeing mortgage rates go up again?

We, we already know that it's benchmarked to the 10 year.

So then why are Treasuries even going up right now?

So let's, let's talk about the, the, the mortgage market here for a second.

So mortgage rates are surging ahead of the Fed's expected rate cut.

What gives is according to market watch, mortgage rates are up sharply over the last few days even though the Federal Reserve is expected to cut interest rates later today.

And this of course was early in the week on Wednesday.

That is departure from.

Our rates have traditionally moved ahead of anticipated Fed cuts.

Typically when the Fed is expected to keep cutting rates, financial markets factor in the move and trades then push the 10 year treasury down.

The 10 year moves downward.

The 30 year mortgage rate often falls in tandem.

The 10 year and by extension the 30 year are not behaving as they traditionally would according to Jeffrey Rubin, president of a home lending company based in the Northeast.

He told the.

He told sorry.

The 10 year treasury remained at 4.16 at 12:50pm Eastern on Wednesday with a 30 year rising in tandem.

The rate increases may be due to a couple of key factors.

Rubin said that the bond market may be trying to assess the Fed's next move following the December rate cut with Inflation potentially still being a problem for the US Economy and I think that it is.

Traders may also be factoring in the likelihood that the Fed will stop cutting rates for the time being after December unless the economy takes a sharp turn.

And Jerome Powell has not said they're data dependent, but has certainly said they're going to have a wait and see approach.

That was part of the take home key points from the, from the meeting.

Financial markets expect the Fed to stop cutting when its benchmark rate falls closer to 3% which is seen as normal.

The normal rate actually he said it's 2% these days.

So that's kind of in question.

Looking at the Fed's longer term dot plot forecast for where rates could be headed, they are getting closer to that 3% range.

Robert Tip, head of global bonds at PGIM Fixed Income, told Market Watch.

And just to reiterate what Jerome Powell said, I want to say there that the Fed was quote, well positioned to wait to see how the economy evolves.

He said.

So he's not saying we're data dependent, but he's certainly suggesting that waiting is likely to be what they're going to do.

Right.

I mean when I was reading this part of the show notes and preparing for the show, what naturally came to mind too was there's, there's been a, we can't forget not too long ago the US Had a credit rating downgrade.

Yeah.

Right.

Officially meaningful.

And that was, it was the third of the, of the, the three amigos, right.

S P Fitch and I think the last one was Moody's that officially downgraded the.

I can't, I can't imagine with where things are going that an A future, another downgrade down because the top rating is aaa.

Right.

With all three are now at, you know, double A, the next rating down would be A. I mean still not saying that, you know, default is at risk, you know, and it's imminent but it's, it's definitely signaling that credit risk is significantly higher than what it once was.

And I can't imagine like within the next several years, if you will, with where things are going that another downgrade isn't a possibility.

I would think that there is.

And if there is another downgrade that has to impact Treasuries.

Right.

I think that's probably a realistic expectation for now.

The US is still the place to park your money no matter where you are in the world.

I hope that it never loses that status and it would be a sad.

Day, but it hasn't always been the.

Case it hasn't always been the case, certainly, but during the last 50, 60 years.

Absolutely.

You've got the national debt at an all time high.

You've got government shutdowns that have happened at a pretty, almost, almost normal clip.

Now it's just consistent.

And you've got.

If this were someone's private household.

Yeah, Right.

And you were to say your credit cards are maxed out.

We need another credit card.

That's what the government's basically saying.

You were to say, hey, we can't spend to keep our household up until we get, you know, more funds.

Yeah.

This is what the government is saying.

This is what they're saying.

And this is what the credit agencies, these agencies that we talk about, this is what they're looking at.

Yeah.

They're looking at debt levels.

Right.

They're looking at patterns of behavior.

What, what is the pattern of behavior that we've seen?

Oh, we're running into a debt crisis.

Got to raise the ceiling again.

Yeah.

Every, every few, every few months.

Right.

And then they're looking at.

Okay, let's look at everyone's behavior.

Is everybody getting along?

Oh, no way.

You guys just had a shutdown again, right?

The longest one ever, if you will, is so you gotta think.

And to your point, I think I have it here.

Just listen to these numbers.

The interest paid on our debt going back from 2020 till now.

In 2020, we paid 345 billion in interest, right?

Yep.

20, 21.

352.

22.

Now we're going up.

476 billion.

Right.

23, 659 billion.

Okay.

24, 881 billion this year.

970 billion, bro, we're talking 20.

Right.

Of, of our revenue.

And so if you're a credit risk agency, that's going to kind of be like, this is kind of not going in the right direction.

Fellas, if you were Dave Ramsey, you'd cut the credit card up.

You should have never had the credit card, bro.

It's like, who gave these guys a credit card?

Cash only, right?

No, it's a problem.

And, and, and to as much as I make fun of Dave Ramsey, you have exponential debt increasing here.

This is not a sustainable business model.

Right.

But if you're a president who comes in for four years and then you come in for another four years, how are you going to fix this in just eight years?

This is almost a trillion dollar problem.

It's not yet, not, not enough time.

Exactly.

There's not enough time.

And even if there was time to set the Infrastructure in place.

You're not there long enough to ensure that it stays in place because the next guy might come and do it.

So, I mean, in some cases, like I use California as an example.

I'm in this bracket, so I'm going to say it.

In some cases, I get taxed.

58.

58.

I was walking the day to get coffee with my dad and I'm like telling him, like, yeah, blah, I'm gonna get this much money.

He's like, oh, it's great.

I'm like, no, no, no, no.

I only get about 42 of that.

He's like, wait, what?

Yeah.

He's like, why can't you do this, this and this?

I'm like, dad, I'm W2 in this instance.

Yeah.

Like, I'm getting taxed no matter what on that.

I know.

I saw a full breakdown of like, how much LeBron actually takes home after.

After everything that he's got to pay out.

It's a lot of money, but it's still, I mean, yeah, nowhere near the top line.

Supposed to be making 50 some million a year.

He's walking home 20.

I mean, that's crazy.

Yeah, that's crazy.

Obviously.

Listen, he's special.

He's got other outside ventures, but just in general, right?

You gotta think big picture.

Like that's.

It's a lot of money going away.

And I saw some models that were, that were breaking out.

Like, even if you, you are in the camp of we should tax the ultra rich, right?

And take all the, Take all their money.

If you were to take the top 100 people and take all, all the, you know, income that they've made and tax them, that's only bringing it down like $2 trillion.

That ain't doing nothing.

You want to, you want to have like an insightful moment.

This is gonna go left, but bear with me, this is, this is about economic policy and money.

The Age of Disclosure documentary that came out, like, I like UFOs and history and archaeology.

I'm into all that.

Right?

I watched it because I thought it was just a fascinating topic.

But they didn't approach it like, oh, do our aliens real site?

They approach it like, hey, man, there's all these things that are happening.

Yeah.

And all this money's going towards this, and that's a lot of money going towards something that does not exist.

I'm just saying.

So, like, so they follow the money trail and they follow that.

Right, right.

And you're like, damn, there's a lot of dollars going to government.

Eight Government agencies that we don't even know exist.

Yeah.

They're doing things that we don't even understand.

Like I.

And that part, the alien part of this, you know what I mean?

And doing stuff that isn't being discussed, disclosed to us.

That's right.

And look, I get it.

National security, like, I'm not saying all those things are not important.

I'm saying that they are.

But at the same time I'm saying like, damn, that's a lot of dollars.

I mean, can we protect home base a little bit?

I'm, you know, just a little bit protect home base.

It's appreciate.

I appreciate you protecting me if I'm not poor.

You know what I mean?

If I'm poor to do it, I feel a little less.

I might be a little bit.

Okay.

With a little bit less alien protection.

Yeah.

And a little bit more wealth.

That's all I'm saying.

Right.

You know, I mean, give me like a tax break.

Yeah.

So it's a problem.

And in the housing market.

Let's get into this too because I, we've talked a lot about housing over the years.

Home prices have gone negative for the first time in over two years.

And I, I linked the CNBC article in the show Notes.

There's also an Axiom article.

The Axiom article has some really great graphics to show you how home prices across the country have reached this number.

Like to give you an approximation, about 53 of the country is seeing declines in home value right now.

That's meaningful.

So let's get into the CNBC quote here.

Home prices have finally come down compared with last year, though just fractionally, according to the daily reads from Parcel Labs, which looks at high frequency listing data on single family homes, condos, townhomes, both new and existing.

They may stay softer though, as home prices are down 1.4% in the last three months.

On a national level, home prices have gone negative since mid 2023, a year after the Federal Reserve first brought rates up from zero and mortgage rates moved sharper sharply higher.

From March 2022 to June 2023, the average rate on the popular 30 year fixed mortgage went from 3.9% to just over 7%, according to Mortgage News Daily.

But even then, prices were negative on a year over year basis for just a few months.

It was nothing like the great financial crisis when home prices dropped 27% from their peak in 2020 in 2006 to their trough in 2012, according to the S and P Case Shiller National Home Price Index.

So I don't know that you're going to see a, a great recessionary, like housing recession.

I don't even know you're going to see a housing recession.

If anything, I'm more worried about the stock market and some of the technology sector stuff.

But here's some interesting facts from axios.

Over half 53% of the US homes have lost their value in the past year, according to Zillow.

That's the most since 2012.

But the vast majority of homeowners still have, quote, plenty to feel good about.

The Real Estate report said many homeowners bought before prices surged in the early 2000s.

As of October, the median home value had jumped roughly 67% since the property was last sold.

Wow.

Wow.

Just 4% loss value in that time around 8.5 years.

For the typical homeowner, losses between sales are up slightly from a year ago at 2%, but lower than pre pandemic levels at 11%.

It's a homeowner's, it's a home buyer's market right now.

If you can't afford it, Big asterisk there.

If you can't afford it.

And I think that's the problem.

That's the underlying issue is that there's not enough places for people to afford it.

But if you can, it's a home buyer's market.

Persistently high mortgage rates and prices have sidelined many nationwide home sellers outnumber buyers by a record 37, according to Redfin.

Yeah, I had that too.

So some regional stuff here, which I think is important because if you're living in Southern California, like what I don't.

See it strongest, strongest buyers markets are in Texas and Florida.

Yeah.

Which I, I think because Texas and Florida, particularly Austin and Miami have had some massive swings down in, in home values.

And there's a lot of deliveries in the market.

If you've driven around Florida, if you've driven around Texas, there's just a ton of property being built.

And ironically, those are the two, two of the biggest states for people to exit California and go to.

Right.

But to, to your point, with properties being built there.

Right.

This is from the Federal Reserve bank of St. Louis.

Unsold new homes.

Right.

The number of completed but unsold new homes has reached levels last seen in the summer of 2009.

Yeah.

Which I would say was in.

Right in the swing of things.

Great financial crisis.

And also that does not recognize the fact that homebuilders are putting in massive incentives and trying to offset their sale price with incentives.

So the net Net price that you're actually paying is lower than you're seeing in the new home sales.

So there's a huge, they've been trying out.

There's smoke and mirrors game going on.

I think there's some, there's some builders that are trying to bribe, you know, new or first time homebuyers with rates of like somewhere with a four handle.

Yeah, right.

And they can't, they can't even get them right.

They're trying to buy down the rate for the buyer.

So you come to me, you say, hey, I can't, I want to buy this home, but I can't afford it.

And I go, okay, I'm a home builder.

Here's what I'll do is I will buy down your rate to something with less than a 5 to start with like a 4.9 or 4.75, whatever it might be.

Right.

I'll give you all these incentives.

I'll make this work for you.

Just buy the home.

Just buy the home.

That's kind of what they're doing right now.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And then why, why is that scary though?

Because if you have homebuilders having a hard time offload this, their capital is tied up, right.

What can't they start doing?

Building new homes.

Start starting new homes to, you know, give more inventory.

Because they're, they, they have margins that they have to, you know, analyze and balance out.

Right.

So what does that mean?

Can't build new homes?

That means the people that were working on homes right now, they're not working anymore.

Right.

Or they're not, they're not getting as many jobs.

So it, again, it's a trickle down effect.

I think it happens over time.

But the home building market, you're going to see a lot of deliveries in Florida, in Texas, and frankly across the country in the next couple of months.

Let's look at the west and the South.

Really interesting data from these two regions where there are more available homes and greater climate risk saw the most widespread losses over the past year.

Year, most major metros in those regions saw at least half of homes lose value, led by Denver, 91%.

Okay.

Not 91 of their value.

91% of homes lost half of their value.

Yeah, thank you for the clarification.

Austin, Texas, 89%.

Sacramento, California, 88%.

Phoenix, 87% and Dallas, 87%.

According to Zillow.

Right.

Most major metros in those regions saw at least half of homes lose value.

Right.

Meanwhile, only three major metros in the North, Northeast and Midwest saw Homes saw most homes lose value.

Minneapolis, Des Moines, Iowa, and Scranton, Pennsylvania.

There is a difference between taking a loss and being underwater or owing more money to your lender than the house is worth.

So to be clear here, I think it's important to be clear.

Just because over half of homes lost value doesn't mean that everybody meaningfully changed their lives or realized that loss.

These are unrealized losses.

Yes.

So what this article is really saying was half of homeowners in a certain region had their home values go down, but unless they were selling the property or they bought it and were very, very highly leveraged, that did not impact their lives.

That's a scare you number.

It's a concerning number to know from a data point perspective, but it's not going to materially affect the financial position of most Americans in those markets.

Markets, right.

Exactly.

And if, and if anything, that that type of rhetoric that gets pushed out could ultimately, with rate cuts coming down, could ultimately push, you know, this into an even bigger buyer's market where buyers have been waiting on the sideline, and it could stabilize those numbers and flatline them a little bit.

I think it's a good trend.

I think it's healthy.

I think it's necessary.

I would like to see it continue and see home values come down.

Now, I don't want to see a market crash, but I would like to see the home values come down.

Mm.

I do think that rates are going to come down over time for the mortgage community, but I don't think it's going to be near term.

I think it's going to take six to eight, nine months to see them come back down.

Do I think?

I'm.

I'm not saying 4% rates.

I'm saying, you know, high fives, low sixes may be plausible in the not too distant future.

Right now, what was interesting, because this is also from Redfin, you know, cities with the best median sale price year over year, There were a few, a few, like outliers that kind of stood out.

And I was like, I'm just trying to understand why or how I don't understand.

Cleveland, Ohio, up 11.6%.

Now, granted, this is the median sale price year over year.

Okay.

Cleveland, Ohio, 11.6%.

Newark, New Jersey, 10.7%.

Detroit, 10.4%.

Milwaukee, 9% up.

Right.

I think a lot of those are turnaround cities.

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Okay.

I think that's what it is.

I think a lot of them are going through revitalizations.

Detroit's certainly one of them.

The truck was hit hard while the automotive industry exit.

And now you're starting to see a lot of investors going there because they were really cheap for a long period of time.

They're able to revitalize the community and almost in some cases restore some historical value by.

And this is where investors get like a bad connotation.

They get like, oh, they're coming to flip houses.

Well, slipping right now is a very risky value proposition.

It's not a clean cut thing.

And I would say that that business has largely died, which is why you've seen the narrative on social media largely go away.

Yeah, it was, you know, house flipping and Airbnb for a while and now that's kind of died.

Yeah, it's because it's a really risky value proposition.

Flip or flop would be a huge flop right now.

Yeah, it'd be, it'd be maybe flip mostly flop.

Maybe flip mostly flop is a great show.

Yeah, someone heard this is like, damn it, Steve, we're going to do that.

But yeah, that's.

It's a really tough thing.

And I think a lot of those markets, because they had a cheaper cost of entry point for a long period of time, investors would go in because they could flip there and make money and they would revitalize the community.

Plus, if you're a first time home buyer and you're like, okay, look, you know what, Detroit might be rough in some areas.

Some areas very, very nice.

Yeah, we could buy in, you know, neighborhood adjacent areas and make a nice home.

And I think those communities are starting to come back up.

Right.

And that's just cyclical, by the way there.

I met somebody at drop off at my daughter's school the other day who recently bought a house like a year or two ago.

That was a flip from Tarik and the team.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

They like it.

They do some beautiful work.

The work is beautiful.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But I mean, she didn't trash it.

She didn't say that the house is bad.

But the reason why it came up was they were having some plumbing issues and I was like, oh, you've experienced.

This as of late?

Oh, yeah, we had.

We had to redo the bathroom because there was a bathroom leak.

And then it was completely fixed and we were happy with it and now we have a leak again.

You've had a 2025, bro.

Bro.

2025 has not been nice to your boy.

But it's okay.

2026.

We're looking, we're looking ahead.

I've got so many things to repair on the house man, it's crazy.

I know.

There's so many little things that I need to, like, take care of them.

Just like.

And look, and we were talking about this not too long ago.

I have little things around the house that I need to repair and fix, and I'm not going to Home Depot to fix them.

And Home Depot is experiencing that on their earnings.

Like, what's going on here?

Yeah, usually.

Because if.

If people aren't buying homes, right, then what.

What they should be doing is renovating their homes and fixing things up.

So they should be experiencing, you know, a little bit of gain off of this, but they haven't been.

I have nothing to base this on, like, nothing at all.

But just my sentiment towards this is.

I think we're at critical mass.

I think that everything's gonna be fine.

It's gonna be fine.

Yeah, yeah.

Has gotten to the point where we all feel insane.

I was telling you before the show started, and I, you know, I don't have a problem bringing this up on the show.

I feel like a failure.

You know, I.

My entire career has changed and I'm working my ass off, you know, in some cases, 12 hours a day, 13 hours a day.

I'm getting the studio, I'm doing all these things.

I'm managing the new business that we launched, plus you know, the, the new stuff for the podcast, the live.

I'm putting all this effort and I know I'm, you know, I'm going to spend at the end of this year, probably 600,000 on my MX.

Right.

Like, I, I know that I'm not hurting relative to the American population.

Right.

But I feel like a failure.

I feel the weight of inflation and debt and fiscal responsibility in my position.

And my.

That number used to be a meaningful feel.

Like your output, you're putting out way more than, I guess you feel like with the amount of work that you're putting out, you should be getting back more.

Is that.

Why is it like, I think we.

All feel that way.

That's what I'm getting at.

It's like, I don't think.

I think it's completely, I guess, agnostic to how much you make.

I think most Americans, unless you're in like the uber wealthy upper class, I think most Americans, regardless if you're making a hundred thousand dollars a year or you're making a million dollars a year, because a million dollars used to sound like a lot, we still stigmatize it.

Like it's a lot, but it's not a lot.

I mean, granted, if you're making W2 wages.

Let's say you're making half a million dollars a year.

And, you know, 50% of that, let's just say across the country, on average, goes to pay taxes.

That's 250 grand.

That number.

Half a million went to 250.

Like that.

Like that.

And.

And that's.

That's a meaningful change.

You have side hustles.

And I'll get into a lot of this on the.

On the tail end of the segment, and I do recommend most people listen to it because it's really fast.

Fascinating culturally.

But I think we all feel this way, and I think we're.

We're just like.

I. I'll use me as an example.

I want to be grateful for the opportunities that I have and the luxury lifestyle that I have.

It's.

It's sensational.

I love it.

But I would be lying to you if I didn't say that I was worried and concerned every single day.

Yeah.

And I think.

I think this resonates with a lot of people, and hopefully people find some comfort in it, because I've had myself.

I've had plenty of conversations around this.

Like, man, I'm not saying that we don't make enough, like, my wife and I together, you know, jointly, but it's like, it don't feel like it.

It doesn't, you know, doesn't feel that way.

I don't think it feels that way for most Americans.

Right.

And it's like, like, how are you.

How is everybody able to manage.

Manage this and get through this?

And it doesn't help.

It really doesn't help sometimes when you're like, okay, social media definitely doesn't help.

So we stay off of that.

You know what's not helping either, though, and this is.

This is a newfound revelation for me is that I. I don't want to be negative all the time.

Right, Right.

So we.

We as a society have adopt.

I'm not talking about light healers.

Go rub a crystal.

I'm talking like, we've adopted this.

Like, be positive, be optimistic.

But are we brainwashing ourselves?

Everything's going to be okay.

Yeah.

Is it like the.

Like, everything's burning around us, like, everything's gonna be fine.

Yeah.

That's my favorite.

It's my favorite gif for the guy.

Sleep.

The dog is sitting in a burning house.

Like, this is fine.

We've covered this in the show.

You're not allowed to say Jeff anymore.

It's gif.

It's Jeff.

No, I know.

There's A debate here.

It's gif.

Okay.

It's gif.

I'll call it gift for you, but I want you to know, mentally, it's gif for me.

No, it's not.

Yeah, you're not allowed to mentally think, but it's.

It's a problem.

And I think that we as a society have gotten to this, like, it's going to be okay.

It's going to be okay mindset that we're actually buying into this dogma, and I don't think it's going to be okay for a lot of people, man.

Yeah.

I don't want to scare anybody.

That's not the intent.

Right.

But if Home Depot ain't filling up right, and people aren't buying new homes at the Cadence they once were, where's all that money going?

Yeah, I know, man.

I'll be honest.

My wife and I have been sitting there and we talk about it, and it's hard to see, like, you know, light at the end of this tunnel, like, right now.

Some days I feel that way, you.

Know, and it's like.

And it's.

You kind of think, like, okay, I'm not ungrateful, obviously, for everything that we have and the life and the life that we built, you know, but there's times where you're like, man, this ain't it.

This ain't it for me.

And it doesn't feel right.

Yeah.

And it's like, I like it.

I, I.

You're almost ready to be like, yo, cash me out.

I'm out.

I literally had this conversation myself in bed last night where I was like, look, I'll just sell a bunch of real estate and I'll pay off all the debt that I can.

Yeah.

And I'll live, like, very modest lives.

I got a lot of people on the payroll, man.

And I'm sitting here going like, I'm Karen X, I'm carrying Y, I'm Karen Z.

And I'm doing all this stuff, and I'm sitting here thinking to myself, like, but at the end of the day, like, this all.

If you're a dad or a mom or even if you got a cat at home, like, you.

You have, like, this weight of, like, I have to ensure these people are protected.

Yeah.

And if you own a company and you're emotionally invested and the culture is good, you feel that way about your company.

And.

And I've seen it firsthand from people like that that do.

I mean, they're not.

A lot of CEOs aren't like, this But a lot of people are like this.

Whether you.

Whether you know this or not, every single person listening to this show, if you're living on your own, you're the CEO of your household.

Yeah, Right.

You might have a co. CEO and a spouse and a partner, but you're the CEO of your household, and this stuff weighs on you.

You might have a public company, but I guarantee those kids you got at home put a lot more stress on you than your shareholders do.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because you.

You.

You care about them to a degree that, you know, it's like you don't just get to shut it off after 5:00pm yeah.

And then you.

The clock is ticking.

You get 18 summers with those kids.

That's it.

And then if you did a good enough job as CEO, they'll want to keep buying from your company and spend time with you.

If you did a bad job, they go, they out.

They're gonna sell out.

That's it.

Yeah.

I'm gonna go start my own company.

Yeah.

See ya.

Hey, yo.

I love you, dad.

It's been a good tenure, but you're out.

Yeah.

I'm gonna take this.

It's.

It's terrible.

So I look at this stuff, and I think the people are feeling really, really stressed.

And speaking of which, according to Morning Brew via Instagram, this year's layoff total is the highest since the pandemic.

So there's a reason why people feel this way.

Okay.

The only happy ones with this news are the people who make pink stationary.

And when I first heard that, I was like, wait, what?

Pink slips.

Pink slips.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, yeah.

Which used to be the way you got laid off.

Yeah, that's just dark.

That's a little dark.

Yeah, a little dark.

But, you know, true.

I'm here for it.

According to a report from consulting firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas never even heard that name released this week, companies have laid off more than 1.1 million US workers so far this year, the most since the pandemic in 2020.

Yeah, that one hit home.

There's some really great charts here, which I recommend if you're.

If you're listening, you're driving somewhere, you click the link in the show notes and check it out later on.

Again, this is from Morning Star via Instagram.

The first page is just a picture, but the next two on this carousel.

Really fascinating bar charts.

The report finds that this year's 1,170,821 cuts get represent a 54% jump from the 761,358 layoffs that were announced over the first 11 months of 2024.

Wow.

It's the only, the sixth time since the night.

I cannot read very well today.

It's been one of those days where I'm like challenged.

It's only the six time.

You don't.

It's too early.

I got you.

No, no, I got it, I got it.

I'm good.

It's only the six times since 1993 that there have been more than 1.1 million job cuts through November.

Per challenger Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency.

Doge cut cuts from earlier this year were responsible for nearly 300,000 layoffs, while the tech sector has now announced 150,000 cuts, up from 17%.

The oft cited reasons for the layoffs were, of course, AI, economic conditions and the dreaded corporate quote restructuring, which is ambiguous corporate talk for anything.

I'll skip over the board.

We want to cut.

We want to cut jobs so that we can boost our stock price.

Yeah, that's pretty much it.

So HP cut about 6,000 jobs.

They're kind of by 20.

I'm sorry, they just announced they're going to cut about 6,000 jobs through now until 2028.

Yeah, and of course this one was interesting because they actually cited the reason why is this was going to be supported by their ramp up of AI efforts.

That's a problem.

HP said on Tuesday it expects to cut between 4,000 and 6,000 jobs globally by fiscal 2026 as part of a plan to streamline operations and adopt artificial intelligence to speed up product development, improve customer satisfaction and boost productivity.

HP teams focused on product development, internal operations and customer support, which will be impacted by the job cut.

CEO Enrique Lorrez said during a media briefing call.

And this is a direct quote, we expect this initiative that will create about $1 billion in gross run rate savings over three years.

Laura's added the company laid off an additional 1,000 to 2,000 employees in February as part of a previously announced restructuring plan.

So this is exactly what AI is supposed to be doing to the markets that we're ignoring in the FOMC saying, well, we haven't seen it yet.

Okay, fine, but you're starting to see it now.

This guy just said that if they cut these jobs, 6,000 jobs between now and 2028, they're going to realize a billion dollars in savings.

They're not saying they're not going to do those jobs anymore.

They're not going to offer those products, offer that service.

They're saying the AI is going to help us be $1 billion a year more efficient with 6,000 less employees.

That's what he's saying.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And look, and he gets the, he gets the benefit.

And I feel like companies right now, they get the benefit of using this as an, as a reason and excuse and get, and get these projections and these models built out to where they can reference, you know, savings of like $1 billion.

Right.

Over the next three years.

Yeah.

And be like, oh, and if I was wrong, okay, we'll just hire people back again.

Yeah, it's okay.

I was wrong.

That's a problem.

That's got to be a big problem.

Right.

It's like, okay, we can, I can lay off these people now.

We can realize the, the gain in the stock price and then if it's wrong, I could just blame AI.

But, yeah, it hasn't come to fruition.

It's not our fault.

It's dirty, bro.

It's dirty game.

Yeah, it's a dirty game.

The next article in the Show Notes was the article that I put in about the private stock market offering stuff.

I actually did put it in.

See, every once in a while I, I do smart stuff.

I'm gonna read a little bit about this because I think it's interesting, and then I'll save.

If you guys are interested in the invitation only stock market, the Sam Altman thing.

This is the Wall Street Journal link.

It's also in the Show Notes.

This year's largest stock sale was on the New York Stock Exchange or its uptown rival, the NASDAQ Stock Market.

Instead, it was a 40 billion dollar offering by OpenAI that was available only by invitation to the investors, hand picked by the firm's executive team, including Sam Altman himself.

Fewer than 50 investors snagged shares.

It's kind of messed up.

I wasn't on that list, bro.

No.

Not even, not even a call?

Not a text.

I'm actually surprised to hear that.

Yeah.

Yeah, you weren't.

That's unfortunate.

Yeah.

Why wouldn't they want the higher standard on there?

I mean, it feels like it'd be a good name to have on the list, you know, higher.

Imagine sponsored by OpenAI.

No, I'm just saying.

Right.

We're humans, though.

Is that kind of.

I'm sure, I'm sure these other, the other 49 investors that got the list, they get a list of all the other people that are investing and if something was there to the higher standard, be like, okay, the higher standard.

I'm gonna start Cold emailing these guys, Sammy, like, refer to them colloquially.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I. Oh, Sam.

Yo, Sammy.

Yeah, it's your boy.

We.

The higher standard body.

There was that.

There was that text that recently that recently got leaked right, from.

It was Larry Ellison's son David, right, who shot a text over to the.

The head guy over at Warner Brothers, right?

He didn't see this, and he misspelled David's name.

And that's his own name.

That's intentional, right?

Come on.

Because that isn't.

That isn't sora.

Like, Siri correcting your.

Your text, right, bro?

Y.

And it's because he's.

He's, like, trying to, like, you know, soften it up.

Like, give him the pitch.

Like, I'm excited at the opportunity at buying you guys, you know, And.

And we would be lucky to be able to partner with you guys.

But, like, how you going to misspell his name, bro, in the text?

Maybe that's his way of showing that it wasn't AI written.

AI wouldn't mess this up.

Oh, no, I wrote this.

Yeah, I did that.

Hey, little.

I want you guys.

I want you guys to know.

Let's go.

Good.

This is a quick tip sponsored by the higher stand, right.

If anybody ever sends you a message and it has a long dash in between, honestly, you know that's A.I.

yeah.

So if you're sending a message to somebody and you use AI and has the long dash, delete that and put in a shorter dash.

That looks like you wrote it.

Dude, I can't remember.

And it's becoming so much more frequent.

It's.

There was one of these, like, either newspapers or.

Dude, it could have been the Wall Street Journal.

I don't know who it was, but it literally said in the footnotes that this was, you know, created.

Oh, yeah, created.

Created by AI but edited to fact check.

So they're, like, giving themselves an out.

Like, we want you to know.

Like, yeah, we use AI to generate this article, but we edited it.

There was another one at the bottom where they just left.

In the left prompt.

Yeah.

Saying you like this, blah, blah.

I can change it to do X, Y, and Z.

That was in.

They just.

If you would like.

Yeah, if you would like, I could change the tone to look, which I.

Think AI does to mess with us.

Because you should be able to hit the copy button and remove their feedback.

Because if you're querying, like, hey, write me this X whatever statement, I shouldn't copy that.

That.

That response and get your additional color in the bottom of it.

Right, Right.

You know what you're doing, AI, you know.

Exactly.

Got you.

Yeah, yeah.

At this point in time, too, here's the problem that I have, okay.

Like, everything I watch, like, you got to question if it's AI, like, derived now, right.

I showed my kids, like, videos.

Sometimes when there's, like, downtime, I'll pull up.

Like, my daughter loves watching a little cat reels or a little dog.

Right.

She thinks they're so them.

We'll watch them.

And even she has an eye to be like, that's AI.

Like, dude, you're seven.

Cats can't sing, dad.

Yeah, come on.

What are you doing?

Yeah, cats can't play dead, but that's a problem.

Yeah.

Do cats play dead?

You got a cat, you would know.

Like, you know how dogs did.

You could, like, fake shoot them and they'll, like, turn over and act.

No, my cat's 18.

It pretty much acts dead most times.

She just chills, bro.

She's.

She's the most mellow cat of all time.

If you're laying down, she'll come lay down on you, but then she ain't gonna move her.

Like, I feel like she ain't laying down if I'm laying down road.

She's taking swipes.

No, she's like, I don't know you.

Yeah, she doesn't.

Like most people.

There's a question mark whether she likes me most time.

Yeah.

But, you know, if I get in bed, she'll.

She'll lay down right next to me.

But the second I move her, she gets angry.

That's it.

Yeah, that's.

That's how my cat rolls.

You know, I posted something the other day, and I knew it was AI, but it was really pretty.

And I'm like, oh, this beautiful.

It was the.

The two guys.

There's four guys having tea, and you run in the base of the mountains.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that was cool.

Yeah, it was cool.

That's an actual place.

And I.

My.

My cousin learned to ski there.

Like, it's an actual place.

I know that, but it's obviously AI, you know, created.

And I got all these comments in, in the DM hating on, like, you know, it's AI, right, bro?

And it's like, yeah, that doesn't mean I can't acknowledge that it's pretty.

Yeah, it's cool.

You can't acknowledge.

So I said, imagine having tea here in the 1970s, because that's what they were drinking.

And then tea in the 1970s.

And I'm like, what's so bad about.

People were just not with it saying real.

Okay.

Again, the whole point is imagine.

Yeah.

You want to put like an asterisk and say fiction.

Right.

You know, I mean, like.

Or like, I know.

I mean, it's at the point now also.

It's like, yo, this is from 1970.

We're now in 2025.

Imagine what it could have been or what it looks like.

I mean, you know what I mean?

It's like, come on, let me.

Let me live a little.

I've also started to derive, like, a theory.

I do this at the end of every single year as it relates to, like, what we do here, the podcast, but certainly as it relates to social media.

I think there's some things that we've experienced that are going to go away.

I think people are tired of.

Of like, overly produced content and like, hooks.

Oh, yeah.

And like, I think people want more live, real engagement.

No.

100.

I think that's the way I was having this conversation because we've been talking about it now.

We've floated it for the listeners to know.

You know, a live show coming in 2026.

Yeah.

And I feel like this is the only real way to combat AI.

Right.

Can be curated.

First of all, we already do an amazing job of no edits in the show, except with the exception of one or two times that wasn't my fault.

But one of them times was your fault.

In almost six years, though.

One of those times is your fault.

One of those times is my fault.

I don't even have to do in the beginning of this show.

Yeah.

Why?

Oh, you didn't know what you said.

What'd I say?

I'll tell you afterward.

Okay.

And just started after.

I can't start there.

But the only way to really combat AI now is let the record show.

That site does, in fact have a potty mouth.

I. I do have a big potty mouth.

It's.

It's pretty bad.

You look at the clock going, damn it.

It's pretty bad.

But, you know, it's really bad for.

For you.

My kids know that my potty mouth only comes out when I'm talking to you.

That's not true.

I swear.

Whatever.

That's not true.

I go.

Because I always go in the other room and then I'm talking to you.

I talk to you freely.

Right?

And they'll be like, is that talking to Uncle Chris?

Damn.

I do tend to get a little visceral whenever I call you.

No, but look, it's.

It's.

I mean, that's how we talk.

I'm going to change the topic here because it's going to look real bad.

Forbes why the career minimalism trend is spreading beyond Gen Z.

And we're gonna spend a lot of time on this topic.

This encapsulates a lot of the things we've talked about all year long, and we're vastly approaching end of the year podcast episodes.

And I know that a lot of you who are listening are going to be on holiday break in the coming weeks, if not by the time you hear this.

And traditionally, podcasts slow down a great deal during this time because you're spending more time with family.

I hope you do.

I don't.

I hope you don't listen to us.

You know, but just share with a friend, though.

Yeah, of course.

And like it.

Yeah.

Trust us that we're saying stuff you're gonna like.

Yeah, I mean, I'll be honest, I do that.

If it's a show that I routine.

If I'm tuning into a specific episode of like, let's say Rogan or Mind Pump.

Mindpump.

Mindpub.

Rogan, Rogan, Rogan.

Right, Right out the gate, boom.

I'm like it for you.

Just because I like you, you're going to get that out of me.

Show your boy some love.

So there has been some pretty interesting career changes over time.

And I have seen this personally, so I can, I can vouch for it that I've seen this type of stuff become very much fodder for office commentary when you talk to employees one on one.

This is real, but I think it also explains the discouragement and some of the stress that people feel with their jobs.

According to a recent Glassdoor survey Of more than 1,000 U.S. professionals, 68% of Gen Z respondents said they would not pursue management if it were not for the paycheck or the title.

It may seem like younger workers lack ambition, but the reality is different.

Gen Z is redefining professional success through career minimalism, choosing to treat their jobs as a source of stability while channeling ambition and creativity into pursuits outside of traditional employment.

Sound familiar?

We're on a podcast, right?

Yeah.

Hey, look what we're doing.

Because honestly, that the creativity aspect of it.

Now, in, in the general sense, it may not seem like, how, how are you?

How would you guys consider yourselves to be creative?

This is wildly creative.

They don't see it.

They don't see it.

Especially with all, you know, all the stuff that you're making, like on the back end and whatnot.

But it's A lot of work.

Yeah, yeah.

But just to be able to have these types of conversations and in the way that we do, in the way that we do and the amount of thought that goes into everything, I mean, there's some fulfillment that you get out of that that I feel like everybody is striving to get because everybody wants that dopamine hit, man, I need that dopamine hit just to feel like I'm doing well.

And it scares me that, that.

And I agree 100%.

And I get the dopamine from the final polish product.

People don't see, they don't realize.

Like, if you're watching the show on YouTube and Spotify, even the TV behind us has got effects put onto it by the time you see it to make it crisper and sharper compared to somebody like a Rogan, for example, the largest podcast in the world.

And we're doing things that they don't even do, largely because he doesn't even need to care about the aesthetic, and he's going for an underproduced show.

But we produce the hell out of this thing, and that's.

There's a lot of fulfillment that comes with that.

But what scares me is if people like us are getting fulfillment like this from stuff like this, it's because we're making up for the dopamine we don't get at our jobs.

And I think that's what Gen Z is feeling.

Gen Z may have popularized the mindset, but millennials, Gen Z and baby boomers are adopting it for their own reasons.

The shift reflects broken advancement systems, widespread burnout, and a growing desire for control over how work fits into people's lives.

Now, I'm going to cover certain elements, the first couple, in a little more detail than the rest of them.

But I want to know from people listening to this, does this resonate with you?

Do you feel in part this way or more?

And are you seeing it?

Because I think this is a lot more pervasive.

And if you're going to.

If you're going to let us know, maybe take the extra step to write, what is it that you feel like you could get at work to maybe give you that fulfillment?

Right.

Or that.

I don't think it's money.

I think a lot of people feel like it's money, but the more you can start going into it, money is not the dopamine hit that most people think that it is.

I'm seeing, like, so, you know, I've been dabbling on, like, LinkedIn now for over a year.

And a half now.

Welcome to the team.

Yeah, welcome to the squad.

You know, and I see these, these posts by all these people that are trying to gain like followers.

Right.

And it's like, like they're all.

Culture matters at work.

And you know, you should, you should care about your managers should care about, you know, you more and, and they're just trying to gain this phone.

It's like that's all.

That all sounds really nice.

But how much of that is really being implemented?

Very little, you know, very little.

Because nobody has the, the job title to implement that.

It's usually like an offshoot of HR or an offshoot of marketing.

And it's like you need a group of people whose job it is to really drive corporate culture.

And that's a really hard, non tactile job.

Right.

Like how do you measure that success?

Right.

And that it takes a long time to build out.

Right.

Culture isn't built overnight.

Well then again there's also competing interests.

If you have a company who's building on AI and that AI is scary to most people because they Fred is going to take their job.

There's an underlying fear of, of someone's job security that's going to destroy all the efforts you're putting forth.

Because no matter how happy.

Joy.

Joy.

You want to, you know, pump up in me, I still have to worry about losing my job.

Yeah.

So that there's always that element there too which I think is real.

So let's go this.

The corporate ladder is broken.

Okay.

Number one, for decades professionals followed a predictable path.

Work hard, climb the corporate ladder, give up personal time and expect long term security in return.

Today that path is less reliable.

I think that's a fair statement.

It's fair.

Problems fueling this shift include dry promotions where responsibilities increase but compensation does not.

I have experienced this.

Saeed is not going to comment.

Declining engagement with only 21% of workers fully engaged.

According to Gallup, only 21% of workers fully engaged.

What?

Yeah.

What does that mean?

79% of people are not fully engaged in their job.

That's what that means.

So is this, is this based off of who.

I mean, who's providing that data though?

So it's like, is it like the key performance indicators, the KPIs that, that I guess I think this is just.

They, the respondents of the thousand people they talk to get in this small pool.

This was just their feedback from those, hey, are you fully engaged in your job?

They probably know like I could be giving a little bit more.

Yeah.

And I think most people would.

Look, I get that if you don't feel like your job is loyal to you, you don't feel like giving loyalty back.

This is like any relationship that you have, right?

Reduced job security even among high paying corporate and remote roles.

AI driven restructuring that disrupts established career paths.

If you're a lawyer, right?

And you're going to work as a law clerk and then go up and become, I don't know, let's pick a random offshoot of law, immigration attorney.

You gotta be worried that your skill set's probably not as valuable if AI can do all this for you because immigration attorneys are basically filling out forms.

If I can go to Chat GPT and say, hey, how do I do this process?

And then give it to you anecdotally, I will say I've used Chat GPT a great deal.

I've been using Chat GPT to program the Stream deck and some of the streaming software and using it with multiple programs and systems like obs.

Something else.

Is it getting better or is it still making mistakes?

It is making a colossal amount of mistakes, dude.

I'm telling you, this is, this is.

I've heard the, the team over at Breaking Points like talk about this, right?

And they're like for now, okay, in theory, what, what everyone's been saying that AI is going to do all these amazing things.

For now.

It's a glorified assistant that provides you rough drafts.

Yeah.

But I'll tell you that some of those I.

So I.

We have a Mac in the studio that we use predominantly for production that Mac has OBS downloaded.

OBS is a broadcast open broadcast source software that we're going to use for live shows.

It is routinely gave me feedback based on previous versions of OBS on non Mac machines.

Even though I have told it this explicitly multiple times and query every single time with that fact pattern and it gives me the wrong answer, sends me down this rabbit hole and I have to figure it out on my own because my logic and reasoning is superior to ChatGPTs in this regard right now.

And then I just, I guess the way I'm looking at this is it's really going to come down to a timing thing, right?

Does the asset bubble pop before this gets figured out?

And if it does, right.

Then all the money that's getting dumped into AI would coming to a crashing halt, right?

And this will have to get picked up again at some time in the future.

That's my fear.

That's my fear with AI and what it and the asset bubble that it's created because.

Okay, okay.

Could it replace, you know, you know, millions of jobs in the future?

I could see a path where it continues to get better, sure.

But with where we are in the economy now, where things are going, if a, if a bubble pops at this time, all the money going in has, is going to come to a stop.

But then I see Disney putting a billion dollar investment to open AI, including allowing them to use Disney.

That's got to be like a hedging of a bet, right?

And open it, I'm like, everybody's just done dumping money.

A billion, you know, we'll give a billion dollars and Mickey's image to this company.

Yeah.

But I think it's.

There was an article, there's an article that came out recently too that said like the projections on open AI are, they're not going to be profitable to at least 2030.

Yeah.

And then Sam Altman of course viscerally fights this stuff out and like has these open angry arguments.

Here's what I'm saying, put all that aside.

If you're an illustrator at Disney right now and you saw that press release go out, you know, they didn't consult the illustrator and be like, hey man, hey Bob, look, we're going to put out this press release about OpenAI and letting me use Disney characters.

You shouldn't worry about your job because this is more of just us hedging our bets.

Hedging every bets for what?

Yeah, you know, in case, Bob, the technology surpasses your skill set, we want to be able to replace you.

How does Bobby gonna feel about that?

Yeah, and this, this just needs to scare like this is gonna scare everybody in this, in this space, right.

I mean we like touched on earlier either Netflix or Paramount buying out Warner Brothers, right.

This is bad for everybody in that industry.

Everybody in that industry is bad.

All they want.

Have you seen the streaming cost of what you've been paying Disney roll out of like $5 a month or something, right?

They're now like above 20, right?

Yeah.

I mean.

And okay, so let's say, let's say Netflix buys, buys this and they get the execution instead of Paramount, right?

They own Netflix now.

They're gonna own hbo.

What is that gonna do to hbo?

What is that gonna do to the creators of hbo?

Right?

Like these, all these companies have a certain way of doing things now.

Netflix is a little bit more loose.

They're just, they're they're kind of adopting the Amazon model, right?

Where, where Amazon came out and everyone thought, oh, it's going to replace every bookstores.

Like, no, no, no.

Amazon's like, we're not going to turn a profit.

And actually what we're going to do is we're going to try to become the only store that matters, right?

Forget, Forget bookstores.

We're going to be the only store, right?

So Netflix comes down, they're like, oh, we're going to be.

Everyone's saying that they're going to replace Blockbuster.

No, dude, we're trying to take out all of entertainment.

Like, we want all of it, right?

So if you're an executive over Netflix and you want somebody on podcast.

Hey, and if you're adopting AI, this is.

This is Netflix approved.

Yeah.

Every single piece of equipment you were listening to is licensed under the Netflix agreement and is usable.

That's a true story.

That's not even put jokes.

The cameras, the Sony FX3s.

We're ready to go, baby.

We got the two thumbs up.

Yeah.

So I'm going to read more on this whole dry corporate ladder promotion concept, which I think is interesting.

Daniel Zao, Glassdoor's chief economist, observes, many workers feel like they are not being rewarded for the level of effort and performance that they are putting out there.

I think that's probably true.

Leadership roles are often bringing heavier workloads and narrower support systems.

When the payoff feels uncertain, climbing the ladder becomes less appealing to workers of every age group.

Group, right is the second category, which I think was really telling and I swear to God this is not.

I did not put this in there.

I did not write this.

I know you're going to accuse me of stuff.

Side hustles offer what employers don't.

It's true.

While 57% of Gen Z have side hustles, so do 48% of millennials and 31% of Gen Xers.

What began as Gen Z trends have become cross generational movements.

Side hustles are appealing because they offer one autonomy with decisions made independently of corporate structures to immediate financial return without waiting for annual reviews.

Very interesting statement, particularly given what we said in the last show about annual reviews and bonuses.

Alignment with personal interests rather than organizational priorities.

Income diversification, which reduces reliance on one employer.

They're hedging their bets, man.

People are hedging their bets.

Which also explains why companies are trying to over like reach into people's personal lives and prevent this.

If an employee is hedging their bet with you by making money with a side hustle and they don't feel like they're not 100% dependent on you.

You, as an employer are trying to grab control.

This is no different than a guy who's.

Whose girlfriend is like, you know what?

Hey, I got a job.

I'm making good money.

I'm not dependent on you.

If you're not secure in your relationship and you're worried about her having more money on the side, here's what I would say.

The problem is you, bro.

The problem ain't her.

Right.

If you don't have the confidence, they.

Need, because they need stability and they need predictability too.

Right.

And right.

They need to make sure that you have to keep coming to work every day.

Right.

So to me, it's like, okay, there's two ways to do this.

Very black and white.

This is very binary.

One, you need to control them.

They need to fear losing their job in a healthy degree, but you need to control them.

Or two, you give them a culture and environment and a fair enough wage to where you make money, they feel appreciated and they enjoy coming to work.

Why is that such a difficult concept for most employers?

Shouldn't be.

And because you brought this up.

Now, in the future, I think I want to gauge the interests of some of the listeners that I wanted to start a certain segment for the podcast.

Yeah, right.

And I want to do it.

I want to do it, I think, on the podcast more so than on the, on the live show, but we could, we could float it.

I want to have a segment that just highlights a company or a person or somebody doing something.

Right, Right.

Something that we can all get behind and approve and almost like promote it.

Just like that a lot.

You know, it doesn't have, it doesn't have to be like the, the greatest thing.

Right.

But it's.

For instance, you and I were briefly talking about the new CEO of like, Red Lobster.

Right?

And this is what, this is what sparked my idea.

I'm like, dude, I don't know much about him.

I haven't done a deep dive.

Right.

I know he went to Harvard, whatnot.

But like, there's probably some connections that were built.

But kudos to that board for hiring a 36 year old, right?

Yeah, like, that seemed like a normal.

Like, like, I mean, that in and of itself is like, there, there's some visionaries on that board, clearly, and they, they're seeing a bigger picture.

And I want to maybe do a deeper dive on that.

But something like that, where we give kudos to somebody that's doing something that's against the grain from what we're all accustomed to.

Seeing.

Yeah, I don't like this idea that, that corporate America has of like the old venerable man, you know, and it's typically a man and it's usually older.

And that has got all this experience and wisdom and this person is going to be able to take this account.

Look what happened to Lululemon.

Lululemon had a young CEO come in.

The young CEO didn't do great.

Now he's out and their profits are down.

And granted, this person grew up.

The CEO choice is critical.

But what's wrong with having a visionary different choice?

I mean, give somebody the opportunity to do something different.

Because obviously the historical stuff is the reason why you're looking for a new CEO to begin with.

Right?

Go.

Right.

Exactly why you keep going down the same path.

Dude, why don't you do something different?

There's always gonna be one person.

No, no, Chris, we're looking for a CEO because our previous CEO is old.

Yeah, I know.

So why don't you put a CEO in place?

It's got a longer run rate.

Mm.

You know what I mean?

Like, why don't you put a CEO in place who's 40 or at 35, you know, and say, okay, this guy, if he's successful, can be in the seat for a long ass time or.

Doesn'T take us through or doesn't just like fit inside of your like little box.

Right.

What if somebody that comes from a completely different background.

Yeah.

That brings a completely different outlook on, on everything that could really shake things up and be beneficial to the company.

I mean, stuff like that.

That's something that I want to highlight in the future.

And if you want to get behind that dm, Chris, let's keep going here.

Technology has accelerated the shift shift, the side hustle shift that we just talking about digital platforms, AI tools, and remote freelance marketplaces.

Think upwork now have make it have made it easier for professionals to build income streams that reflect their skills and passions.

Economic volatility has also played a role.

Inflation, rising interest rates, and periodic layoffs have made diversified income streams feel less optional and more like a practical form of stability.

Right.

If you're losing, if you, if you're afraid to lose your job, you hedge your bets by having a second job.

Right?

Right.

For many workers, side hustles are not just supplemental income.

They are a place where effort, creativity, and initiative are rewarded more visibly than their primary jobs.

Okay, I 100% agree with that.

We've often advocated for the value of building your net worth between the hours of 5pm to 9am and this is frankly another variant of that.

But it also brings in the fear of losing your job and uncertainty into the equation.

I think this is important because you can't ignore this as an employer.

Here's the problem.

You can say, chris, you have a podcast.

You're visible.

I don't want you to do that.

It could harm our brand.

But what you have a challenge with is, let's say you got somebody in it, okay?

And this somebody in it happens to be really good with their job, and they're not feeling they're making enough money, they go, okay, I'm gonna go home and I'm gonna be a freelancer working in graphic design, interface design, or learning something and deploying it on upwork or any other similar, like, platform.

What are you going to do to stop me?

Right?

Some people even have a ubiquitous, simple name.

Like, you could be Tom Nguyen, right?

There could be probably 6,000 of those across the country.

Now.

I've got a unique, you know, name.

You got a bit of a unique name.

All yours is all first names, but you could easily.

All the first names you could.

So let me just, just, just walk this through.

You post that you're Kevin Smith, right?

You change the picture of you to look like something different, and then you work on upwork.

Your company isn't gonna know that, right?

It's a shame that you even have to do that, though, right?

That's.

That's a shame.

Yeah, that's 100%.

But a lot of people do that, and a lot of people don't talk about it.

And as a guy who had the podcast, and I was very upfront, it was on my LinkedIn bio, I didn't hide it.

And I got a lot of criticism internally for doing it because I was very open.

I even went to our board and disclosed multiple times over multiple years, because I want to be very honest, like, look, I'm doing this, and I think it's good for the company.

It's a pro bono effort, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

That being said, a lot of people just do it and they do it on the download.

But a lot of people came to me was like, yo, Chris.

Like, I'm doing this, Yo, Chris, I'm doing that.

You'd be surprised how many people we used to work with that had like a cookie business on the side or were doing it work or graphic design.

I even know people that we used to work with that had podcasts, some of which have quit since that time.

That one of which had a podcast about the anxiety of being a man in today's adult society.

Whoa.

And he didn't disclose it.

It wasn't on his stuff, and he stopped doing it because he had children, and it became a little difficult for him.

And I get it.

But the.

The crazy part to me is, is you have to compartmentalize work and prioritize that over your life.

And you're like, work to live.

Live to work.

Right?

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

Like, it doesn't make any sense.

And it's.

So.

It would.

It would be okay if I was going home and I was gaining another certification or that's okay, right?

Because.

Because it benefits you.

Yeah, exactly.

But.

But me doing something that maybe that might benefit me in another way, not so much.

Okay, then.

But I think this mentality that right there, the ownership of the employee mentality, Companies should have a vested interest in growing and.

And building the employee.

You should have a vested interest.

Okay, so here's my problem.

A lot of people in the space, and I'll use banking because this is the space that I came from.

A lot of people say, I'm a banker.

So I'm going to look, act, think, walk like a banker.

Okay, that's great for you.

You can own that.

And good for you.

I can't do that because here's what I think.

I think I can be a banker and wear a T shirt.

I think I can wear.

Be a banker and wear a hoodie.

But then there's.

But there's also more to Chris than just being a banker.

That's right.

And just because I like banking, I like finance, I like the economic environment, doesn't mean that I have to look like what you think the historical image of that is.

And basically, and I'm using looks here as a microcosm for employees being fully ingratiated in the corporate ecosystem.

If you want employees to be fully ingratiated into their job and ecosystem to double down, you have to give them the opportunity for growth.

That was the quote, American dream.

Work at the company, be there long enough, get the opportunity to increase your job over time.

Let me, the employee, decide if I want to take on more responsibility.

But don't tell me, hey, take on this extra work.

Yep.

And we may pay you more.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Yeah.

That ain't the way this works.

If I do extra work, you pay me for it.

And we've gotten to the system now where people are like, oh, you know what?

If you do this, we'll see how it goes.

And Then we'll pay you more.

Name another part.

Okay, here's what's gonna happen.

I'm gonna walk into a Subway.

I'm gonna order a sandwich.

I'm gonna say, hey, man, I'm gonna take a bite of this, and if it's good enough, I'm gonna pay you $5.

Okay?

If it's not good enough, on page three, see how that works out for you.

See how that works out for you.

And not to mention, like, just going back to our own personal experiences, we had turned down actual sponsors for the show because it could have been viewed as a conflict.

Yeah.

Like, we turned down money, tens of thousands of dollars.

Yeah.

Turned it down.

So it's, like, crazy, man.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So burnout is changing how people view work as, well, burnout.

So, number one, right?

They feel like the corporate ladder is broken.

Number two, side hustles over what employees think is a necessary thing at this point in time.

And number three, burnout is changing how people.

People view work.

This is crazy to me.

People with side hustles are afraid, are burning out at their primary job.

And it's easy for the corporate America to be like, no, no, no, no.

It's Your side hustle's burning out.

No, bro, My side hustle.

I get a little bit of passion and joy, and it's just.

It's just coming to work every day.

It's getting the way of, like, my life.

Okay, so let's.

Let's go through this.

Burnout reaches far beyond younger workers, New York work.

So new research from Moodles.

Moodle.

Moodle.

They're playing on Moody's, bro.

Right.

They have to be trying to be cute.

Moody's.

Yeah.

Hey, Moodle.

Hey.

Moodle shows that 66 of American employees are experiencing some form of burnout in 2025.

66.

Yeah.

Are experiencing some form of burnout.

Some of that has to be on what we talked about earlier in the show, where we're like, you know, we kind of.

We feel like failures right now.

Right?

I do.

Like, how am I.

How am I working?

Working this hard, Right?

It's a Saturday morning, dog.

I'm with you.

You're welcome.

I cleaned up for you, too.

You do?

You look good.

Yeah, thanks.

What church you going to?

Mariners.

All right, so American.

Americans, workers are.

I'm sorry.

I don't know if it's just you being dressed up, me not being dressed up with the caffeine or Saturday morning, but whatever it is, it's all my mind is drifting.

American workers across most industries are struggling, especially young employees.

Burnout rates are high, and the threat of AI is triggering significant fear about their relevance at work, said Scott Annenberg, CEO of Moodle.

Wow.

AI is now scaring employees and making them feel burnout and irrelevant.

And irrelevant.

That's.

So then you take on a side hustle because they don't want to be irrelevant.

So if you're an employee and you're at, I don't know, HP and you just announced you're laying off 6,000 employees between now and 2028, I'm pretty sure you're creating burnout in your corporate culture by not being clear about how AI is going to help people keep their jobs.

Yeah, I'd be interested to hear from somebody in that space.

If somebody's listening and wants to DM us, let us know.

What is the culture like at those tech companies?

AI Heavy company.

Yeah, AI Heavy company.

What is culture like and how do.

You feel about your job?

Like, do you know you're going to lose it eventually and you're just like, okay, yeah.

Or is it like scaring the, you know, crap out of you and you're.

Like, I don't know.

Yeah, I don't know.

And the finance business that, that we are from, I, I think is going to be heavily swung by this underwriters.

Phones.

Phone.

If you're in a call center right now, bro, give it up.

Yeah.

You got no value.

I know, I know.

Well, some of those.

Some of those big single family, like, sweatshops.

Yeah, right.

It's.

They're literally inputting numbers and it's just spinning out.

Like, do they get approved or not approved?

The first mortgage lender that comes out with AI heavy infrastructure to, you know.

It'S around the corner.

So here's what Rocket Mortgage does now.

And Rocket.

Now, I just bought Mr. Cooper, so now it's Mr.

Rocket.

They.

They.

Rocket Man.

Rocket Man.

So here's what they do now.

You upload to their, their mobile app or their website, right?

You upload your documents, okay?

So it's already digital.

Boom.

There.

Yeah.

Somebody looks at it, okay?

They're gonna.

There's companies that already use AI that's gonna pull.

Rip all the data down from that and Input it into DoDU Desktop Originator.

Desktop underwriter, which is the Fannie Freddy form that can be done with bots.

Now you don't need AI for this, right now the credit decisioning, you don't need AI too.

You can build a model that does that, but let's just say you do with AI.

Yeah.

It meets a certain debt ratio.

Right.

It's like boom.

Okay, approved.

So now loan processor gone.

Loan underwriter gone.

Recommendation for approval, gone.

Approval metrics.

Who you gonna trust, dog?

You gonna trust AI, who's gonna be very like non racial, no discrimination, no emotion.

Just make a decision.

Yes.

Are you gonna trust?

I don't know.

Tommy.

Yeah.

Tommy may be in an industry for a long time, but Tommy's still a human.

Yeah.

Now someone says, hey, Chris, you've discriminated against people.

No, I haven't.

AI has been doing it.

Yeah.

AI's got an instruction, an algorithm saying not to discriminate built out.

Yeah.

Let's, let's query AI and ask why I didn't discriminate and why this is just purely based on the metrics and.

Companies get to avoid all those potential lawsuits.

Well, yeah.

And then you get to program with AI a little more strategic perspective because if you have one underwriter approving a loan, you have one person at the top looking at, I don't know, fair lending and stuff like that is from a compliance and risk perspective.

You now have an AI controlled system where the AI knows this at all time.

Think of it as like a hive mind.

Yeah.

Imagine if everybody was working in parallel with what everybody else was doing and they knew how many loan approvals are coming in at any given time.

All in at the same time, real time.

Yeah.

It makes, it makes a very palpable argument to change that entire industry into a couple humans at the top and then a lot of technological infrastructure at the bottom.

Right.

So I think jobs are going to change a great deal over there.

Right.

Scary hours, bro.

Scary, scary hours.

Okay, let's go to the rest of these really quickly because there are some, some less detailed variants.

I want to do this after burnout.

Nonlinear careers are the new normal.

The traditional ladder model has evolved into something more flexible.

Careers now resemble a lily pad where people move toward opportunities that fit their needs in the moment rather than staying in one organization for decades.

I've seen this on resumes a lot.

Okay.

And I can make a use case argument that somebody who's jumped around from industry to industry, from company to company, probably has a little bit more appreciation for what good and bad looks like versus somebody who's been in one company for 20 years, which, yeah.

Used to be look viewed as, as like a strength.

Yeah.

Strength you would commend.

Yeah, yeah.

Now you're like, you're probably not that good because you were stuck there for 20 years and I'm the guy who was stuck there for 20 years.

So I'm not, I'm not criticizing employees value agency over titles.

This one is interesting and I completely agree.

Another reason career minimalism is expanding is that people are thinking what motivates them.

They're rethinking this.

Okay?

Titles and promotions have lost some of their power, especially when they bring longer hours and more stress.

The number one thing that people have said to me, every time I've called friends and family and said, hey, I'm thinking about doing X, Y and Z, they always say, what's the time?

Trade off?

What's the cost?

Is it worth it to you?

Is it worth it to you?

It used to be a foregone conclusion.

Yo, I'm getting a promotion, dog.

It's always worth if I'm getting a promotion.

And now not so much.

Remote work obviously accelerated this shift.

Remote work is another major reason career minimalism is spreading.

And I had, I overheard a conversation last night I want to share.

Not surprisingly, remote jobs are more desirable to job applicants.

As a result, remote openings receive more than three times as many applications as fully in person jobs, obviously.

Last night I was at hot pot with my wife and it was, you know, kind of misty outside, felt very holiday.

The music was playing the background.

My wife and I are talking and I hear a guy across the table, Asian dude, talking to another Asian dude about their travels all through Southeast Asia.

And the guy was talking about how he's from a certain country over there and explaining it to the other guy.

The other guy was saying like, yeah, my family's really originally from those regions.

I haven't seen it as much as I want to, but I want, I'm going to do this more.

So they was talking about, like, family and friends in, in and around this region.

The guy was like, well, how are you going to do this more?

And he goes, well, I'm looking for a job right now that'll allow me to work remote so that I can travel more.

And that, that moment stuck out to me because I was like, man, this is crazy.

He's not talking about paying him more money or less money or about, like, career growth.

He's like, I want to see more of the world.

I want to visit my family in these regions more frequently.

Yeah, I need a job that pays me so that I can remote.

Yeah.

I mean, it's hard to quantify how much of an impact social media has had on this.

Yeah.

But I feel like for the greater portion of, like, you know, our economy and our existence, it's been, you know, people fall into routines.

Yeah.

And then humans are very much routine.

Right.

And then you just, you just hear from somebody at work, oh, I'm going here for the holidays.

I'm doing, I'm going on this, you know, one, one big trip a year.

And then that was it.

And then now with, with, with social media, you would have to think that you just seeing people live life right as opposed to just working more.

It's like, man, I want to do more of that.

I feel like, I feel like the time is passing me by in a way that it's like I'm never going to get it back.

So, yeah, that's the truth.

So I, I believed in American exceptionalism for a long time.

And then in my late 20s and early 30s, I spent a lot of time traveling overseas across the world.

Southeast Asia, Europe, a little bit of the Middle east, but generally more of the.

The previous two.

And Mexico, certainly South America.

South America and Europe, particularly Spain and France.

Some of my favorite countries and cities.

Barcelona, Paris, for sure.

Saint Germain.

There is a different culture as it relates to work, and I'm sure it's not all over the place, but there is a culture of life, work balance, and work bleeding into your personal life in a fun way.

Business dinners with alcohol, longer coffee breaks.

But you just see people out more.

People don't have big homes.

They have smaller homes.

Right.

And they live outside more.

They have.

They probably eat dinner more out.

That's right.

Yeah.

And those companies seem to be doing pretty, pretty damn good.

Well, lvmh, Bernard Arnold's company, you know, one of the biggest companies in the world, one of the wealthiest men in the world.

I mean, and, you know, look, I, I look at what we're doing and I ask myself, have we as workers, like, approach this extremism where we are now so overworking ourselves to compete that we're now less productive as a result of it, and to offset that, less productive as a result of it, we're rolling out AI to further make us more discouraged.

It's just a parasitic cycle that I just see continuing on and on and on, and it worries me a great deal.

And of course, the last thing here from this employee review of millennials and how they feel in this trend.

Employees are taking notice of all this stuff.

Organizations recognize that career minimalism is changing how people relate to work.

To respond, some companies are adopting shorter weekends.

I'm sorry, Shorter weekends, Shorter work.

Freudian slip.

Shorter work weeks.

Meeting free days, clearing job expectations and clearer job expectations, expanding on internal mobility programs and some other stuff there.

And I really should not be allowed to read anything on Saturday mornings anymore.

This is pretty bad.

Pretty bad.

No, you did fine.

Look, man, hopefully there, there's.

It needs to be a systemic change, right?

And I don't know how this happens without it coming from the top, right, at every institution.

Why would it.

I know why would it.

That's.

And that's why you, you would naturally think that nothing's going to change.

You would need a CEO and vis a vis the CEO, a board that was willing to go against the traditional narrative.

And I don't see a public company doing that because shareholders just want their pay.

I'm not, I'm not bastardizing capitalism.

That's great.

But I think you're going to see a shift towards more private companies, less public companies.

And I think there will be some CEOs and boards at these private that are going to say, you know what?

I want to have longevity in the space.

And in order to do that, I want to have happy employees that are committed to growing this thing long term.

Because just like the president coming in and being in office for four years and maybe eight years if they're lucky, you don't.

You're not really there long enough to change the national deficit.

You want employees that are there for 20, 30 years, that are there long enough to be impactful and see the vision through.

But it's going to be interesting to see, like, what is it, what is that going to look like for people?

Right?

Like a 3% salary bump ain't gonna cut it for somebody you know.

Well, not.

Well, it's certainly not a year where inflation was 9.1%.

That person effectively got a 6.1% salary decrease.

And when you take real inflation to them, in some years, we know it was 20, close to 20%.

When you take, you know, actual food, actual travel, cost of living, and you move all the nonsense that was probably dragging the weighted average down, you have a much higher cost of living, yet your salary went up 3% that year.

You effectively got a salary decrease.

And this happened year over year over year for the course of three, four years.

And then you have taxes which aren't getting meaningfully better.

So now as you make more, you enter the next highest tax bracket, plus inflation's kicking in.

It's going to feel like you're making less because you are taking home less.

Right?

That's a real thing.

It's a real thing.

We want to give a special shout out to our boy Bob File and a special shout out to Rosalina.

These are some listeners that have reached out to us and have told us some personal experiences that they've had in their life and how they've.

Much they've enjoyed the show and how much.

A lot of that lately, again, a.

Lot of that people are.

Are getting hip to the fact that we're getting better.

You know, I think.

I think as much as we talk about being discouraged in the show, I think people who listen and certainly listen to the end, they.

They tend to.

To want to say that they feel the same.

They reach out.

And every single one of these stories I think I share with you and Rejeel and.

And they.

They mean something to me, man.

Like, there are days where I feel like a failure because we're doing this, that the only reason I come in the next day to do it is because of messages like that.

Yeah.

Yeah, me too.

You know, one of our listeners said that she was pregnant and that she listened to us during her first pregnancy.

Now she's on her second pregnancy and she was looking forward to her second pregnancy and us being a part of that because she listened to us so frequently.

I mean, I immediately showed my wife.

Yeah.

And I thought to myself, like, this is.

This is awesome.

This is.

Yeah, this is really cool.

I told my wife that same story and she was like, wow, that.

That's.

It kind of gets lost, right?

Because we get into the routine and.

Was a barrier between how we deliver the product and how people interact with it and what we do on a daily basis.

That's why I'm excited.

I'm excited for 2026 in the live show where we can maybe interact with some of the commentary, the chat right live or whoever can tune in and watch it grow.

And hopefully some of our OG listeners can make it over to there and we can interact with people a little bit more.

So to be clear, I've set this up recently.

We're going to stream live on YouTube.

We're going to stream live on LinkedIn, stream live on X, stream live on Instagram, stream live on Tick Tock, Bang Instagram and Tick Tock.

There is a way to make it vertical format and have the full show represented horizontally.

I'm not going to do that right now because it requires extra load on our equipment.

The rest of the shows should be normal, just 16 by 9.

What I will say is interesting is that I didn't know this until I tapped into kind of the technology here.

We can respond back on YouTube.

We can't respond back to messages that you leave on x and on LinkedIn, but we can see those live in the stream.

So no matter what platform you watch on, if you comment, we will see it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So we can't always respond to all of them because the way that the technology works, but certainly we will see it and they will show up in the live stream as we laid out.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm excited for it.

You got anything else?

No, man.

I think that's it for a Saturday morning, brother.

That was a really good episode.

Rajeel, you got anything?

So silent there, buddy.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Look forward to seeing them on Wednesday.

All right, my man.

Shout out to first form again for hooking us up with the screaming freedom.

And what are you on?

You on the orange?

I'm on the Orange Fury.

Thank you, Andy.

We appreciate you.

Love you, dog.

All right, brother.

It's been fun.

Shall we.

Shall we do it?

Good night, everybody.

Okay, bye.

It's.

It's noon.

Good night, everybody.

I know.

It's weird, right?