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Cody Sanchez
Whenever the government says I'm from the government and I'm here to help, they're typically not. And I am talking about red, white, blue, purple, whatever the color, they show up as the only good government is a one that is at a distance, allowing you to be able to continue to do the things you need to do on a daily basis as opposed to mandating you do one thing or another. Quick FYI, before we get too much into it, we've got just a few months before my first ever book is out in the world. If you want to pre order it for yourself or anyone you love, you can do that in the link in the show notes or you can search it online. It's called Main Street Millionaire. You'll love it. I think it'll make you a lot of money and I hope you guys pre order it. Hello and welcome back to all those who put in the work. I'm Cody Sanchez, and this is the Big Deal podcast. Okay, this segment's a little bit different and interesting, I hope for you guys. We're going to call this one something along the lines of current events. If you want to tell us what you think we should name this podcast, drop it in the links. Come up with a catchy name for us. We've got our interview podcasts, we've got our Moneymaker podcast series, and now we got this one where we talk to you about what's happening in the world. Let me preface it with this. I think we have to obsess a little bit for just a small amount of time on what's happening with the government right now around us. Let me tell you why. I used to run a business in Latin America at a company called First Trust. We grew it to over a billion dollars in assets under management. We were one of the fastest growing international businesses in Latin America. And before I left that company to go start my own, I watched what happens when we let the government get in the way of business. In fact, when I was in Latin America, running our business was the same time a new president came on board in a country called Argentina. And that president's name was Cristina Fernandez. Christina Fernandez came into an Argentina that was just starting to write its way out of formerly socialist policies. And Christina Fernandez came in, and over the span of three to six months, she nationalized just about every business. She kicked people out of the country like me, who had financial companies where we were helping people who knew that the Argentinian dollar there at the time was really volatile. So even now, if you go to Argentina, you Don't go to a bank to exchange your currency. You go to the black market because you get a much better rate. And oftentimes they run out of dollars in the banks in Argentina. And that is because they've had really poor management by the government. So my business was all around Latin America. And in the span of the night, Cristina Fernandez made my business illegal, which was just allowing them to invest in international exchange, traded funds, mutual funds, things we think of as normal. Because she wanted to keep all the money in Argentina. She wanted to lock down all of production, and she wanted to own everything. And because of that, the economy cratered overnight. And some of my friends who owned businesses there had them taken away, and we had a mass exodus from Argentina. And the country has never really recovered. And I watched that. And so now when people say, cody, stay in your lane, don't talk about the government. I don't talk about Republicans or Democrats. I think they're largely the same in many ways. I talk about the fact that we have to protect our own freedoms and that I will do everything I humanly can to fight for each one of you to be your own sovereign and to be in charge. And to have no Big Brother or Big Government tell you what you can and can't do, you don't need it. I think that you are more competent than most people who wear a little flag lapel on their pin and try to tell you that they're here to protect you. And so today I thought we got to look at something that's a little crazy, which is what's happening with government spending. And I want to break that down, but I wanted to tell you why. Because if we let the government become what Argentina became, which is somewhere where they nationalized the economy, because the government doesn't know how to build. Government only knows how to protect and how to spend. They are not innovators. You guys are. And I don't want us to become a poor replica of a country that has more wealth and beauty. You can imagine Argentina is gorgeous. But sadly, people in power who don't believe in the individuals, they believe in the collective. And so let's talk about what the hell is going on in the world today. We're going to do this pretty quickly. We're going to break it down, and we're going to come up with some ideas for what to do next. Okay, first, as of July 26, 2024, the US federal debt has skyrocketed to $35 trillion, almost equal to the size of the economy. Not Fun. Listen, the thing is, this is not actually new news, as the US has been running a deficit for a very long time since 2001, meaning we've been spending more than we earn and borrowing to fill that gap. Things got even worse after March 2020. You guys all remember this Covid when central bankers started partying like they just closed an IPO and had bottle service at TAO in New York. You just picture the little central bankers shaking their champagne bottles. So why should we care about this? Well, economic ruin does not sound fun. And not to be dramatic, but this debt could lead to a budget crisis, higher interest rates and economic instability. And so I think we got to really understand it. Because more than that, long term, it could hurt America's standing in the world, which, candidly, we can't afford right now. I thought I'd do an episode really clearly breaking down what is going on, why it matters in a way that won't put you to sleep but will make you sound smarter than either your neocon perma war uncle at the family gathering or your kind of commie money as a human right cousin who's never had a real job. Cool. Okay, we're going to break it all down and we're going to read up on what some of the brightest minds in business have to say about this. So let's steal their homework and get into it. But first, don't be greedy. Share the pod with the needy. I repost all of you who tag me in your Instagram stories sharing the pod. So make my day and your buds bank account swell and share this episode said. We see a ton of people downplaying our economic situation and it makes me nervous. Some of the smartest minds in business are starting to sound the alarm. The contrarian view here is that we should actually be listening to these warnings. You see our economic challenges. It doesn't mean that we're about blind optimism or doom and gloom. It's about facing hard truths, considering unconventional solutions, and being prepared. All right, so Elon Musk has been sounding the alarm about our financial situation. I know some people don't like him and think he's mean or think he's not great, and that could all be true. But he's definitely smart. And anytime somebody has a bank account bigger than I do and has built something bigger than I have, I like to at least listen to part of it. And I want to break down and see where I disagree or where I agree. But with a guy like this, it's worth seeing what his brain is thinking so he said things like the dollar will be worth nothing if the US doesn't do something about its national debt. Like this tweet right here. And he's basically talking about the fact that this tweet talks about interest payments on US national debt will shatter 1.1 trillion this year, eating 76% of all income taxes collected. And I think whether you like the guy or not, he's pretty much a legend. And so let's quantify him before I use a few more takes from him and a few more of his research. So think about this for a second. I think that Elon Musk might be one of the best CEOs of our generation. And then you might go, Cody, you're just a fan girl. You're an Elon stooge. Okay, let's qualify this in a few different ways. Do you run a business that is harder than rocket ships in space? No, you probably don't. No, I fucking don't either. Okay, well, he does that business. And not only does he do that business, get this stat. 60% of all satellites in Earth's orbit are now from Starlink 6. 0. 60%. Look at this image which basically shows of the 10,036 satellites in the Earth's orbit. Starlink has 6,800 of. How about from this perspective, the US will launch like one hundred and fifty nine rockets this year. SpaceX has already launched eighty four. Last year he launched ninety six. Okay, so he's pretty good at space. One of the hardest games out there. And oh, by the way, if you, if you fuck up, you die. That's pretty serious. But it's not even talking about what he's done in media, electric cars, batteries, and open sourcing that technology. If you think about it, a friend of mine, Balaji, has a great tweet where he talks about how hardware is one of the most difficult tech or businesses that you could run. And then you add the fact that he's going electric space reusable rockets and managing three multibillion dollar companies simultaneously. I think his pain tolerance must be unrivaled. And on top of that, anyone who thinks he's bad for the economy is either lying or so dumb as to be irrelevant. I think we should pray that our best and brightest like him continue to exist and that our government is 1/10 as efficient using our tax dollars as he is using his shareholders. In fact, I think if you're wondering if you should date a woman and take her home to your mom, or if you should date a guy and Take him home to your dad. You should ask them what they think of Elon Musk. I think it is a great litmus test of intelligence to ask somebody, do you think that Elon Musk is better for society or worse for society? If they say worse for society, cut and run. And so before we get into more, I just wanted you to know what the man's accomplished because I think it's really easy to look at Twitter and say his memes are dumb. And I don't like that he did this or that. But we've got to go one step deeper than this. So when I was looking at more data from a couple people that I respect highly, from Elon Musk, from Balogy, from another one of my good friends, Brian Westbury, who's an economist, I pulled together a bunch of information on the debt crisis overall in the US and what I found was fascinating is we've been running a deficit for years, obviously, and at which point most people on the Internet will go something along the lines of, this doesn't matter, we can keep printing capital. We're the tallest of all the midgets. Which is a way of saying that, you know, we're the best economy in the world still, even if all the economies aren't that great, at least we're better than theirs. But there's a couple things that are different than at any time. One is look at rising interest costs. I mean, the government is spending more and more just to pay interest on the debt. This is becoming one of the largest expenses in the federal budget, which you can see right here, looking at this, this slide. And then look at social programs at risk, like Social Security, Medicare, they could run out of money in the next decade, leaving millions of Americans without critical support. I think if you also want to have a litmus test of an intelligent person, the next question should be, can we continue to have social programs structured in the way that we do, or should they be need based? Because at some point we won't be able to have an input like this for one generation to the next. In fact, Scott Galloway has an incredible TED Talk, basically talking about how these programs are stealing from the youth to give to the next generation. And I think that is actually true. I think if you are a mom, a dad, a grandma, a grandpa, and you look at this data and you don't think that you are stealing from the youth to pay for your generation, you're not looking at the math very clearly. Now the problem is that the government can't seem to do anything about this. Lawmakers don't want to fix it. It's very unpopular. But why? Because voters are not young people. Voters are middle aged to older. And so it's human nature. We vote in our self interest. And those who are older are going to continue to vote these programs on. And you know, I think there's a really interesting post out there by Balaji. He basically talks about the true state of the financial situation in the US and talks a lot about debt, borrowing and the value of the dollar. What's interesting, I'm gonna break down three of these graphs. So the first one we basically see how when the government puts a program in place, they rarely pull it back. This is important to know. It happened during TARP. That's the asset relief program, which happened in 2008 post financial crisis, it happened on 911 with rolling out widespread ability to keep us safe but also learn a lot about its citizenry. Never pulled that back as well. So in 2003 the Fed issued more emergency loans than during the 2008 financial crisis. Think about that for a second. If you look at this graph, you can see it's like, I don't know, 5x more emergency loans in 2023 than 2008. If you guys weren't around in the workplace in 2008, it was bad. I was actually at Goldman in 2009, 2010, which was the worst part of the crisis. 2008 is when it started. You saw the first trickle from Lehman Brother and like a game of dominoes, you basically saw one bank fall after bank fall after bank fall. And in 2009 or 2010 is when Goldman really got it and we had to go in front of the Senate and give a bunch of commentary about what had happened in the financial crisis. So what is scary to me is remembering what happened in 2008. If we are anywhere near that in 2023 to 2024, it's scary if we are four to five times that by the federal government. I'm actually not sure how to quantify that. Then if we look at it from this level. All right, so emergency loans, not great. Maybe that's not that big of a deal. Well, let's look at borrowing levels. The US is borrowing more now than during the COVID 19 pandemic with interest rates around 5%. So during COVID 19 we're basically at 0% interest rates. Now we're at 5%. You guys know what that feels like? Have you tried to go get a house lately? Have you looked at like the difference in Interest rates for the mortgage you could afford two or three years ago versus now. That is what's happened in the government at scale. This, this graph is basically showing you, oh my gosh, we are issuing trillions of dollars in bonds. And oh, by the way, we're paying really high interest payments to do it. The next graph is basically showing you interest payments on the national debt that we have. And what's crazy is for the first time ever, we have net interest. So just us paying our interest payments, it's like you having a credit card that instead of you paying off the amount every month, you just pay the interest that you accumulate. That fat debt is still sitting there on your credit card. And on top of it, you're barely making interest payments. Well, for the first time ever, our net interest payments in the US we pay more towards those than we do our national defense, which is scary in a world in which China's China in. And we have what's happening in the Middle east and we have what's happening in Russia. Then we got a trifecta in case you guys aren't ready to slit your wrists already, which is the dollar devaluation. So the dollar's lost like 25% of its value in just four years. 25 cents of every dollar that you own, you have lost because of devaluation of our dollar over the last four years. If you were to go back to the 70s, we're talking about losing almost 75% of $1 in just that amount of time. Then interestingly enough, who owns most Treasuries or the way that we fund our economy? Who is our, like, mom and dad funding our bills? Well, that's China in a lot of ways. China holds more treasury securities than anybody else. But Rutrow since about 2010 when they peaked, 2014 when they peaked again. They are now back to almost historical lows of how much they own of Treasuries. So China doesn't want to be our buddy and stabilize our economy anymore. So I talk a lot about business buying and I get a lot of questions about it. One of the most common questions is where do you find a business to buy? The answer is sad because the worst deals are oversaturated marketplace sites, but the best deals are off market or curated. Either way, finding a business to buy basically sucks. And I think it should suck less. So that's why we've built something for you guys. Bizcout, a business buying marketplace full of only the best deals for both on and off market. And bizkout is just built different. Okay We've got verified buyers so the best sellers are actually interested in selling scout sites AKA at a glance. What's the quick analysis of this deal? Off market data so you can get all the info you need to direct outreach efficiently embedded lending so you can get your financing for the business right where you buy it. Biscott is going to change the face of main street buying and selling probably not immediately. We have a lot more work to do but I want you guys to be part of it, to be part of the buyers and builders in this next round. So you guys are one of the first to hear. Go to bizkout.com and check it out. Then we've got the Brics. I remember when these got created when I was at Goldman which is Brazil, Russia, India and China. It's a grouping of countries that came together to sort of comb dominance. Right. They came together and said what if we create a coalition between the four of us? Well it turns out that many people outside of the U.S. including the BRICS nation which are a huge block of power are buying large amounts of gold instead of US Treasuries. I mean check this out. You can basically see that during the financial crisis we had record high levels of gold, bought more gold than I know how to quantify. We got Fort Knoxes of gold all around the globe. Well guess what, were just about to surpass that level of gold held in 2024. And gold holding is usually an indicator of a risk off trade which basically means oh man, I'm worried about what's happening in the economy so I'm going to pull back risk. Then we've got de dollarization. So China has started to use its own currency for most cross border transactions. What does that mean? Well in the past if you wanted to do a deal like China and India or if you wanted to deal do a deal China and Latin America, China would use US dollar. Latin American countries with US use US dollar and that would be their trading currency. China's now said nah, nah, we're going to use our own, we're going to use yuan. And that basically means that we're seeing more deals done in Chinese currency than the US currency, at least by China. And that's not great because that decreases the amount of liquidity and usage of our own currency which we don't want. Then we made another kind of series of dumb decisions. We had a sanction on Russia and Europe that we thought was going to hurt Russia but actually ended up hurting Europe more. So we said you know, no natural gas, no energy for you, Europe, we're going to shut you off from Russia because Russia really needs your cash. Turned out not to be the case. The other problem with this, it's like a little, a little high brow to understand is like imagine we used to use the dollar. You were supposed to use the dollar as a government. You were supposed to say, we do not politicize our usage of the dollar. You just go out and forget anybody who wants to use the dollar, trade it back and forth amongst people, go off and prosper. Well, the second that you start politicizing the dollar, which means saying, hey, we are going to use sanctions on Russia, we are going to tell them they can't trade in USD. Well, what happens? They start using other currencies and going to other providers and that's what's happened in Russia. Then the other thing that's a little scary is from a peacetime perspective, usually in times of peace, not times of war, debt goes down. But what has happened to us since the 1900s, well, we have skyrocketed post 2000 to some of the highest levels of national debt we've ever had. And all of this together tells me that there is something to worry about. And we'll get into answers of what you do next. But have you ever tried to solve a problem without having proper context for a problem? Have you ever started to sit down and think, how do I fix my business? It's not working. How do I fix my relationship? It's not working. Well, if you go to fix your relationship and you're like, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to love language the shit out of them. I'm going to buy her so many flowers and gifts and presents and outings. And you don't actually understand why your wife is upset is because she just wants quality time with you and you to listen to her more and you to be kinder to her. She doesn't want fancy things, she doesn't want flowers. If you don't understand the situation you're in, you can't actually fix it. So I think one of the most important parts of this podcast is to understand what's going on in our world around us so that we can fix it and we can prepare for it properly. So what's interesting is, according to my friend Balaji, who was the CTO of Coinbase, one of the smartest men I know, and did this famous tweet right here, I just burned a million to tell you that they're printing trillions. His point here was I'm concerned about the chance of a crisis. And so Balaji thinks there's a 10% chance of a crisis happening soon, 70% chance in the next two years, which is scary because he's very smart. Now what does that look like? If you look back at history, it took just two days from the collapse of svb. You guys remember Silicon Valley bank sort of collapsing and everybody freaking out to then the government printing $300 billion. Within two weeks, 500 billion was withdrawn from local banks seeking safety. That was one bank. And its ripple effect lockdowns due to COVID 19 were implemented just two months after the virus hit the U.S. the financial crisis was only acknowledged two quarters after. Ben Bernanke is the chairman of the Fed at the time. Mild recession, famously mild recession prediction. And then Balaji says the USSR transitioned from a superpower to collapse in just two years. And so his point here is multi pronged, which is we have major issues all across our economy, which means that you guys need to learn how to become asset holders. More and more we need to learn how to become asset holders because if we add on top of this the commercial real estate crisis that I think is happening all around us, you guys have seen it. You travel around to different parts of your city. Here in Austin, Texas, if you were to drive any street with eyes to see, you would see vacant commercial centers. Why would that happen? Somebody owns those. Why would they just be sitting there empty? Well, they're sitting there empty because in order for them to sell it, they'd have to mark down their portfolio, which means that they'd have to say we told you investors this was worth $100. It's actually worth 20. And because of that, they're going to have a ripple effect through their entire portfolio. It's also why they aren't leasing those things out. Then we've got pension crisis. We've got underfunded pensions to the tune of like $1.4 trillion with a T. We've got auto loans rising in their default rate, which means people not about to pay them. I think that's also at risk. We've also got record high credit card debt. So $930 billion in credit card debt in the U.S. this is a all time high. And then we've got more people moving away from the dollar. So we've got some serious issues here in this country. Which is why I impress upon all of us to really think about how do we get to financial freedom and protect ourselves from an environment in which we have global uncertainty that we've probably never seen before. I think maybe the only place that's worse off in some degrees is Europe, because they're literally playing a game of 1984 between the government. The government instituting that somebody could get jailed because of what they tweet or put on Facebook is something that I never thought I'd see in my lifetime. All right, let's get into some wild and crazy stuff now that we're talking about 1984 in Europe, because why not? Crazy idea. I don't think it's awesome to have Facebook CEO Zuckerberg tell you that he was lightly coerced into censoring news during the last election cycle and also during COVID I don't think it's awesome to have a founder of a tech company arrested in France for not sharing information on citizens. I definitely don't think it's awesome for governments like the UK and the European Union to say that they would come after even US Citizens for things that they say online that they don't like. Elon Musk posted this tweet, which is sadly kind of true. It's 2030 in Europe and you're being executed for liking a meme which increasingly feels like that could be reasonable. But what's fascinating to me, we don't seem to be very good at second and third order effects. We think that if one party tells us something we don't like, we should censor them, but we don't actually think about the opposite, which is what happens when your party or the opposite party from yours says something that you don't like. What happens when your guys go out of power and the other guys come into power? Then you just play a game of going after one another. It's why we shouldn't arrest former presidents for political reasons. It's why we should make sure everybody gets free speech, even when we don't like what they're saying. And it's why we should make sure that we push back on censorship anywhere we can. And yet, for some reason, this has become non normalized. It's become okay for people to say that you shouldn't be allowed to talk. Stay in your lane. You're not an expert, motherfucker. No, I'm an expert as an American in the First Amendment, which is that we have the right to free speech. And I do not think we should allow anybody to push back on that. Now I got to read this next thing to you because let's go back to Argentina. And Venezuela, where I had a business before. So if you've never been to Venezuela, you probably didn't know that if you wanted to buy a chicken, this is how much money you would need. Or about 14 million bolivars, which is their version of a dollar. That would be the equivalent to $2.22 USD 14 million bolivar to $2.22. Now, how did it happen? Where in Venezuela, their currency became worth so little that they make purses out of it like this on the street. Like literally, you can have a purse made entirely of dollar bills. You know, price controls. Two words that sound awesome and actually are not. Which is probably why that quote is true, that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It just sounds so good. I go to the grocery store and I see the prices of groceries today and I get pissed. I'm like, why do I have to pay 20 bucks for this fancy organic XYZ? The problem is, is that we don't want the government to set anything. And let me explain by. And I'm not going after one candidate or another. I won't even say who said this idea about price controls. All I will say is if you want a masterclass in price controls, go look at Venezuela and Argentina and see how it worked out for them. Spoiler. Not great. So I want to read you a tweet from a friend of mine. We should just listen to what he has to say about it. This is a friend of mine, Robert, who is the CFO of a company. He's saying people need to stop overreacting about X's plan to reduce food inflation as it would lead to communism, mass starvation and the end of America. He's like, come on, I worked in M and A in the food industry. Here's a step by step summary of what would actually happen. Step one, the government announces that grocery retailers aren't allowed to raise prices. Grocery stores, which operate on 1 to 2 net margins, can't survive if their suppliers raise prices. So the government announces that food producers. Next line. Also aren't allowed to raise prices. Okay, well not all grocery stores are created equal. So stores in lower income areas make less money than high income ones. Right. Because these aren't able to cover their overhead, grocery chains start to shut down. So that means we have food deserts in rural areas. In low income urban areas, that becomes even worse. Meanwhile, margins for food producers going down. Their primary costs, ingredients, energy and labor aren't fixed and they have shrinking profits. So number five, grocery stores which have finite shelf space start to repurpose their stores, those that didn't have to shut down to sell more non price controlled items. So your local Kroger or Safeway starts to look and feel more like a Walmart. Food producers then stop making products with lower margins, no eggs or milk or bread, because they can't make any money on it. So their businesses are starting to die. So then they compete on things like payment terms and how long you can pay for something. Then small grocery chains start to shut down entirely. So whole chains or they get sold to larger chains like Kroger in addition not being able to cover the fixed costs. A major reason is because they can't secure delivery of products due to producers prioritizing sales to larger customers and those that might stay in business because they have to float sometimes the customer payment. So the smaller food producers which typically sell via distributors rather than right to the grocery stores, they go out of business because these producers have an additional step in their value chain. So they actually have higher costs because you're a smaller guy. As supply chains break down, lines start to form outside grocery stores every morning. Now cities assign police officers to patrol store parking lots and food producers draft contingency plans to assign armed escorts to delivery trucks. Step 10 the federal government announces a program to issue block grants for states to purchase and operate shuttered grocery stores because government's here to help. The USDA also ceases closed down production facilities because you're not allowed to close down. 11. The government announces that prices for all key food costs, corn, wheat, cattle, energy are now fixed to stop profiteers from gouging the now government operated food industry. 12. Shockingly, the government struggles to operate one of the most complex industries on the planet. The entire food supply chain starts imploding. What happens next? Communism, masturbation and the end of America quickly ensue. Hey, wait a second. And you have to laugh at this slightly, except that it's a tale as old as time. I had a friend who ran, I kid you not, a distributor from Mercedes Benz in Argentina. And when Cristina Fernandez came in and took over the government, they nationalized his business and they mandated he produced coffee. This motherfucker knew nothing about coffee, but they could export coffee and she no longer wanted to allow imports of Mercedes Benz. So what happened? He tried for a while before the business went under because he had no idea what he was doing. That is the problem with when we try to have the government as Big Brother taking care of anything. And like this is where some people go, well, some price controls are great and you're right, some price controls are necessary so profiteers do not gouge the American public. Like for instance, you could say, what about pharma? What about those fuckers in pharma just charging us a million dollars for everything? And you'd be right in some ways. For instance, US drug prices are roughly 3x higher than prices anywhere else and yet we account for roughly a third, up to 60% of the revenue of U.S. pharma companies. In some places, price controls are intelligent. Like for instance, we should be thoughtful about life saving drugs and trying to make sure that we have price control so people can have access to them and there doesn't become a massive amount of profiteering. But the problem becomes when we think that something that works on the edges works across the board. And that is the truth of what's happening right now in the us. So the truth of the matter is we got some work to do. But I think what you need to realize listening to all of this is that your ability to earn is really focused on two things, that is your willingness to continue to do what it takes and your ability to pick the right market for you. That market, increasingly is something that you have to think about when it comes to federal and regulatory oversight. Lots of people these days like to play in online businesses, for instance. They like to play in businesses that seem a little bit sexier. But guess what? In a market in which we're coming into a recession, in which things might get harder, you are probably going to be happier with a plumbing company that everybody needs, as opposed to a gaming company online, as opposed to starting that E commerce store that you saw with some one off widget that nobody really actually needs. When times get tough, there's always a way to make money. But some ways are a lot harder than others. If you guys think we should do an entire episode on what to do in order to make money and continue to persevere in a down market when we have a recession, if the market continues to get more difficult, let me know and we will do that on one of these next podcasts. But in the meantime, remember this, whenever the government says I'm from the government and I'm here to help, they're typically not. And I am talking about red, white, blue, purple, whatever the fuck color they show up as. The only good government is a one that is at a distance, allowing you to be able to continue to do the things you need to do on a daily basis as opposed to mandating you do one thing or another. And that is a hill. I will die on. All right, if you guys thought this was useful and an interesting way to break down some of the stuff that we're talking about so you can be more intelligent in conversations where people want to get emotional about politics and economics as opposed to being rational about it, let me know in the comments. We're going to maybe do more of these current events because I think in a world so crazy, we've got to know what's going on so we know what's coming. See you next time.
Episode: How the Debt Crisis ACTUALLY Affects You
Host: Codie Sanchez
Release Date: September 24, 2024
Duration: Approximately 1 hour
Timestamp: 00:00 - 05:30
Codie Sanchez opens the episode by expressing her skepticism towards government intervention, emphasizing that genuine support from the government is often minimal. She shares her entrepreneurial journey, highlighting her experience running First Trust in Latin America, which grew to over a billion dollars in assets under management. Codie recounts how the Argentine government under Cristina Fernández nationalized businesses, crippling the economy overnight and leading to a mass exodus from the country. This personal anecdote sets the stage for her concerns about government overreach and fiscal mismanagement.
Notable Quote:
"I think the only good government is one that is at a distance, allowing you to continue to do the things you need to do on a daily basis as opposed to mandating you do one thing or another."
— Codie Sanchez (00:45)
Timestamp: 05:31 - 15:00
Codie delves into the alarming state of the US federal debt, which has surged to $35 trillion as of July 26, 2024, nearly matching the size of the US economy. She traces the deficit back to 2001, exacerbated significantly post-March 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Codie warns of potential consequences such as a budget crisis, higher interest rates, and economic instability, which could tarnish America's global standing.
Notable Quote:
"This debt could lead to a budget crisis, higher interest rates, and economic instability."
— Codie Sanchez (07:15)
Timestamp: 15:01 - 25:00
Highlighting opinions from influential figures, Codie references Elon Musk's concerns about the national debt, citing his tweet about the dollar's potential devaluation. She praises Musk's accomplishments across various industries, arguing that his warnings should be taken seriously despite any personal biases listeners might have against him. Codie also mentions insights from Balaji, the CTO of Coinbase, and economist Brian Westbury, who provide data-driven analyses reinforcing the severity of the debt situation.
Notable Quote:
"The dollar will be worth nothing if the US doesn't do something about its national debt."
— Elon Musk (Referenced by Codie Sanchez, 16:40)
Timestamp: 25:01 - 35:00
Codie discusses the formation and actions of the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), focusing on their moves to reduce reliance on the US dollar. She explains how BRICS countries are increasingly conducting trade in their own currencies, diminishing the dollar's dominance and liquidity in global markets. Additionally, Codie touches on geopolitical maneuvers, such as sanctions on Russia, and their unintended consequences, like Europe suffering more due to reduced energy imports.
Notable Quote:
"China has started to use its own currency for most cross-border transactions... which decreases the amount of liquidity and usage of our own currency."
— Codie Sanchez (29:50)
Timestamp: 35:01 - 45:00
Using Venezuela and Argentina as cautionary tales, Codie explains the detrimental effects of government-imposed price controls. She describes how Argentina's nationalization under Cristina Fernández led to economic collapse, while Venezuela's hyperinflation rendered its currency nearly worthless. Codie highlights a detailed breakdown from her friend Robert, CFO of a company, illustrating the step-by-step fallout of price controls on the food industry, ultimately leading to shortages and economic turmoil.
Notable Quote:
"If you want a masterclass in price controls, go look at Venezuela and Argentina and see how it worked out for them. Spoiler. Not great."
— Codie Sanchez (38:20)
Timestamp: 45:01 - 55:00
Codie outlines various economic red flags signaling an impending crisis, including rising interest costs, underfunded social programs like Social Security and Medicare, increasing auto loan defaults, and record-high credit card debt totaling $930 billion. She emphasizes the need for individuals to achieve financial freedom and become asset holders to safeguard against economic uncertainty. Codie also references Balaji's assessment, which suggests a 70% chance of a financial crisis within the next two years, comparing potential outcomes to historical collapses like that of the USSR.
Notable Quote:
"More and more we need to learn how to become asset holders because... you are probably going to be happier with a plumbing company that everybody needs, as opposed to a gaming company online."
— Codie Sanchez (50:30)
Timestamp: 55:01 - 1:10:00
Transitioning to actionable advice, Codie advocates for building businesses in essential sectors that remain resilient during economic downturns. She contrasts essential services like plumbing with more volatile ventures like online gaming or e-commerce stores that may falter in a recession. Codie introduces Bizcout, a curated marketplace for buying and selling businesses, designed to streamline the process and offer vetted opportunities. She encourages listeners to prioritize stability and necessity in their entrepreneurial endeavors to navigate challenging economic landscapes.
Notable Quote:
"Your ability to earn is really focused on two things, that is your willingness to continue to do what it takes and your ability to pick the right market for you."
— Codie Sanchez (58:45)
Timestamp: 1:10:01 - End
In concluding the episode, Codie reiterates her stance on government intervention, emphasizing the importance of maintaining personal and economic freedoms. She urges listeners to stay informed about current events to make rational decisions rather than being swayed by emotional or political biases. Codie invites feedback on the episode format and hints at future discussions focusing on strategies to prosper in a potentially recessionary environment.
Notable Quote:
"Whenever the government says I'm from the government and I'm here to help, they're typically not... the only good government is one that is at a distance."
— Codie Sanchez (1:09:30)
Codie Sanchez delivers a compelling analysis of the current debt crisis, interwoven with personal experiences and expert opinions. Her emphasis on financial independence and strategic business decisions provides listeners with both a macroeconomic perspective and practical guidance to safeguard their financial futures amidst escalating governmental and economic challenges.