The Backstories of Your Favorite Music & Money Mastery in a Changing World - SYSK Choice

Summary

Podcast Summary: Something You Should Know
Episode: The Backstories of Your Favorite Music & Money Mastery in a Changing World
Release Date: March 29, 2025
Host: Mike Carruthers | OmniCast Media

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1. The Backstories of Your Favorite Music

In the first segment of this episode, host Mike Carruthers engages in an insightful conversation with Kelefa Sanneh, a distinguished writer for The New Yorker and former pop music critic for The New York Times. They delve deep into the evolution and intricacies of popular music genres.

Defining Genres and Their Origins
Sanneh breaks down popular music into seven distinct genres: Rock and Roll, R&B, Country Music, Punk Rock, Hip Hop, Dance Music, and Pop. He emphasizes that a genre often represents a musical community rather than just a category. "A genre is in some sense a musical community," Sanneh explains at [04:38], highlighting that each genre carries its own narrative and cultural significance.

Grassroots vs. Corporate Influence
Sanneh discusses the dual forces that shape genres—grassroots movements and corporate marketing. Using the birth of hip hop as an example, he recounts how DJ Kool Herc organically developed the genre by experimenting with record mixes at parties, which was later recognized and marketed by larger corporations. "Hip hop ends up being the name that kind of sticks," Sanneh notes at [06:08], illustrating how grassroots innovation can be co-opted and popularized by industry powers.

Pop Music: From Umbrella Term to Respected Genre
The conversation transitions to pop music, tracing its journey from a broad label in the 1960s to a more defined and respected genre by the 1980s. Sanneh explains, "In the 1960s, people used pop music to refer to like everything," but by the 1980s, artists began to reclaim the term, transforming it into a distinct and glamorous genre ([10:52]). This evolution allowed pop music to establish its own identity separate from other genres like rock and roll.

Challenges of Genre Definitions
Sanneh and Carruthers explore the complexities of genre classifications. Sanneh asserts, "For a genre, to have a genre, just like any community, you need some inclusion and you need some exclusion," at [21:41]. This exclusivity fosters a sense of community but also leads to debates about what constitutes belonging to a particular genre, especially in the evolving landscape of music.

The Role of Technology in Music Discovery
Addressing the shift in how music is discovered, Sanneh points out that traditional methods like radio are being supplemented—and sometimes replaced—by digital platforms. He observes, "For younger listeners, they're discovering stuff on TikTok all the time," at [26:10], highlighting how social media and streaming services are reshaping the music discovery process and influencing genre popularity.

Notable Quotes:

• "A genre is in some sense a musical community." — Kelefa Sanneh [04:38]
• "Hip hop ends up being the name that kind of sticks." — Kelefa Sanneh [06:08]
• "Pop sort of starts as a catch all, it becomes an insult. And then, especially since the 1980s, it becomes a real genre unto itself." — Kelefa Sanneh [10:52]
• "For a genre, to have a genre, just like any community, you need some inclusion and you need some exclusion." — Kelefa Sanneh [21:41]

2. Money Mastery in a Changing World

The second segment features Jill Schlesinger, a certified financial planner and award-winning business analyst for CBS News. She shares her expertise on achieving financial stability and executing a financial reset in today's dynamic economic landscape.

Understanding the Financial Reset
Schlesinger introduces the concept of a financial reset, emphasizing the importance of understanding one’s current financial situation before making significant changes. She advises listeners to assess their assets, liabilities, income, and expenditures to gain a clear financial picture. "You have to actually take a good hard look," she states at [33:36], underscoring the necessity of self-assessment in financial planning.

Overcoming Financial Inertia
Discussing the common reluctance to manage finances, Schlesinger attributes it to human inertia. She notes, "People simply stop right there," when faced with the daunting task of evaluating their financial status ([30:25]). Her approach encourages proactive management to gain emotional and practical control over one’s financial decisions.

Conventional vs. Personalized Financial Advice
While acknowledging the effectiveness of conventional financial strategies like paying off debts and investing in index funds, Schlesinger advocates for a personalized approach. She argues that without a tailored plan, traditional advice may lack relevance: "Without going through any sort of process to think about what you want and what you have and how you're going to get there, all those rules are kind of meaningless." ([31:31])

Practical Steps for Financial Reset
Schlesinger outlines three critical steps for a financial reset:

1. Fund an Emergency Reserve: "You want to have 6 to 12 months of your living expenses in a safe, accessible account," she advises at [40:03].
2. Pay Down Consumer Debt: Prioritize reducing credit card debt, auto loans, and student loans to improve financial stability.
3. Invest in Retirement: Maximize contributions to retirement accounts like Roth IRAs to secure future financial health.

Embracing the Process of Financial Change
Emphasizing the importance of continuous evaluation, Schlesinger explains that a financial reset is an ongoing process. "If you are doing all of those three things... then you are putting yourself at Roth risk," she warns at [41:21], highlighting the benefits of disciplined financial management.

Notable Quotes:

• "You have to actually take a good hard look." — Jill Schlesinger [33:36]
• "People simply stop right there." — Jill Schlesinger [30:25]
• "Without going through any sort of process to think about what you want and what you have and how you're going to get there, all those rules are kind of meaningless." — Jill Schlesinger [31:31]
• "You want to have 6 to 12 months of your living expenses in a safe, accessible account." — Jill Schlesinger [40:03]

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Conclusion

This episode of Something You Should Know offers a compelling exploration of music genres and financial mastery, providing listeners with both cultural insights and practical advice. Through engaging discussions with Kelefa Sanneh and Jill Schlesinger, host Mike Carruthers delivers valuable information aimed at enriching listeners' understanding of the music they love and empowering them to take control of their financial futures.

Listeners are encouraged to explore Sanneh’s book, Major: A History of Popular Music in Seven Genres, and Schlesinger’s work, including her book The Great Money Reset, for deeper insights.

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Notable Moments:

• Music Genre Evolution: [04:38] - [26:10]
• Financial Reset Guidance: [29:14] - [43:09]

Quotes with Timestamps:

• "A genre is in some sense a musical community." — Kelefa Sanneh [04:38]
• "Without going through any sort of process to think about what you want and what you have and how you're going to get there, all those rules are kind of meaningless." — Jill Schlesinger [31:31]

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For more information and resources mentioned in this episode, refer to the show notes linked with the podcast.

Transcript

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Today on Something you should know how your clothes can affect your personality. Then a fascinating look at popular music. Rock, country, hip hop, dance and pop.

[Mike Carruthers]

In the 1960s, people used pop music to refer to like everything. Like the Beatles were pop, the Rolling Stones were pop, the Supremes were pop. And in the 1970s, that starts to change and you start hearing people using pop as a derogatory term.

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Also the very best method to make leftover pizza taste as good as fresh. And a way to look at your money that might just open your eyes and free your soul.

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Something you should know.

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Fascinating intel, the world's top experts and.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Practical advice you can use in your life today.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Something you should Know with Mike Carruthers Hi welcome to Something you should know. Have you heard the saying, I'm sure you've heard the saying that clothes make the man or the woman. Well, that saying may be more true than you realize. This is according to some research that was published some years ago in the Journal of Experimental Psychology. For example, if you want to feel smarter and actually be smarter, Wear a white coat. Just make sure it's the right kind of white coat. In the experiment, volunteers were given an intelligence test while wearing a white lab coat. The group who believed that the jacket belonged to a doctor scored higher than the other group who were told the jacket they were wearing was a painter's smock. The study had some other revealing results. Women wearing a white blouse looked and felt more innocent. Men in black T shirts were a little stronger. People had more energy when they wore bright colors. And and those people in formal attire had better posture, grammar and more poise. So in many ways, clothes really do make the person and that is something you should know. I'm sure you have your favorite kind of music, favorite song, favorite artist, favorite genre. That's a word that gets tossed around a lot in music genre. And something that's really interesting is that there's a backstory to all the popular music genres that you like, whether you like country music or classic rock, hip hop, that music came from somewhere. It evolved from something. And someone who can tell that story better than most is Kelefasaneh. He is a writer for the New Yorker, former pop music critic for the New York Times. He's a contributor to the CBS Sunday Morning program and author of a book called Major Labels A History of Popular Music in seven genres. Hi Kelefa, Welcome. Thanks for coming on. Something you should know.

[Mike Carruthers]

So happy to be here.

[Jill Schlesinger]

So you've broken down popular music into these seven genres. So why don't you explain what a genre is? And the seven genres are what?

[Mike Carruthers]

Rock and roll, R and B, country music, punk rock, hip hop, dance music, and pop. Right. A genre is in some sense a musical community. I feel like within each of these communities, within each of these genres, there is a story to tell.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, it's interesting that you say that because when I think of genres I don't think of well, I never really thought about it much, but I don't think of them as communities so much as I think of them as categories. When you ask people what kind of music do you like, they typically respond with one of the genres or categories. They say, I like country music or I like hip hop or I like punk music. That's what they say.

[Mike Carruthers]

In fact, often when you ask people that, I've found you get the opposite. Right. You get people saying, I like all kinds of music. And my mischievous response is usually, I bet you don't. Which is just to say we like to think of ourselves as being very open minded Right. And many of us are to one extent or another. But for most of us, loving music also means there is some other kind of music that we don't love quite so much.

[Jill Schlesinger]

So maybe pick one or two and explain, like, where do genres come from? Like, somebody didn't just wake up one morning and say, I'm going to create myself a genre here, and we're going to call it country. So where do they come from?

[Mike Carruthers]

Well, it's often a little bit of both, which is that they come from below and they come from above. What I mean by that is they come from people getting together, doing a thing, right? You think about a Jamaican immigrant named Kool Herc throwing parties in the Bronx in 1976. He wasn't necessarily saying, like, oh, I'm starting a genre. He was just playing records at a party. And more and more people started playing records at these parties, and they're playing old disco records, and they were kind of cutting them up, and people started maybe talking over them a little bit. And soon you had this thing that came to be known as hip hop, right? So you had a cultural phenomenon, and just for ease of reference, people give it a name. People in other parts of the city and then other parts of the country start hearing like, oh, there's this thing going on. There's this thing. And a couple different, you know, people called it rap music. There's different words for it. But hip hop ends up being the name that kind of sticks. So in that sense, a genre can be a really grassroots phenomenon. At the same time, you have these big corporations always trying to figure out how to make money off of this stuff, how to market to us more effectively. And so for these corporations, it's really helpful for there to be a name, a genre, sometimes a sub genre. You think about classic rock, which is a radio format that's born basically in the early 1980s, is when it really starts to thrive as a way of radio programmers realizing, like, oh, there are some maybe young, but also not quite so young listeners who would love to hear the music of the 60s and the 70s. And it's not exactly oldies, and we'll call it classic rock. So sometimes a genre can feel a little bit like a publicity stunt or a conspiracy, and sometimes it can feel kind of like a secret or a local tradition that gets discovered. And often, I mean, this is often true in popular music that you see a bit of both, right? You see the sort of grassroots phenomenon, and then you see the corporate marketing scheme and many of the things that we love including rock and roll itself end up being a bit of both.

[Jill Schlesinger]

And so who defines a genre? Or is it just an organic y thing that happens? Or does. Is there some sense of there's somebody pulling the strings here, that this is what. This is what country music is, this is what rap is?

[Mike Carruthers]

It's a great question. When I was. When I started working full time as a music Critic Back in 2002, one of the things I realized that was kind of heartwarming to me is that record labels were always trying to launch, you know, new acts, new bands, sometimes new sub genres. And much of the time they failed, right? Much of the time, the thing that the record companies told you was the next big thing turned out not to be. And that was heartwarming to me because it made me realize that there was a limit to how much anyone, even these powerful record companies, could control anything. And so I tend to think at the end of the day, one of the most important force is what people are into. And you see that. Well, in country music, where there's a bunch of different definitions of what country music might mean, right, you could. You might have someone who is country music because of the instrumentation, right? They have a band, and there's a fiddle and a banjo player and a mandolin, maybe a pedal steel, and they're doing something that sounds as if it's inspired by Hank Williams and maybe Johnny Cash and some Patsy Cline in there, right? That's one way to be country music. But there's another way to be country music, which is there is now an audience that thinks of itself as country fans. They listen to country radio. And to a large extent, country music is whatever those people say it is. Whatever those people want to listen to is country music. And so that's why country music evolves over the years. Generally, what happens in musical genres is in order for the genre to stay vibrant and stay popular, usually it has to change. And often what that means is there are a number of people who are upset about the way that it's changed. You see the same thing in hip hop. You know, there's. People sometimes say that the. The question of when hip hop sounded best is whenever you were in high school, that was really the peak of hip hop. And, you know, today's hip hop doesn't even sound like it sounded 20 years ago, let alone 40 years ago. And again, I think that's. That's proof of. Of. Of the health and the vibrancy of hip hop. But it's also tricky for anyone who loves, you know, the older sounds and the question of how it possible for hip hop to evolve and yet remain recognizably hip hop is a really interesting question.

[Jill Schlesinger]

What is pop music? How do you define that genre? Because it seems to change a lot. And a lot of songs and artists fall out of that genre and then are homeless.

[Mike Carruthers]

In the 1960s, people used pop music to refer to like everything. Like the Beatles were pop, the Rolling Stones were pop, the Supremes were pop. It was just what was popular with young people. And in the 1970s, that starts to change and you start hearing people using pop as a derogatory term. Right. The Carpenters are merely a pop act because they aren't rock and roll. And pop is often used in the 1970s to describe musicians who don't belong to any musical genre. They are homeless in terms of musical genre. Or maybe they've been kicked out of a musical genre because they've tried cross over, they've left genre behind. Right. Olivia Newton John had some, some country songs, but really she goes pop. And so this idea of going pop and this suspicion that maybe going pop is a bad thing really takes hold in the 1970s and in the 1980s. That's where you have an interesting reversal. You have, especially in the uk, you have a whole cohort of musicians. They're glamorous, they're wearing makeup, they're very kind of theatrical, influenced by David Bowie. And they're reclaim the idea of pop, of pop music as a good thing. Pop music is cool. The idea is like actually rock and roll is old. It's been around too long. It's a bunch of sweaty guys in blue jeans. We're gonna do something cooler, younger, sexier, more fun, more glamorous. And we're gonna embrace this term pop. And so, you know, ever since then you've seen pop used as kind of a narrower sense to often to describe a particular sound. And so nowadays, if you think about a pop artist, pop singer like Katy Perry or someone like that, she really is working. You can hear in her music that tradition of 80s pop, right? The tradition of Madonna and musicians like that. So in that sense, pop sort of starts as a catch all, it becomes an insult. And then, especially since the 1980s, it becomes a real genre unto itself, which is to say a community and a musical tradition.

[Jill Schlesinger]

We are talking about popular music through the lens of popular music genres. My guest is Kelefasane. His book is called Major A History of Popular Music in seven Genres.

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[Jill Schlesinger]

So Kelefa, I find it interesting, I've always found this interesting how an artist can fall out of a genre, like be really hot in a genre and then fall out and then they can't come back. Say Barry Manilow, he like a monster pop artist, then he kind of fell out of favor. And you know, another artist could release a song that sounds a lot like Barry Manilow and could be a big hit. But if Barry Manilow puts out the song, it won't be a big hit because he's, he just, he's not allowed back in.

[Mike Carruthers]

Well, I gotta say, Barry Manilow has had an extraordinary career and by many metrics remains an extremely popular singer. But, but, but it's true that over the years, I mean, this is part of, this is part of what makes popular music different from some other things, right? It's, it's devoted to novelty and innovation, right? Those are values that traditionally have been championed in popular music. There's always someone new doing something new, catching people's attention. And also because often the target audience has been so Young. There's always been this idea or perhaps this fear that the young people that love popular music, broadly defined, are going to move on to something else. And that's linked to an idea that if what you're doing is popular among young people, well, maybe it's not that great. Maybe it's not built to last. Maybe these teenagers are going to move on and find something else. And one of the most fun and exciting things about pop music is how wrong those judgments often are, right? You think about the way people looked at Led zeppelin in the 1970s. And the idea is this is music for a bunch of, you know, high school morons smoking dope, right? And it turns out that Led Zeppelin is. Is almost as popular now as they were then, right? This turns out to be kind of one of the classic bands that generations discover and rediscover in a very different way. If you think about Madonna in the 1980s, there was this idea like, oh, well, this is very superficial music. This is MTV era. People just like these music videos that look good and there's really no substance there. And now we look back at Madonna's career as, you know, one of the most important figures in popular culture probably in the past half cent. So often people are making these judgments about popular music, about what will last and what will fall away. And often it's really hard to predict what is going to be popular and what is going to have influence over the years.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Where did rap come from?

[Mike Carruthers]

Rap, it's funny, rap. There's a way of thinking about it where it's almost not quite a mistake. But, you know, rappers weren't supposed to be the stars in the early days. You know, this movement starts with DJs. It starts with cool DJ Herc and other people basically who had big sound systems and big record collections. And they'd play a party and they found ways to go mix back and forth between records. So they could play funk records or disco records or R B records. And they'd find the most rhythmic part, the break where everything would stop except the drummer. And they could play the break backwards and forwards. And so they'd be able to create, you know, a great soundtrack to a party where people would dance and it would be really up tempo. And it was kind of like they were manipulating these records in an interesting way. So in the early days, the rappers were just the hired help. They were the guys on the microphone. They were MCs in the old fashioned sense of the term emcee, right? They were the party host, saying they just Want to. They'd welcome everyone. They'd say, I hope you're having a good time. They would sing the praises of the dj. Isn't this the best dj? And as they started doing that, they started doing that in rhyme. And then, you know, they ended up basically stealing the spotlight. The rappers became the star of the show and the DJ became just this extra appendage. You know, you think about someone like Will Smith. When Will Smith first gets popular, he's part of a duo and the duo is called DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince. Right. In the early days, the rappers often got second billing to the dj, even though it turned out that rapping is such a powerful and charismatic form that many of us end up paying more attention to the rappers than the DJs. And the rappers kind of take over. And now you have a whole form of music that's basically built around rapping. But the way it started was you, yes, in this funny way, a little bit backwards.

[Jill Schlesinger]

And how did it become involved in crime? I mean, rappers are always getting shot or in trouble or arrested. But what's the connection there? Cause I think a lot of people are confused by that. It's an art form, but it's something else.

[Mike Carruthers]

One of the things that hip hop did was it retained this connection to the cultures where it was born. And this is generally working class, predominantly black neighborhoods. And one of the really surprising things about hip hop is that over the decades it has maintained this connection to those neighborhoods. And part of what that means is that means that through hip hop we get to hear from people that we otherwise wouldn't necessarily get to hear from. Right? People who wouldn't necessarily end up making a film or even making a podcast, make records. And those records really resonate. And so that's really exciting. But part of what it means is that in these communities, if there are these issues, if there are issues of crime, not only are you going to hear rappers talk about that, but there is an expectation that rappers really be part of that community. And sometimes being part of that community can be really dangerous. If that's a dangerous community, if that's a dangerous place to live. And because the culture is so important in hip hop, there is an expectation that rappers not separate themselves from that culture and still be part of that culture. And I think, you know, that's a very double edged thing. It's part of what makes the genre even now still so vivid. But it can mean that the lives of these stars are really dangerous because they're in dangerous places. With a big target on them. And they're talking in ways that make it seem as if they're still part of these communities.

[Jill Schlesinger]

R and B is an interesting category to me because R and B implies a certain kind of music, but it's also defined by the artist and typically black artists. And it is the only genre that is typically defined by a race. So what is R and B?

[Mike Carruthers]

Well, this is one of the really interesting and really vexing things about genres in music, especially in America, which is that one thing that popular music is great at is reflecting the world that we live in. And to the extent that we live even now in a segregated country, you'll see that segregation reflected in music. And, you know, over the years, R and B musicians themselves have had mixed feelings about that. Luther Vandross, one of the great R B singers who had a string of incredible records in the 1980s especially, never had a number one pop hit. And he used to, you know, he used to say he really wanted one. And he was kind of upset that he was sort of. And he was upset that he was sort of categorized as R and B. And in that sense, kept away from the pop chart. The flip side of that is someone like Whitney Houston comes out, and she is, from the moment she comes out, she has big success on the pop chart. And she is often categorized as a pop artist or as being, quote, unquote, not really R and B headline in either Time or Newsweek called her the prom queen of soul, which was kind of a compliment and an insult at the same time. And so, by comparison, Whitney Houston sometimes suffered from the perception that she wasn't R and B enough. And, you know, one of the things I talk about with genres is that generally for a genre, to have a genre, just like any community, you need some inclusion and you need some exclusion, right? That's what makes it feel like a community. And one of the things we love about a musical community is it gives you a sense of intimacy, A sense that we're all here listening together, it's just us. And so one of the things you get in R and B is that sense of intimacy, precisely because it's a tradition that doesn't include everybody.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Talk about how music is discovered, because that's changed a lot. It used to be that radio was the primary means of discovering new music, and radio was an important means of delivering music. And it's lost, in many ways, its prominence, or at least there are a lot of other ways that people find music.

[Mike Carruthers]

Radio has always been, and actually still is to A surprising extent, old fashioned, what they call terrestrial radio still does a really good job of introducing listeners to new musicians they might enjoy. And all these newer outlets are trying to figure out how to do that. Right. If you're Apple Music or your Spotify or even your YouTube, you're trying to figure out how do we do we get people and point them towards something that they love. For someone like me who's a music obsessive, right. I love logging onto Spotify and like, I'll just go to the new release page and listen to everything, literally everything. But to someone who's a more casual listener, sometimes that interface can be a little intimidating. Right? You pull up Spotify and Spotify says, great, we have almost all the albums ever made. What would you like to listen to? And for a lot of people, that's a little bit paralyzing, Right? Right. Too much choice. And so one of the things you're seeing now is a bunch of companies and a bunch of technologies trying to figure out how to get people into what they like. And one thing that can be a little difficult, in fact, in the streaming era is finding that sense of community. Right. Do you have a sense that, okay, there's a playlist you might like to listen to on Spotify? Do you have a good sense of who else is listening to that playlist? Do you feel like you're part of something? Sometimes I think that that sense of community is shrinking down to the individual level of an artist. Right. If you're a fan of a particular artist, whether it's a huge K pop band or a relatively unknown country singer songwriter, it's really easy now to find other fans to go on social media or go on Reddit or go wherever. And so you can really become part of a community in a way that makes the fan club era look really prehistoric. Right. The era when you'd send your name in an envelope to some address and join the fan, which is the way it used to work, now it's much easier to become an active fan and feel like you're part of a community of fans. So I think you've seen that on the level of an individual artist. But I talk to listeners all the time who are trying to figure out, like, what should I be listening to? And that's a question that companies like Spotify are trying to help them answer.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, right, because if you ask anybody, pick your favorite song, where did you first hear it? You probably first heard it on the radio. And if you're not a radio listener anymore, where are you going to hear those songs?

[Mike Carruthers]

Yeah, because. And it's generational, of course. Right. For a younger listener. They're discovering stuff on TikTok all the time. And if a song. If a snippet. Right. On TikTok, it would just be a snippet. But you're seeing snippets of songs go viral. You're certainly seeing people get signed to record deals and become stars because they first were discovered on TikTok. And you're seeing. You're seeing the somewhat comical phenomenon of established stars trying to figure out how to use TikTok as well as the teenagers do, because they're trying to get that kind of engagement there on TikTok as well.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, I've heard the topic of music, popular music, discussed and sliced and diced in a lot of different ways. And this is really a unique lens to look at it through. I appreciate you sharing your observations. I've been talking with Kelefasaneh. He is a writer for the New Yorker, former pop music critic for the New York Times, and author of the book Major A History of Popular Music in seven Genres. You'll find a link to that book in the show notes. Great, Kelefa. Thanks for coming on.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Thanks.

[Mike Carruthers]

That was great. That was so much fun. Hi, this is Jevon, your blinds.com design consultant.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Oh, wow, a real person.

[Mike Carruthers]

Yep. I'm here to help with everything from selecting the perfect window treatments to, wow.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

I've got a complicated project.

[Mike Carruthers]

No problem. I can even help schedule a professional measuring install. We can also send you samples fast and free.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

I just might have to do more.

[Mike Carruthers]

Whatever you need.

[Jill Schlesinger]

So the first room we're looking at is for shopblinds.com now and get up to 40% off with minimum purchase. Blinds.com rules and restrictions may apply.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Campfire season's back and that means s'mores. But when you're at home treating yourself, take them over ice with Duncan S'mores Cold Brew concentrate and suddenly you're open. Treating yourself the home with Duncan is where you want to be. Click or tap the banner to shop now.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Very few things are more important to you than your financial security and stability and future. Still, so many of us struggle with money. It seems we never have enough. We feel guilty when we spend it. We worry we're not saving it enough. There are so many issues with money. So perhaps what we need to do is stop and take a breath and hit the financial reset button. And here to help you do that is Jill Schlesinger. She is a certified Financial planner, an Emmy and Gracie Award winning business analyst for CBS News. And she is host of the Jill on Money podcast and radio show. She's also author of the book the Great Money Reset. Hey Jill, welcome to something you should know.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Thanks for having me.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Sure. You know, I find it so interesting that money is so central to our lives. It guides so many decisions and determines what we do or don't do. And yet so many of us struggle with it. You would think that something so important, so central to our lives that we'd be better at it, that we'd nail it. Why don't we? We?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, I mean, inertia is amazing, right? And I think that when you have like sort of the big dreamy like, oh, I wish I could do this or that or another, like another idea, making that idea or that dream a reality is really difficult because it really means that you have to do some work. And when there's work involved, our inertia will take over. So, you know, essentially to reset to a new place, you have to understand where you are today. And where you are today means you've got to actually take a good hard look. You've got to calculate what you own and what you owe and your total income and how much you're spending. And you know, frankly that regardless of how much you have, that is a very difficult part of the process. And people simply stop right there.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Yeah, well, I'd rather have root canal, I think, than sit down and figure out how much I owe. And just, it's just one of those things that it's like doing taxes. It's like nobody wants to do it.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, I guess you're right. On the other hand, think about this. When you take a good hard look, it usually means at the end of the day, even if you don't decide to reset your life, you do feel like you are more in control. So if I told you that, you know what doing your taxes or flossing your teeth might mean you have more control out off over your, your eventual outcome and your choices in the future, that you will be able to take smarter and more thoughtful and more nuanced risks in the, then maybe I could convince you to do it.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, often we hear though that the common advice is pay off your debts, put some money in the bank for a rainy day, have an emergency fund and invest in an index fund. And that's kind of the conventional financial advice that people hear.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Yeah, I mean, I'm not conventional. I guess by many measures I am not one of these people. Who thinks that paying off your mortgage is like the be all and end all? Um, you know, look, I just really believe that if you're stuck in neutral and you can't break with your existing reality, if you cannot take meaningful action, once you start thinking about all these things that you have, then you really have to kind of go into the future. And yeah, it is true that, like, the idea that many people early in their lives have scrolled away enough money so that they can reset their lives is true. But there are also people who are young in their lives and they realize I've started down a track and I don't like that track that I'm on. And that is also another kind of reset, which is I'm on a career path that I thought I liked, but maybe I don't. What are my options going forward? There is many a person who's found him or herself in that situation where you're like, well, do like these tried and true rules really hold true? Sometimes they do, but sometimes they don't. And I think that in each individual's situation, some of those rules are really important. Yeah, using low cost index funds does work. Yes. Diversification and asset allocation. It really was hard last year, but generally speaking, it pretty much works. But in the end, without going through any sort of process to think about what you want and what you have and how you're going to get there, all those rules are kind of meaningless. So. So the weird thing about a reset and why I love this topic so much is that when I talk to people, one of the things that I learn is that a lot of people have done all those things right, but emotionally they are just absolutely fearful of making a big change. And what I hope happens is that when you have the numbers in place, then you have the wherewithal emotionally to make the leap you want to make.

[Jill Schlesinger]

And so how do you compile these numbers? How does the process begin? Begin?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, I mean, it's really very boring and it's really very illuminating. So it you start with, you know, you look at your, what you own your assets, you then look at what you owe your liabilities. And I want to point out something about your assets and your liabilities or a balance sheet that's really important for all the people who prattle on about how paying off your mortgage is the most thing, important thing in the world. I'm not the hugest fan of that in every case sometimes maybe, but you know, when you're going through a transition, you might need that cash in your hands. Rather than in the payment of your home. I think that a lot of people make the mistake of they're thinking about a reset, and they find like, well, all my money's stuck in my house and I don't want to sell my house, or all my money is in a retirement account. If I wanted to pull that out now, now, there would either be a tax, maybe a penalty if I'm under the age of 59 and a half. So when you're contemplating a transition, one of the things I always stress is you might need more cash than you think to cover the expenses that you never could have predicted. So once you have that kind of basic balance sheet, what you own, what you owe, what's liquid, meaning what's accessible to you without paying a big tax or having to sell a major asset. What are you spending right now? I know you hate that part. I hear you groaning. And I'm not saying budget. I'm not saying cash flow. I know that would be a mega turnoff. But I think people who make a lot of money and a little money discount the idea on focusing on their spending or their consumption. Because when you do that, guess what you have to do? You have to look at your spending habits, and you have to look at what's really going on behind your behavior. So I don't think that you have to blow up your whole life to make a big change. In many cases, you may not have to, But I think the pandemic was an amazing lesson in consumption. You know, when I think about where we all were in the summer of 2020, we were not spending money in the same way that we had before the pandemic. We really understood what was important. And, you know, I always ask people three very specific questions about their spending. When you're spending money, you know, you ask yourself, what do I really need in my life and what do I only think I need? You know? And pandemic made you realize that, right? I need, you know, I need housing, I need a shelter, I need food. I need to help my family be safe, you know, But I thought I needed to pay for all these extra activities for myself, for my family, my kids. Those were not really needs. Those were the things I thought I needed. The second question is, do I ever find myself feeling guilty or insecure or anxious about a purchase I make? Sometimes the. If you explore that, like, why do I feel guilty about that? Maybe I'm spending for the wrong reason. Maybe I'm making a purchase because I'm worried that I'm not Keeping up with my cohort. You know, I always hear this from Gen Zers who say, you know, well, I'm a teacher and my friend's an investment banker, and I feel like I'm spending a lot of money when I'm with this crowd because it's embarrassing to say to them, like, I'm a public school teacher, I can't afford this. So you have to be careful about that. And the last question is, you know, do you find yourself making impulsive purchases? If so, when and why? And the thing is, when you start answering these questions, it can help you naturally curb the amount of money that you are spending. Spending. And that in and of itself can pave your way to a great money reset. Because honestly, if you need less money than you thought to spend, it might give you this permission structure to reset your life in a different way.

[Jill Schlesinger]

So when you. I think when people hear this, they think, well, if I take such a close look at my spending, you're sucking all the fun out of it. If I have to examine everybody, little coffee at Starbucks I buy, then, you know, life is less fun.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Is it? I mean, I don't know. Like, I would never have actually thought that to be the case. I think that maybe I look at numbers sort of analytically because that's kind of what I do. But is it less fun to know what you're actually doing and making more thoughtful choices and making better choices and being more in control? I don't know. I don't really see it that way.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, let me ask it this way, then. So maybe fun isn't the right word. So we make choices with our money and whether or not it's a good or bad choice. If everybody's going to Starbucks to get coffee or everybody's going away for the weekend, how do I make that choice to participate? I mean, save the money and do something else or go and. And have a good time?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, I mean, I'm not saying if you don't drink a latte, you're going to be a millionaire, because I don't really believe that at all. But what I believe is that if you consciously understand that I'm spending money on latte, going out to dinner, going to a concert with my friends, like, those are all fun things. I can't do that to excess because I actually also want to put money in my retirement account or I'd like to be able to do some of the fun stuff. Stuff. Maybe not all the fun stuff, because if I don't, if I do it sort of halfway, I may have more options down the line. And if I really think critically about these questions, maybe it doesn't feel like I'm robbing myself of fun. Maybe it is I'm giving myself the opportunity to make different choices down the line. I think that there are plenty of people who make a lot of money. But I think it's funny, I've talked to people who have millions of dollars, dollars and negative net worth. And the journey of all these financial questions starts with how much money spending. And if you cannot answer that question, you're really kind of flying blind.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, because this topic can feel so big and hard to get your head around, can we get real specific? Like if you got to start from the very tiniest babies step. How do you get a handle on your money?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

There are three things that you need to consider now. If you're living paycheck to paycheck, you may not be able to do this. I'll be honest. Like there are people who can't do this. But if you were having. If you're beyond living paycheck to paycheck, one is you want to fund an emergency reserve fund. You want to have 6 to 12 months of your living expenses in a safe, accessible account, a banking, savings, checking, money market, short term cd. That's where your money needs to be for your safe money. Number two, you want to pay down your consumer debt. You can pay down a credit card. You want to pay down an auto loan, you want to make sure that the student loan clock when it starts again, that you are absolutely able to actually meet your obligation and then hopefully pay it down even faster. And number three, after you've got one and two, emergency reserve consumer debt, pay down fund retirement to the best of your ability. And if you're doing all of those three things and you're still spending a bunch of money and, or you're going into debt and you're not maxing out your Roth or ira, or you are spending so much money that you don't have any emergency reserve fund, then you are putting yourself at Roth risk.

[Jill Schlesinger]

So you say the IRS is your friend. You're the only person I've ever heard say that. So what does that mean?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, the interesting thing about the IRS code is that there are so many parts of it that are geared towards people who pay attention. And the easiest thing in the world is to kind of blow this off. I get it. It's not fun. I totally understand that.

[Mike Carruthers]

But.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

But let me give you an example. So let's presume that you really want a different job. You were working in a high paid job and maybe some of that pay is going to go away if you move to something else. Well, you know, there are parts of the IRS code and that are really very friendly to people who think about them. So, you know, that could be everything from, you know, maybe I should be using a Roth ira. Maybe I should be looking at while I'm still making a bunch of money, maybe I should be thinking about how do I take advantage of that big income and fund a charitable contribution. How do I think about whether or not in my retirement or in my next phase I could do something different with, with my money that will limit or against again, make more certain what my future tax liability will be.

[Jill Schlesinger]

You know, I think just about everybody has had that wish, that dream of switching careers or changing jobs or moving to a new place or going out on their own or trying something different. And often they don't. And so what is in your view, what is the big hurdle that stops people really from, you know, taking a risk risk and following their dream?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

The biggest hurdle actually is the idea that you don't know who you are in this new world and you feel unmoored. You can think about this as I would almost call this like CEO ITIs. You know, you can talk to high functioning professional people and it doesn't matter what the profession is. You can be, be the best plumber in town, you could be the best salesperson in town. And when you are no longer that person, it can leave you feeling a little bit anxious. You know, again, using myself as an example, you know, when I was a financial advisor, when I was like the CFP in town, everyone knew that I was like, you know, dependable old Jill, money manager, financial planner, da da, da. When I went to try to become somebody in the media to talk about some of this stuff, I was a nobody. And I felt a little unsure. Like, who am I if I'm not that person? Why did I work all those years to get a cfp? Why did I build up this huge company now to have nothing, just I've sold it, I've moved on and who am I? Those are the kinds of questions that start to really hold people back back.

[Jill Schlesinger]

When people go through this reset, you know, how do you know you've done it? How do you know you've like, yeah, this was, this was great. Or is it just a continual process that you're always reevaluating where you are?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, I think for me it's been a Continual process. And it's, it's when I talk to people, what I'm trying to do is give them permission to enter the process. It's like saying, how do you know that you're finally in good shape? Shape? Well, you're in good shape for five seconds until you pull your back out and then you can't work out anymore, you know, so. And then you're back, back to square one. I think for many people, being clearer about the process is about the idea that you are now taking control of what your choices are. And you know, listen, I think that just to be this person who says you want to tell your boss to take the job and shove it and having no game plan is a terrible idea. Idea. But being a dissatisfied worker for the last 12 years of your career can really eat away at you. So if you go through the process where you say, hey, you know what, maybe I don't have to make as much money as I thought I had to make and I don't have to stay in this job that's kind of making me miserable, or maybe I don't want to be in management and make as much money. Maybe I want to go back to doing the thing I really like doing, which got me to this management role. Or maybe I'm in a position where I can take some time off and kind of downshift and have some sort of part time gig income which will make me much happier and give me more control over my work life and that will allow me to actually work longer. Then that to me is success is to go through or at least enter the process. Contemplate how you might do things differently and take advantage of the opportunities that you've created for yourself or maybe that have been placed in your lap. Look, for most of my life I have been around people who work on Wall Street. My parents, yeah, my father was a trader on the American Stock Exchange. My uncle was a trader on the New York Stock Exchange. I grew up in the New York metropolitan area where tons of my high school classmates went into big money making professions. I went into such a profession and it made me kind of miserable. And that's a scary thing. Have the courage to at least start the process, have the dialogue and imagine not just that a dream is a reality, but that you have a myriad of options. You have the ability to change your life if you have the courage to go through the process.

[Jill Schlesinger]

How do you, if you can, how do you engineer a parachute if it doesn't work?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Well, I mean, for many people it's just making sure you have like plan A, B and C. Right? All things go well, I don't have to worry about it. My middle case scenario? Well, you know, I'm going to be a moderately successful person in the media. This is me, Jill. And I'm going to have to do something else on the side. I don't know what it is. I'm going to have to write, I'm going to have to do something. This whole thing falls apart. No producer wants to put me on the air. Life looks horrible. I'll go back and be in a financial planning world, but I won't own my own company because that was the part of the job I really hated. Or I'll go get a job selling something else. You really want to map out a few different scenarios that you think could make you happier than where you are right now?

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well, you know what I like about this is I think so many people feel stuck and don't know know what it is to do to get unstuck. And you've laid out a game plan here that is fairly simple to do to at least get a sense of where you are and where you're going and how to get there. I've been talking to Jill Schlesinger. She is a certified financial planner, award winning business analyst for CBS News, and host of the Jill on Money podcast and radio show. And the name of her book is the Great Money Reset. And there is a link to that book in the show notes. Thanks, Jill. Thanks for coming on.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Hey, thanks a lot for having me. Take care.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Every pizza lover knows that pizza tastes best when it's fresh. You know that if you have leftover pizza, it's never as good the next day. Heat it in the microwave, it gets mushy. Heat it in the oven, it gets dried out. The editors of Cook's Illustrated magazine have uncovered a way that will make pizza taste almost as good as if it were fresh when you reheat it the next day. And here is the recipe. You put the cold slices on a rimmed baking sheet and cover tightly with aluminum foil. Place the baking sheet in the lowest rack of a cold oven, set the temperature to 275 and let the pizza warm up for 25 to 30 minutes. If you do it exactly as I just said, the crust will be soft, the cheese will be melty, and the toppings and the bottom will be hot. And that is something you should know. And now that this podcast is over and hopefully you enjoyed it, I hope you'll share it with your friends and let them give a listen. I'm Micah Ruthers. Thanks for listening today to something you should know. This episode is brought to you by Universal Pictures. Today's the day. From Universal Pictures and Blumhouse come a storm of terror. From the director of the Shallows.

[Mike Carruthers]

The woman in the yard.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Don't let her in.

[Mike Carruthers]

Where does she come from?

[Kelefa Sanneh]

What does she want? When will she leave?

[Mike Carruthers]

The Woman in the the Yard in theaters now.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Hello, I am Kristen Russo. And I am Jenny Owen Youngs. We are the hosts of Buffering the Vampire Slayer. Once more with spoilers, a rewatch podcast covering all 144 episodes of, you guessed it, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. We are here to humbly invite you to join us for our fifth Buffy promotion, which, if you can believe it, we are hosting at the actual Sunnydale High School. That's right. On April 4th and 5th, we will be descending upon the campus of Torrance.

[Mike Carruthers]

High School, which was the filming location.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

For Buffy's Sunnydale High, to dance the.

[Mike Carruthers]

Night away to 90s music in the.

[Kelefa Sanneh]

Iconic courtyard, to sip on punch right next to the Sunnydale High fountain, and to nerd out together in our prom best inside of the set of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. All information and tickets can be [e-mail] prom come join us.