WEBVTT - The Invisible Coach 0:00:15.276 --> 0:00:25.316 Pushkin. Welcome to season two of Against the Rules. I'm 0:00:25.356 --> 0:00:29.316 Michael Lewis. Before we get to where we're going, I 0:00:29.396 --> 0:00:31.276 want to go back for a moment to where we've 0:00:31.316 --> 0:00:37.316 been a little backstory from season one. The story involves 0:00:37.316 --> 0:00:40.436 a woman named Katie Highland. She's in her late thirties, 0:00:40.756 --> 0:00:44.036 a public school teacher, wife, mother of two small children. 0:00:44.516 --> 0:00:47.676 Her entire adult life, she'd been made miserable by student 0:00:47.756 --> 0:00:50.156 loans she'd taken out when she was eighteen years old. 0:00:50.476 --> 0:00:53.316 I don't see any payoff, and it just keeps getting 0:00:53.316 --> 0:00:59.716 harder and harder, and that's soul crushing her state of mind. Well, 0:00:59.756 --> 0:01:02.796 even her children could see it wasn't good. It might 0:01:02.836 --> 0:01:07.156 be actually kind of painful for her, because all of 0:01:07.196 --> 0:01:12.996 this counts with a bell and getting something changed to 0:01:13.076 --> 0:01:17.796 another thing that's the same, but changing to it. I 0:01:17.876 --> 0:01:23.516 love you if you well, it does feel kind of painful, 0:01:23.596 --> 0:01:26.676 right mommy. Yeah. A lot of the papers, Yeah there, 0:01:26.836 --> 0:01:28.676 it's a lot of paperwork. It's a lot of and 0:01:28.756 --> 0:01:34.236 a lot of pain. Yea for doing it. This killed 0:01:34.236 --> 0:01:40.236 me to hear, but especially this next part. It is 0:01:40.596 --> 0:01:45.796 very good to be thoughtful for everybody, but the person 0:01:46.156 --> 0:01:51.636 who's the most best person on earth is this lady 0:01:51.756 --> 0:01:58.156 right there, This lady Jackson's mom, Katie Highland, shouldn't have 0:01:58.196 --> 0:02:01.836 owed anybody a dime. That was the point of the story. 0:02:02.236 --> 0:02:05.716 Katie had qualified years ago for a program that Congress 0:02:05.756 --> 0:02:09.436 created to forgive the student loans of public servants, but 0:02:09.516 --> 0:02:12.236 her student loan servicer made money offer only as long 0:02:12.276 --> 0:02:14.516 as she still owed the money, and they had more 0:02:14.596 --> 0:02:16.916 or less tricked her to keep her in debt. I 0:02:17.036 --> 0:02:19.116 like to try to always find the good in people, 0:02:19.236 --> 0:02:22.956 and when you have experiences like my experience, you get 0:02:22.996 --> 0:02:25.916 discouraged and you start to think that people aren't as 0:02:25.956 --> 0:02:34.876 good as you once thought they were. Sometimes you stumble 0:02:34.916 --> 0:02:36.756 onto a story and you can't get it out of 0:02:36.756 --> 0:02:40.316 your head. Katie Hyland had played by the rules, made 0:02:40.316 --> 0:02:43.396 all her loan payments, thrown herself into being a good 0:02:43.396 --> 0:02:46.276 mother and a great teacher, and she'd been abused by 0:02:46.276 --> 0:02:48.876 the company that was meant to help her navigate her finances, 0:02:51.996 --> 0:02:55.836 and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the one financial referee 0:02:55.876 --> 0:02:57.876 that might have stepped in to help her, was doing 0:02:57.956 --> 0:03:01.556 nothing to help. So we decided to help on the 0:03:01.596 --> 0:03:04.956 website go fund me to try to pay off Katie's 0:03:04.956 --> 0:03:10.956 student loans. When I looked at the page and I 0:03:10.956 --> 0:03:13.036 think I saw at that time that it was like 0:03:13.076 --> 0:03:16.916 eleven thousand dollars. I was completely blown away. I was 0:03:16.916 --> 0:03:19.276 at my son's baseball game. I remember I showed my mom. 0:03:20.076 --> 0:03:23.716 We were like freaking out about it and just reading 0:03:23.756 --> 0:03:29.436 people's responses and the encouraging words and like where people 0:03:29.476 --> 0:03:33.396 were from. There were people from Ireland, there were people 0:03:33.396 --> 0:03:36.756 from England. We started this campaign two months after the 0:03:36.756 --> 0:03:40.276 show originally aired, so after most people had listened to it. 0:03:40.636 --> 0:03:43.596 Even then, it took you our listeners less than three 0:03:43.636 --> 0:03:47.276 months to pay off fifty thousand dollars, and I think 0:03:47.316 --> 0:03:51.076 the last person that donated donated like enough to like 0:03:51.196 --> 0:03:52.876 hit it. And it was just so I was like, 0:03:52.876 --> 0:03:56.356 oh my god, Mom, like it happened. We did it, 0:03:56.676 --> 0:03:58.356 and I can't even tell it's because you said to 0:03:58.356 --> 0:04:00.316 me in one email, like just pay it forward or 0:04:00.476 --> 0:04:02.436 just do it for someone else. And every go fund 0:04:02.436 --> 0:04:04.596 made campaign that I see, I make it a point 0:04:04.716 --> 0:04:07.956 to do the same, even if it's ten twenty whatever 0:04:08.036 --> 0:04:10.476 I can do that. Don't you dare go get into 0:04:10.556 --> 0:04:16.596 debt again. I thought that would be the end of 0:04:16.596 --> 0:04:18.676 the story, but there was a lot more to it. 0:04:19.916 --> 0:04:22.356 Of course there was more to it. I mean, Katie 0:04:22.356 --> 0:04:24.516 had told us that financial stress had caused her to 0:04:24.516 --> 0:04:27.196 grind her teeth at night, and she started losing her teeth. 0:04:27.596 --> 0:04:31.036 She used to smile all the time, Now she avoided smiling, 0:04:31.596 --> 0:04:35.396 and along the way she'd picked up another debt problem. Already, 0:04:35.396 --> 0:04:37.596 I'm on a payment plan with a dentist like five 0:04:37.676 --> 0:04:40.236 hundred dollars a week. I've spent like thirty thousand dollars. 0:04:40.276 --> 0:04:43.276 I've lost a bunch of teeth through the grinding and 0:04:43.876 --> 0:04:46.796 all of that. That part has been really difficult. So 0:04:46.836 --> 0:04:49.156 I still have a lot, you know, remaining with that. 0:04:49.276 --> 0:04:50.796 It's still a lot to pay off, still a lot 0:04:50.836 --> 0:04:53.356 of dental work to get done. So you do have 0:04:53.436 --> 0:04:56.636 credit card debt? Yeah, I have credit card. Any big 0:04:56.636 --> 0:04:59.916 purchases that I've had to make, I've put on credit cards. 0:05:00.716 --> 0:05:02.956 Unless you're a very lucky kind of American, you may 0:05:02.996 --> 0:05:06.636 recognize yourself here. You try to do prudent things to 0:05:06.676 --> 0:05:09.476 save money, well, like drop the vision card ridge on 0:05:09.476 --> 0:05:14.636 your health insurance. Then suddenly your daughter needs glasses. That 0:05:14.756 --> 0:05:16.716 was the kind of thing that Katie and her husband 0:05:16.716 --> 0:05:19.676 did that wound up biting them. They now have five 0:05:19.756 --> 0:05:23.356 credit cards between them, all charging high interest rates, even 0:05:23.396 --> 0:05:26.956 though their credit score is great. Personally, I just want 0:05:26.956 --> 0:05:29.316 to not be scared to look at my bank account. 0:05:29.356 --> 0:05:31.556 I don't think I've looked at my bank account in years, 0:05:32.196 --> 0:05:35.156 to be honest. I just, yeah, that's not a good 0:05:35.236 --> 0:05:38.996 I know that's not healthy, but I don't know why. 0:05:38.756 --> 0:05:42.076 It's just like terrifies me. I'm I'm not sure why. 0:05:42.876 --> 0:05:45.516 The credit card industry already had her by the throat. 0:05:45.996 --> 0:05:48.836 She was ashamed of it, and she had no sense 0:05:48.916 --> 0:05:55.476 that anyone would help this time. Well, so here's my goal. 0:05:55.556 --> 0:05:57.396 My goal season one, the goal was to get rid 0:05:57.436 --> 0:05:59.596 of your student debt. In season two as they restore 0:05:59.636 --> 0:06:03.036 your smile. So that's what we're gonna try to do, 0:06:03.236 --> 0:06:10.876 all right, Okay, thanks Michael. I'm Michael Lewis, and this 0:06:11.196 --> 0:06:16.636 is against the rules. Last season was about referees, the 0:06:16.676 --> 0:06:20.636 attack on our societies, WHEREFS is obviously a big problem. 0:06:20.676 --> 0:06:24.356 This season is about coaches. Yeah, what are you doing 0:06:24.916 --> 0:06:27.956 and their rise in American life? You need to stop 0:06:28.036 --> 0:06:30.076 being a lazy piece of shit and work for your 0:06:30.076 --> 0:06:32.836 picture or I'm going to kick your ass. Got it. 0:06:32.836 --> 0:06:36.116 It wasn't that long ago the coaches were confined to sports. 0:06:36.796 --> 0:06:39.156 Now they're everywhere. We're going to refocus like we're training 0:06:39.156 --> 0:06:41.796 a puppy, if we're going to train your mind like 0:06:42.036 --> 0:06:44.676 we train a puppy. They're people who call themselves life 0:06:44.676 --> 0:06:47.436 coaches and other people who call themselves death coaches. I 0:06:47.476 --> 0:06:50.676 am here to guide you and making sure you grow 0:06:50.716 --> 0:06:53.916 as a person. Every big time corporate boss has an 0:06:53.956 --> 0:06:57.116 executive coach, but now so do new nbas starting out 0:06:57.116 --> 0:07:00.196 at Wall Street banks and consulting firms. These are super 0:07:00.276 --> 0:07:04.396 smart people who maybe just haven't heard the right strategies. 0:07:04.476 --> 0:07:06.996 You can hire a coach to improve your online dating 0:07:07.036 --> 0:07:11.476 performance or your career. It's a saying which is therapy 0:07:11.556 --> 0:07:13.796 is a path of tears and coaching is the path 0:07:13.876 --> 0:07:17.116 of lafta. And that's all great, but coaching is also 0:07:17.196 --> 0:07:20.916 becoming an odd source of unfairness. Just look around and 0:07:20.996 --> 0:07:23.956 ask yourself who gets good coaching and who doesn't. That 0:07:24.116 --> 0:07:26.356 guy would never have gotten into Yale, but this guy 0:07:26.396 --> 0:07:28.796 who got all this coaching did get into Yale. It 0:07:28.836 --> 0:07:31.116 just seems like anyone who can answer these questions has 0:07:31.116 --> 0:07:34.596 got to be coached. Oh my god, we're loving this 0:07:34.756 --> 0:07:50.196 fucking team. Rice money is a great place to ask 0:07:50.236 --> 0:07:53.676 this question about coaching and fairness. But first you have 0:07:53.716 --> 0:07:56.796 to stop thinking of finance as a business and start 0:07:56.876 --> 0:08:00.236 thinking of it as a competitive sport. When eighteen year 0:08:00.276 --> 0:08:03.436 old Katie Highland took out her student loans and twenty 0:08:03.516 --> 0:08:06.596 something year old Katie started using credit cards, she was 0:08:06.636 --> 0:08:09.596 basically walking into an arena alone with a target on 0:08:09.636 --> 0:08:13.036 her back. The giant company should be facing off against 0:08:13.116 --> 0:08:15.596 knew more about her game than she did. That's how 0:08:15.636 --> 0:08:19.476 they made their money from her weaknesses. You can always 0:08:19.676 --> 0:08:27.476 make more money exploiting people's irrationalities then you can by 0:08:27.876 --> 0:08:32.156 fixing them. Richard Taylor winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics. 0:08:32.196 --> 0:08:34.756 He spent his career trying to understand the ways that 0:08:34.796 --> 0:08:37.836 people don't act in their own self interest. And one 0:08:37.876 --> 0:08:41.036 big thing his work suggests is that ordinary people need 0:08:41.116 --> 0:08:45.076 coaching far more than they know. Let's think about the 0:08:45.116 --> 0:08:50.396 people who get the most coaching. Well, professional athletes would 0:08:50.396 --> 0:08:55.076 be one. Take Roger Federer. He's probably got ten guys, 0:08:55.876 --> 0:09:02.396 coaches and physical trainers. So here's Roger feder one of 0:09:02.436 --> 0:09:05.996 the greatest athletes in the world, and he has ten coaches. 0:09:06.996 --> 0:09:14.076 Who else? Actors Meryl Streep has a director helping her 0:09:14.276 --> 0:09:18.956 act now, God knows, Yeah, she doesn't need it, right, 0:09:19.116 --> 0:09:23.076 Brad Pitt, You know, does he really need help? But 0:09:23.356 --> 0:09:27.996 the richest, best performing people in the world have the 0:09:28.076 --> 0:09:34.796 most coaching. And who's coaching the uber driver on what 0:09:34.996 --> 0:09:39.156 hours to drive and when you should go to the 0:09:39.196 --> 0:09:42.316 airport and if you get a ride to the airport, 0:09:42.996 --> 0:09:48.556 should you wait in line or immediately leave? So coaching 0:09:48.636 --> 0:09:51.236 just ends up making the rich richer. Yeah, it's one 0:09:51.276 --> 0:09:56.156 of the many factors that contribute to this curve. We've 0:09:56.236 --> 0:10:01.636 all seen about the one percent or the point or 0:10:01.716 --> 0:10:07.036 one percent share of the economy. No one's coaching the 0:10:07.156 --> 0:10:09.716 tens of millions of Americans on the wrong end of 0:10:09.756 --> 0:10:15.996 consumer finance. No one even seems interested. I've tried, unsuccessfully 0:10:16.036 --> 0:10:19.036 to get somebody to create what I call the good bank. 0:10:22.596 --> 0:10:26.396 With this good bank look like, well, so it would 0:10:26.436 --> 0:10:31.756 warn you when you're about to overdraw your credit card, 0:10:32.956 --> 0:10:36.516 rather than wait until the end of the day when 0:10:36.556 --> 0:10:40.396 you've swiped five times and they charge you twenty five 0:10:40.516 --> 0:10:44.276 dollars penalty for each swipe, twenty five bucks a swipe. 0:10:44.436 --> 0:10:47.596 It's supposed to scare you from overdrawing your account, but 0:10:47.716 --> 0:10:51.316 you only get the warning after it's too late. I mean, 0:10:51.356 --> 0:10:53.556 there's a reason for this. It's a subtle form of 0:10:53.556 --> 0:10:56.196 coaching that makes the banks a lot of money. No, 0:10:56.356 --> 0:10:59.636 the problem is people pay bad coaches and not good coaches. Right, 0:11:00.516 --> 0:11:03.956 it's another thing, and they pay because they don't see 0:11:03.956 --> 0:11:07.076 the charge. Right. Trip to bad coaching is never show 0:11:07.156 --> 0:11:09.956 the bill, Yeah, exactly. The problem good coaching is you 0:11:09.996 --> 0:11:13.156 have to share the bill. It goes something like this, right, So, 0:11:13.196 --> 0:11:15.516 at the start of the month, you're paid your paycheck. 0:11:15.796 --> 0:11:19.916 This is angela strange venture capitalists and kindoisseur of how 0:11:19.956 --> 0:11:22.996 the financial sector exploits human nature. And so you send 0:11:22.996 --> 0:11:25.636 your rent check out and you don't see in your 0:11:25.636 --> 0:11:28.596 bank account that check is cleared, probably for a few days. 0:11:28.676 --> 0:11:30.836 You pay a bunch of other bills. You know that 0:11:30.836 --> 0:11:33.916 those are gonna hit as costs in your bank account, 0:11:33.956 --> 0:11:36.836 but that also hasn't cleared. Now you're like, well, can 0:11:36.876 --> 0:11:40.156 I pay this bill? I think so, But you're doing 0:11:40.236 --> 0:11:43.356 some mental math around the checks that you have in 0:11:43.396 --> 0:11:46.396 the air, like you just don't have a sense of 0:11:46.436 --> 0:11:49.956 what is your real time cash position. And then, oh, 0:11:49.956 --> 0:11:52.196 by the way, if you screw it up, it's a 0:11:52.276 --> 0:11:55.556 thirty five dollars overdraft feach time. Right, there were thirty 0:11:55.556 --> 0:11:58.836 four billion dollars in overdraft fees paid last year, again 0:11:58.956 --> 0:12:02.796 reofiting from people screwing up. It's huge, it's huge. It's huge. Wait, wait, 0:12:02.876 --> 0:12:06.636 thirty four billion dollars in overdraft fees yep is the 0:12:06.676 --> 0:12:10.036 typical penalty thirty five bucks. Yeah, it's clem up. It 0:12:10.156 --> 0:12:12.876 used to be twenty five about ten years ago. So 0:12:13.316 --> 0:12:15.636 that means that there are a billion instances of this 0:12:15.676 --> 0:12:18.836 a year, yes, and they tend to be concentrated where 0:12:18.876 --> 0:12:21.676 the people they get hit with overdraft get hit a lot. 0:12:22.356 --> 0:12:25.556 Thirty four billion dollars in overdraft fees is really just 0:12:25.676 --> 0:12:28.556 the start. There's more than one hundred billion in credit 0:12:28.556 --> 0:12:31.836 card late payment fees and interest charged each year. And 0:12:31.876 --> 0:12:35.196 then there's the entire credit card industry, which thrives on 0:12:35.236 --> 0:12:38.636 the mistakes people make playing the money game. There is 0:12:38.756 --> 0:12:42.316 now over one trillion dollars of credit card debt in 0:12:42.316 --> 0:12:45.156 the US. People who have this debt it's been about 0:12:45.156 --> 0:12:47.636 fifteen thousand dollars. They tend to have it across three 0:12:47.636 --> 0:12:50.196 to four different cards. So let's say you're like, Okay, 0:12:50.356 --> 0:12:51.716 I don't want to be in credit card debt. I 0:12:51.716 --> 0:12:53.916 need to get out of credit card debt just going 0:12:53.956 --> 0:12:57.476 through what is that process? You have debt across three 0:12:57.516 --> 0:13:01.156 to four different cards. They likely charge different rates, they 0:13:01.156 --> 0:13:04.116 have different due dates. So do you pay off the 0:13:04.236 --> 0:13:06.396 highest rate card first? Oh? By the way, like what 0:13:06.516 --> 0:13:09.716 is the highest rate card? It's just a very complicated 0:13:09.796 --> 0:13:13.356 mess to get your way out of. Angela wondered why 0:13:13.396 --> 0:13:15.476 no one had tried to help people who had gotten 0:13:15.516 --> 0:13:18.636 into this mess. Why no one had, say, tried to 0:13:18.676 --> 0:13:21.796 create a money coaching business, the same way that Richard 0:13:21.796 --> 0:13:24.076 Thaylor wondered, why no one had even tried to create 0:13:24.076 --> 0:13:27.756 a good bank. Then she realized the sort of people 0:13:27.796 --> 0:13:30.836 with the ability to coach other people about money, or 0:13:30.836 --> 0:13:33.556 to finance a company to coach other people about money. 0:13:34.156 --> 0:13:38.196 Those people already had money. People who didn't have money 0:13:38.396 --> 0:13:41.436 were like Martians to them. Like your investment banker is 0:13:41.516 --> 0:13:44.556 not the person who grew up on food stamps, right, 0:13:44.716 --> 0:13:46.796 And he's not the person who's got five different credit 0:13:46.836 --> 0:13:49.316 cards maxed out and is paying thirty percent interest rate 0:13:49.356 --> 0:13:54.516 to some bank. Another problem Angela saw trust Americans had 0:13:54.556 --> 0:13:56.916 been screwed by consumer finance for so long that they 0:13:56.916 --> 0:13:59.396 were likely to be wary when some companies sprung up 0:13:59.756 --> 0:14:01.916 claiming it was actually going to be on their side, 0:14:02.396 --> 0:14:05.196 like it takes time as an athlete or as anything 0:14:05.276 --> 0:14:08.196 to build trust with your coach, until they'll start by 0:14:08.196 --> 0:14:11.116 making these suggestions and you might follow them, you might 0:14:11.156 --> 0:14:12.556 not follow them. And you know, if they're a good 0:14:12.596 --> 0:14:15.356 coach and they know you really well, then you'll notice 0:14:15.356 --> 0:14:17.876 that over time, as you take more of their suggestions, 0:14:17.916 --> 0:14:27.396 you tend to perform better. The explosion of coaching, it's 0:14:27.436 --> 0:14:30.756 related to the war on referees. It's what happens when 0:14:30.836 --> 0:14:34.196 more and more of life feels like a brutal competitive sport. 0:14:34.836 --> 0:14:37.636 The scarier it is to lose, the more people scramble 0:14:37.716 --> 0:14:41.716 to find an edge. That's what a coach offers, an edge. 0:14:43.036 --> 0:14:46.556 Angela Strange had noticed an absence, just as Richard Taylor 0:14:46.596 --> 0:14:49.556 had noticed an absence of a coach who really should 0:14:49.636 --> 0:14:53.916 exist in the middle of American financial life. Both were 0:14:53.956 --> 0:15:11.676 waiting for whom or what they did not know. In 0:15:11.756 --> 0:15:14.316 the Year of Our Lord nineteen seventy nine, in the 0:15:14.356 --> 0:15:18.276 Mountains of Colorado, a woman gives birth out of wedlock 0:15:18.636 --> 0:15:22.196 to a boy, Jason. She names him. The mom's name 0:15:22.236 --> 0:15:25.596 is Christina Brown. She's a fundamentalist Christian and takes the 0:15:25.636 --> 0:15:28.796 Bible as the literal truth. She doesn't know how she's 0:15:28.836 --> 0:15:30.636 going to make ends meet, but she knows what she 0:15:30.716 --> 0:15:33.916 wants for her child. She wants him to be well educated. 0:15:34.236 --> 0:15:39.756 To make sure that happens, she'll educate him herself. When 0:15:39.796 --> 0:15:44.316 we were studying the health unit, I had Jason cleaned 0:15:44.316 --> 0:15:46.716 the floor on his hands and knees with an extra 0:15:46.796 --> 0:15:49.796 fifty pound backpack on his back, so that he would 0:15:49.796 --> 0:15:53.396 know what it would be like to be overweight. That's Christina. 0:15:53.516 --> 0:15:55.396 She didn't want her son to be taught what was 0:15:55.436 --> 0:15:59.076 taught in schools, the theory of evolution, for instance, but 0:15:59.276 --> 0:16:01.236 mostly she just thought she could teach him better than 0:16:01.236 --> 0:16:03.516 any school could. It was like, hey, Jason, what do 0:16:03.516 --> 0:16:05.956 you want to learn? The world is your classroom. You 0:16:05.956 --> 0:16:08.996 can go learn anything you want. That's Jason Brown, all 0:16:09.196 --> 0:16:12.276 grown up now. And you know there's one time in particular, 0:16:12.316 --> 0:16:14.036 I remember she's like, what do you want to learn? 0:16:14.076 --> 0:16:16.956 And I said, I want to learn about taxidermy, and 0:16:16.996 --> 0:16:19.596 she said, okay, fine. She goes through the Yellow Pages. 0:16:19.636 --> 0:16:21.436 This was in the time where he had Yellow Pages, 0:16:21.476 --> 0:16:25.556 and she calls all the taxidermists and convinces that some 0:16:25.636 --> 0:16:28.156 guy who owns a taxidermy shop to let us go 0:16:28.556 --> 0:16:31.596 camp out in his workplace for a week, and we 0:16:31.596 --> 0:16:33.756 would show up there and he would he would show 0:16:33.796 --> 0:16:36.036 us how he would take these animals and you know, 0:16:36.116 --> 0:16:38.276 end up stuffing them and turning them into things that 0:16:38.316 --> 0:16:41.116 could go on people's walls. And what was really cool 0:16:41.276 --> 0:16:43.476 is you know, I learned about biology. I learned about 0:16:43.516 --> 0:16:46.436 the anatomy of animals. He taught us about the chemicals 0:16:46.476 --> 0:16:48.556 that were used. And then I would ask a lot 0:16:48.556 --> 0:16:51.076 of questions about just the business of taxidermy, like how 0:16:51.156 --> 0:16:52.956 much do you all these chemicals cost? How much do 0:16:53.076 --> 0:16:54.396 you pay for this thing? What do you sell it 0:16:54.436 --> 0:16:58.036 for the education of Jason Brown wasn't normal. It was 0:16:58.156 --> 0:17:02.316 kinetic hands on. His mother encouraged him to ask questions, 0:17:02.916 --> 0:17:04.956 but at the same time, he lived in a very 0:17:05.036 --> 0:17:10.716 small world. It was just turn him and his little brother. 0:17:11.676 --> 0:17:13.836 Maybe because he was so dependent on his mom, he 0:17:13.956 --> 0:17:16.716 worried about her. Even as a little kid. He could 0:17:16.716 --> 0:17:20.476 see that she was exposed and vulnerable, especially when it 0:17:20.516 --> 0:17:25.316 came to money. My money was in envelopes, and each 0:17:25.516 --> 0:17:29.276 envelope had a different designation and when the money was gone, 0:17:29.276 --> 0:17:32.876 it was gone. What would have been the envelopes designations? Okay, 0:17:33.436 --> 0:17:37.316 the first envelope was my tithe, then it was rent, 0:17:37.636 --> 0:17:45.956 then it was groceries, miscellaneous electric gas, and you paid 0:17:45.996 --> 0:17:51.836 in that order. That's right. We literally, and I'm not exaggerating, 0:17:51.876 --> 0:17:54.676 eight beans and rice. Pretty much every day. I ground 0:17:54.716 --> 0:17:57.276 my own wheat, made my own whole wheatbread, made my 0:17:57.316 --> 0:18:01.916 own tortillas, made cereal in the crock pot for breakfast, 0:18:02.036 --> 0:18:05.036 and we had peanut butter on toast. We ate very simply. 0:18:05.516 --> 0:18:10.636 We shopped at Goodwill, even for a Christmas gift's birthday gifts. 0:18:12.756 --> 0:18:16.436 Sometimes Jason snuck a peek inside the money envelopes. A 0:18:16.476 --> 0:18:18.716 lot of the time they were totally empty. Yet, even 0:18:18.756 --> 0:18:21.716 when she had no money, his mother insisted on staying 0:18:21.756 --> 0:18:24.796 home and teaching him and his brother. By the time 0:18:24.836 --> 0:18:27.436 he was ten years old, Jason was fully aware that 0:18:27.476 --> 0:18:31.396 his mother was running huge risks. They were totally on 0:18:31.436 --> 0:18:35.356 their own. There was no safety net. The most trivial 0:18:35.356 --> 0:18:38.516 events could disrupt their lives. So we had this friend, 0:18:38.596 --> 0:18:41.676 his name was Donnie. He's a big kid, and he 0:18:41.716 --> 0:18:43.916 came over to the house and spent the weekend or 0:18:43.916 --> 0:18:46.636 something like that, and Donnie ate a lot, and he 0:18:46.876 --> 0:18:51.116 really really liked milk too. And I remember specifically in 0:18:51.156 --> 0:18:53.996 the kitchen and Donnie was just pounding the milk and 0:18:54.156 --> 0:18:56.916 he finished the milk, and I remember looking at my 0:18:56.996 --> 0:18:59.996 mom and she looked at me, and I could just 0:19:00.356 --> 0:19:05.036 see the dread and fear on her face because Donnie 0:19:05.076 --> 0:19:07.596 drank all the milk. Donnie drank an envelope. Yeah, he 0:19:07.756 --> 0:19:10.876 drank an envelope, and just like because I knew that 0:19:10.996 --> 0:19:15.636 the envelope for food was already used up. And you know, 0:19:15.676 --> 0:19:17.356 I could see in her eyes like, hey, what are 0:19:17.356 --> 0:19:19.396 we gonna do? Like we can't go on buy more mode, 0:19:19.436 --> 0:19:26.516 Like that's it. So they went without milk. Another memory 0:19:26.596 --> 0:19:28.476 is the day Jason's mom told him that she needed 0:19:28.516 --> 0:19:30.996 to take on a second job and it'd have to 0:19:31.036 --> 0:19:34.196 go to a real school. He was in the eighth grade. 0:19:34.356 --> 0:19:37.636 The real school was hellish. Other kids made fun of him. 0:19:37.756 --> 0:19:39.316 One day, a kid just walked up to him and 0:19:39.356 --> 0:19:41.476 punched him in the face, and no one did anything 0:19:41.556 --> 0:19:45.036 about it. Jason felt totally loved by his mom, and 0:19:45.116 --> 0:19:48.596 he loved her back. She'd given him real strengths. He 0:19:48.676 --> 0:19:52.116 knew how to learn to teach himself, but she'd also 0:19:52.196 --> 0:19:56.556 left him with a fear of money, of being one 0:19:56.596 --> 0:20:00.716 accident away from disaster. His mother couldn't afford for him 0:20:00.756 --> 0:20:03.236 to fall off his bike and break his wrist, much 0:20:03.316 --> 0:20:05.876 less pay for him to go to college. He went 0:20:05.916 --> 0:20:09.756 to the University of Colorado anyway. To pay for he 0:20:09.796 --> 0:20:12.796 took out student loans, but the moment he did that, 0:20:13.116 --> 0:20:16.676 he felt exposed and vulnerable like his mom. He was 0:20:16.716 --> 0:20:22.236 eighteen years old. I would drive home every single weekend 0:20:22.716 --> 0:20:25.556 starting in January, and I would go home to my 0:20:25.716 --> 0:20:28.236 hometown where I grew up, and it was about two 0:20:28.236 --> 0:20:29.956 to two and a half hour drive, and I would 0:20:29.956 --> 0:20:33.396 spend the weekend knocking on doors, handing out flyers, say hey, 0:20:33.396 --> 0:20:35.876 would you hire me to paint your house. Jason had 0:20:35.916 --> 0:20:38.036 never painted a house, but then there was a time 0:20:38.076 --> 0:20:39.916 when he didn't know how to stuff an animal, and 0:20:39.956 --> 0:20:41.956 he'd figured out how to do that. And there's just 0:20:42.076 --> 0:20:44.116 you know, there's six feet of snow outside, and this 0:20:44.236 --> 0:20:46.516 kid is trying to convince you to paint his house. 0:20:46.556 --> 0:20:49.356 And they're like, number one, come back to me in 0:20:49.396 --> 0:20:51.636 the summer. Number two, how many houses have you paint out? Like? 0:20:51.636 --> 0:20:53.796 I've never painted a house in my life. But I 0:20:53.876 --> 0:20:55.716 promise I'm going to hire people who do know how 0:20:55.756 --> 0:20:58.476 to paint their house. Maybe the oddest thing about Jason 0:20:58.556 --> 0:21:00.876 Brown is he found nothing odd about any of this. 0:21:01.476 --> 0:21:05.116 An eighteen year old convincing grown ups in the snow 0:21:05.516 --> 0:21:08.476 to trust him with their homes. So I brought snowshoes, 0:21:08.796 --> 0:21:10.076 and I would have a pair for me and a 0:21:10.116 --> 0:21:11.916 pair for them. And now I knew as long as 0:21:11.916 --> 0:21:14.276 I could convince the homeowner to put on their shoes 0:21:14.316 --> 0:21:15.876 and coat and go around the house with me and 0:21:15.916 --> 0:21:18.116 snow shoes, that they would then by the end of 0:21:18.156 --> 0:21:22.596 that have a pretty good chance of hiring me. He 0:21:22.676 --> 0:21:24.636 was still a kid, but pretty soon this wasn't a 0:21:24.716 --> 0:21:28.156 kid's business. The crazy thing is, by the end of 0:21:28.196 --> 0:21:31.476 the summer, I had painted something like forty or fifty homes, 0:21:31.876 --> 0:21:35.036 and I had I think fifteen or twenty employees, and 0:21:35.236 --> 0:21:37.916 I actually put fifty thousand dollars in my pocket for 0:21:38.076 --> 0:21:41.756 one summer. Really, you cleared fifty one hundred and fifty 0:21:41.756 --> 0:21:44.396 thousand dollars a total revenue, And it was fifty thousand 0:21:44.396 --> 0:21:48.356 dollars nut to me. He wasn't done. After Jason's first 0:21:48.436 --> 0:21:50.596 year in college, he set out to grow his business. 0:21:51.236 --> 0:21:54.916 Rural Colorado wasn't a great market. There weren't that many houses. 0:21:55.196 --> 0:21:57.476 The weather was hard on paint, but not as hard 0:21:57.516 --> 0:21:59.996 as it was in other places. He decided to find 0:22:00.036 --> 0:22:04.436 a better market, and so I transferred to Boston University. 0:22:04.556 --> 0:22:07.636 And by the time wait, wait, you transferred to Boston 0:22:07.716 --> 0:22:12.396 University specifically to pursue the business of painting houses, I did, yes, 0:22:12.396 --> 0:22:14.436 Because you'd based so much money in painting houses. I didn't. 0:22:14.476 --> 0:22:15.636 I was like, I was like, you weren't even in 0:22:15.676 --> 0:22:17.636 the right place to paint house exactly. To pick your 0:22:17.636 --> 0:22:19.956 school based on where there'd be the most houses to paint, 0:22:20.076 --> 0:22:23.876 you got it exactly. At BU Jason ran his painting 0:22:23.916 --> 0:22:27.636 business from his laptop at the back of classrooms, prepping 0:22:27.676 --> 0:22:29.676 for the big season in the summer. When we were 0:22:29.676 --> 0:22:31.916 painting all the houses, it was about four hundred employees, 0:22:32.276 --> 0:22:35.116 and I think in the year that I sold the company, 0:22:35.156 --> 0:22:37.396 we were doing about three million dollars a total revenue. 0:22:37.716 --> 0:22:39.716 I don't remember the exact amount that I made from 0:22:39.716 --> 0:22:41.676 all that. A couple questions one, are you at any 0:22:41.676 --> 0:22:44.956 point are you conscious that you're being driven by having 0:22:44.956 --> 0:22:47.116 grown up in an environment where money was so scarce. 0:22:47.476 --> 0:22:49.956 I did so when I was I think I think 0:22:49.956 --> 0:22:53.956 I was probably about ten. I really loved avocados, and 0:22:55.076 --> 0:22:57.036 you know, money was so tight in our household. We'd 0:22:57.036 --> 0:22:58.796 go to the grocery store. I'm like, Mom, can I 0:22:58.796 --> 0:23:01.356 have amocados? She's like, I'm sorry, they're too expensive. Every 0:23:01.396 --> 0:23:02.956 now and then we would get when it was a treat, 0:23:03.156 --> 0:23:06.996 and I remember just savoring every bite of that buttery avocado, 0:23:07.436 --> 0:23:09.956 and I in my mind mid I said, I will 0:23:09.996 --> 0:23:12.836 be rich enough one day to eat as many avocados 0:23:12.876 --> 0:23:15.516 as I want. And still to this day, I eat 0:23:15.556 --> 0:23:18.796 an avocado almost every single day, And not a single 0:23:18.796 --> 0:23:20.756 time do I ever opened an avocado and not feel it. 0:23:20.876 --> 0:23:24.316