Latest / The Wes Carroll Morning Show / It's Not Greed, It's Envy

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It's Not Greed, It's Envy · The Wes Carroll Morning Show

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The news, opinions, commentary, and interviews. You need to start your
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day when you're listening to the West Carrol Morning Show. Thursday morning, twenty
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second day of February. I'm west Thanks for joining me. These short weeks
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are always weird. All of a sudden, it's Thursday. Doesn't feel like
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Thursday, but it's Thursday. Here we are. I went yesterday to the
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store. There were a couple of things that I needed. First and foremost,
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I needed some juice because Jill likes juice in the mornings. She likes
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orange juice in the mornings. We'd run out of orange juice and she told
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me it can wait. I can wait a couple days, no big rush.
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But I wanted Jill to have her juice right. It's just that's what
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I do. If I can do it, I do it right. Get
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her herd juice. That's what I wanted to do, so she'd have it
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this morning. So that was the main thing. But I also oh needed
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to get a couple of other things. And because of the nature of the
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other things that led me into Walmart. I'm not one of those Walmart snobs.
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I'm also not the you know, diehard Walmart fan, loyalist or anything.
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I'm just a person who says, hey, there's benefit in Walmart,
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and I can get things for cheap, and I can go in there and
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I can buy juice, and I can buy, you know, the bulb
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for the headlight of my truck. I can do that. Say I've got
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an old truck. I've got one of those trucks where you don't replace the
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entire headlight piece for you know, fifteen hundred dollars. You can still just
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go buy the bulb for eight dollars. Okay, that's important to where I'm
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going with all of this. But you can buy both of those things in
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the same store, you know, And you can also buy something for your
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pet. While you're in the same store. You can buy fertilizer for your
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lawn, all in one place. It's what's great about it. Then you
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can go buy a video game if you want, and then get a prescription
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filled. You know how Walmart works. It's a benefit, right. I
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understand that there are people who hate it because, oh my gosh, they
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ran a bunch of small businesses out and local businesses, and I get that
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too. I absolutely understand that we're currently in an economy where a place like
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Walmart is helping a lot of people function. ALDI is helping a lot of
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people function. They just are just the reality. I have a system that
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I do for my grocery shopping typically, and I go, you know,
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in this order, Aldi, Walmart Publics. That's where I go. That's
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my order of things. If I can't get it at one, I go
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to the next one, and then I go to the next one. But
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often at Walmart that's when I can take care of some of those other things
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I need to stop and buy some over the counter medicine. That's where I
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usually get it. No, I don't go to CVS and pay more for
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it. I don't do that unless you catch it on sale, right,
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So, and no offense to CVS. I certainly go to them when I
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need to. They're just not in my routine for the normal weekly shopping.
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So on this particular occasion, I went into Walmart and there were a few
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things I needed. I need a couple of things for my car, something
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for my truck, and some juice for my bride. That's what I needed.
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That's where I went. So I go into Walmart and I start getting
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the things that I need, and then I run into a hiccup along the
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way. I run into a small snag in getting what I needed from Walmart.
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I had to wait for customer service to come and help me because I
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was buying something that was locked up by behind a glass case. No,
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it wasn't a video game, although I've done that. You have to go
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get help and they come and open up the case for you. I have
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bought a number of things that they have to open up the case. I
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think I bought a rokup once and they said, we got to go and
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get the get the rokup for you so that you can get it from behind
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the locked case. Some things that make sense, some things it does not.
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The thing that I was buying yesterday at Walmart that was locked behind a
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case was a light bulb for my truck for the headlight. It was eight
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dollars. Sorry, it was seven ninety seven. I think, not even
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eight dollars, but for the benefit of the doubt, we'll just round it
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up to eight dollars. Slightly less than eight dollars, and it was locked
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up. I've heard all these stories about California and New York and Chicago,
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and a number of places where they say, oh my gosh, they're starting
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to lock things up. They're locking crazy things behind the counter. Toothpaste,
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that's nuts. I mean, if people want toothpaste, let them have the
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toothpaste for crying out loud. There's enough deodorant and a lot of people who
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need that. I haven't witnessed those things just yet, although I did talk
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to someone yesterday, talked to a friend in the store that I bumped into,
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who shared that, yes, they had been into and I think they
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said CBS and there was deodorant locked behind the counter and they had to get
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help to get it. Apologies if it wasn't really CBS. I'm just sharing
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a story secondhand. Uh So I had to wait for help to get a
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bulb to go into the headlight of my truck costs slightly less than eight dollars.
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Now, I understand in this case there were a lot of bulbs for
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a lot of different vehicles, and each one cost eight dollars. And I
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assume my really old antique truck light bulb probably was on the lower end of
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the spectrum for the prices, so there probably were some others in there that
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cost more and probably was convenient to just lock them all into one case.
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But I found it interesting that apparently there have been enough people going into Walmart
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and stealing light bulbs that they felt a need to lock them behind a case.
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Now, keep in mind, we've all seen video of people that go
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in and grab a TV and put it in a cart and just walk out
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and put it in their car and leave. We've seen those videos, We've
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heard stories about that. I know, there's not really an easy way to
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lock them in a case. It's it's kind of hard to get a big
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TV out of the store, you would presume. I know some Walmart locations
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have those little barricades up when you come in to make it harder to just
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go right back out the door without going through a register area. But they
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don't lock the TVs in there. They don't lock the large pieces of furniture.
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I did see someone as I was leaving yesterday. It was buying some
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sort of a piece of furniture that they were stopped and asked to see a
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receipt, and not happy about it. Very senior gentlemen who complained about it
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had some choice words for the woman who was just doing her job. That
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was what she gets paid to do is to check the receipts that people walk
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out with an item that's not bagged up. But in my case, it
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was just a light bulb. That's what I was buying along with those other
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items. And I did the self checkout, scanned the light bulb, paid
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for the light bulb, exited the store, and got to hear this gentleman
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grumbling on my way out of the store. I had a couple of items
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by the way that weren't in bags either. But this lady sees me in
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there all the time. I assume she now knows that I'm not stealing from
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Walmart. But light bulbs. We've heard about it all over the country,
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right We've heard about things being locked behind cases, And I remember a number
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of times thinking I'm glad that nuts stuff's not going on here. I mean,
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I've thought it, and I've thought I wonder if it's going to make
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its way here, and it has now. I have no idea how long
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they've been locking up bulbs. The last time I replaced a bulb in my
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truck, I guess was the other headlight. I don't think it was that
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long ago, maybe six months ago, I don't know. It wasn't that
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long ago, and it was easy to get the bulbs. Go in,
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pick it up, get it. I got a friend, sorry, Brandon,
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calling you out. I got a friend who had a uh a tail
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light on his car that was out, and I remember telling him repeatedly,
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hey, man, you're a tail light still out by the way, don't
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forget that tail late, specifically break late. And you know it's a little
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more serious, I think, because you drive the car and you use your
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brakes all hours of the day, my headlight being out not as big a
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deal unless I'm driving at night. So I remember going to buy him one.
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That was a couple of years ago, a year and a half ago
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maybe, And yeah, he bought one for him, and just so I
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could say, hey, here, put your I'll put it in for you.
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I got my screwdriver in the car because I didn't want him to get
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a ticket, didn't want him to get any grief about it. So uh
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it's this is something relatively new. I don't know how long it's been happening
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at Walmart, but it hasn't been long. Those are the last two times
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I bought bulbs for a vehicle, one mind, one for a friend,
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So what's going on? How has it now made its way to us?
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And I talk about this because it happened to me yesterday, and it also
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happened to me within an hour of someone shared this yesterday with me. It's
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a quote. It was actually a video. I'm not going to play the
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video because I don't exactly know the original source for it. I know it
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was it some sort of an event, and I think it had something to
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do with the company that he owned. But it's Charles Munger, who you
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know, number two guy to Warren Buffett is right hand man, okay,
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And Charles Munger a brilliant finance He died November of this past year. And
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he had this really great quote about the status of society and while we are
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where we are, and he was asked a question. This was an annual
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meeting, I guess for the Daily Journal. He was director of this newspaper
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company, and he was asked about how the richest people in the world,
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like the wealth gap had grown and the divide was bigger, and he said
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his answer to this a question about this was that the world is not driven
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by greed, it's driven by envy. That was hanging with me already yesterday
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when I went to the store and I had my experience with the light bulb.
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He also had this quote about envy, which I thought was also great.
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I want to come back to the main point of that, but when
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he said, envy's a really stupid sin because it's the only one you could
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never possibly have any fun at. There's a lot of pain and no fun.
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Why would you want to get on that trolley? I think that's a
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great quote. I love that quote. But onto this subject of his thoughts
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on on envy, because we get told repeatedly that we're a society that is
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dwindling because of greed. But if you think about it, he's exactly on
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the money when he talks about envy, and social media has only fed into
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that, it's made it worse. He even part of the quote and part
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of his conversation. I'm gonna start paraphrasing a little bit, but he talked
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about, you know, living through the Great Depression. He talked about that
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experience and how they had nothing and now people that have a lot more than
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he had then think that they have nothing, and how they think that because
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they see what other people have, and it's largely because of social media.
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And I'm not going to sit here and tell you that social media is the
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absolute worst thing ever. There's obviously some benefits to it. But he points
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out that people are five times better than they used to be, and they
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just look at what other people have and they think it's not fair. Even
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equates it to ten commandments when he talked about coveting, and he talks about
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how that that's what we do. We look at our neighbors. Donkey,
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right, and he points out Donkey's not even a great animal. But he
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says, you know, we feel like we're missing out. We feel like
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we don't have it, when we really have a lot more than we really
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think that we do. It's not about greed, it's about envy. It's
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about wanting to have something that we don't have. We look at other people
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and we say, ah, ah, their college got paid for by their
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rich family, So my college loans should just be forgiven. I shouldn't have
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to pay them. It's too much debt. It's not fair that I have
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them. It's the people who walk into stores like Walmart and say I'm just
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gonna get a TV. I want a TV. I don't have this TV.
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Other people have this TV. I should have this TV. So I'm
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gonna get it and I'm gonna leave with it, and no one's gonna stop
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me. I'm just gonna walk out the door with it. Or apparently,
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you know, a shopping cart full of head light bulbs. I guess who's
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stealing light bulbs? Who's walking in and just taking all the light bulbs?
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Am I missing something? I don't know, but that's what's happening. People
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are seeing it and going, wait a minute, this person's getting this vacation.
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And they also see things that they shouldn't really believe on social media.
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Now, I've been training my kids to recognize that every time they see someone
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who's really famous giving away fifty thousand dollars to the next person I see on
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the street, it's probably fake. It's almost certainly fake. Not always,
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but it's usually fake. They're putting on a show. It's entertainment, and
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they're getting you to watch it, and they're getting you to want it envy.
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Oh my gosh, that person just won fifty thousand dollars. Oh my
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gosh, mister Feast just gave away a billion dollars. What no, he
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didn't. He didn't give anybody a billion dollars. That didn't happen. And
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I know I said his name wrong because I'm really covering my butt on this
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whole thing. I'm just covering it. That's all I'm doing. And I've
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told you before that guy has done some good stuff around the world. I
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don't mean to pick on him. He's just the famous one, right,
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He's the one that he's just famous. But he's done some stuff that's made
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people mad, so people are attacking him, which makes me like him more.
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But I have a hard time with a lot of these people that are
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claiming to give away things and not giving away. But it makes people that
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don't have parents that say that's probably fake. Just don't believe everything that you
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see on here. Don't believe that these people have so much money that they're
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giving away a billion dollars. Don't buy it. Don't buy that they're giving
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away ten million dollars to a stranger on the street. Who would do that?
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Why would you do that? How many times has this YouTube video got
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to get watched for them to make up that ten million dollars or that billion
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dollars? But it's envy Envy's there, It's everywhere. It's the thing that's
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driving our whole political system right now, isn't it. It's this whole notion
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of you have it, I want it, I don't have it. If
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I say this, then maybe I can get it. If I accuse you
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of something, and if I say it loud enough and long enough, maybe
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someone will give it to me. Isn't that what we're experiencing now, over
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and over and over again. Isn't it a little bit of what we see
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whenever, the back and forth with just absolute nastiness from both parties at times.
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We're seeing a pretty bad swing of it right now, obviously with what's
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happening to Donald Trump, what's happening in New York, And how's any of
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this going to be good for real estate in New York? That's just part
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of it. Who knows where the rest of these cases are going. Who
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knows where all this is going? In gosh, the Fanny willis stuff.
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Oh my gosh. But I love the quote, and I love the timing
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of seeing the quote and hearing the quote because I've read it, and then
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I listened to the met because I wanted to look it up and actually hear
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him say it, and I listen to it, and then I go to
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the store and I'm having a hard time buying quickly buying a headlight bulb for
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my truck, my old truck. Again, I'm not talking about one of
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those fifteen hundred dollars jobs that you have to order and go to the dealer
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and get replaced. And that's not what I'm talking about. Just the bulb,
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pop it out, pop it in. Should have been a pretty easy
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exchange, but it's been made complicated. And I think Charlie Munger's onto something.
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I think he was on to a lot when he talked about envy being
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the thing that drives society. It's not greed, it's envy. Today's show
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More West Carol Morning Show right after the break. So I've never been to
22:30
Sweden. I'd like to go. I'd like to go skiing. Also,
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skiing in Sweden has apparently just gone up a notch because McDonald's has opened a
22:45
mixed ski in Salin, Sweden, and it is a ski through window at
22:56
this particular resort town. And the story of this particular mixed ski has gone
23:02
viral thanks to visitors sharing posts about popping in for goodies. It has the
23:10
full menu of a McDonald's and there's also a McCafe where hot chocolate and warm
23:18
Swedish cinnamon buns are waiting for folks that are skiing. So maybe I need
23:26
to put silent Sweden on my Sorry. I listened to the pronunciation of it
23:32
a couple of times, so make sure I had it right, and I
23:33
think I just got it right. I try, you know, try to
23:37
get those names right if I can help it. Most people prefer not to
23:41
think about their own death, but Katie Cosgrove of Buffalo is not most people.
23:48
She's a healthy, thirty year old. Katie has been planning for her
23:51
own funeral, from the playlist to the flowers to her outfit. She's even
23:56
saved ten thousand dollars to pay for it so her loved ones won't be burdened
23:59
with the call lost. Katie became fascinated with death at the age of fifteen
24:04
when her father passed. This eventually led her to a career as a death
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duela, someone who provides emotional, physical and spiritual support for a person nearing
24:15
death. She says, I chose to plan my own funeral to be prepared
24:18
because we never knew when never know when we're going to die. It's never
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too early to plan. Plus, having your own touches on your funeral can
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make it so much more beautiful and really help you grieve. Folks grieve you
24:30
in an inspiring way. I like where this is going. I just think
24:33
that. I mean, I know they say you can never do this too
24:37
early. Thirty seems early for it, though't you think that seems just a
24:41
little premature? But hey, good for her, certainly taking a lot of
24:45
the guess work out of the folks that you know, if something horrendous were
24:52
to happen to her in her thirties, you know, obviously she's doing them
24:56
a great favor in that regard. Nice that she's so empathetic to people that
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you know would be grieving her. That part's really nice. And I'm all
25:06
for empathy. So you know what, do do it at thirty? That's
25:08
fine. I'm not going to complain anymore. All right, back to Sweden
25:14
again. I forgot to add another Sweden story. So if you ever wondered
25:18
why you remember things that you learned from your favorite teachers, scientists in Sweden
25:22
say that our brain is programmed to learn more from people that we like and
25:27
admire. And they say that we're less likely to learn something new when the
25:33
information comes from someone we don't like. According to researchers, this can be
25:38
translated to other aspects of life, like politics, where we favor people or
25:42
groups that we like. The problem is this can lead to polarization, and
25:48
it says as a quote, we are more inclined to form new connections and
25:52
update knowledge from information presented by groups we favor. Such preferred groups typically provide
25:57
information that aligns their pre existing beliefs and ideas are potentially reinforcing polarizing viewpoints.
26:06
This comes from Mikyle Johansson. For half a second, I thought it said
26:11
Michael Jackson, but it was spelled Swedish. But Johansson, who's the professor
26:15
of psychology at Lund University. Yeah, I mean I can think specifically to
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some classes and I had favorite teachers that I seemed to do much better in
26:29
their classes. I had teachers that I absolutely did not like that I didn't
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do nearly as well in their classes. At a couple of teachers in my
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day, One professor really comes to mind. It was a complete moron.
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I didn't learn anything from him, but I don't really think he was teaching
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anything of value. So some of the things that he taught in his classes,
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you know, I remember those, but because of how idiotic some of
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the things that he said were. And you know, if you send me
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a self addressed stamp twenty dollars Bill, I might tell you, might tell
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you who that professor is or yeah, is it was for me? You
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know, I got to a point where I finally just told the head of
27:17
my department, I'm not taking any more of his classes. I can't do
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it anymore. And if you need the reasons, let me lay them out
27:22
for you here they are all right. That'll do it for this Thursday edition
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of the show. Thanks to our sponsors and patrons. Thank you for listening.
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I'll catch you back here tomorrow morning. This is the West Carrol Morning
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