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Money Monday with Brian James · Brian Thomas

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: 805, fast approaching 806 here at 55K, our CD talk station.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: It is that time of week I always look forward to.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Financial information from Brian James from Allworth Financial. He's a
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: financial planner, and we get him every Monday for a
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: couple of three segments to talk about money matters. And
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: welcome back, Brian James, for another edition of Money Monday
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: here on The Morning Show.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Good morning, Mr. Thomas, and I hope you are doing
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: well as well.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: I am trying to be. it's a bit gloomy and
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: doomy out in the political world. If you haven't noticed
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Brian James and considering I have to deal with this
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: every single day of my life, it's hard to, it's
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: hard to find a happy place.
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Coffee and headlines at three in the morning or whatever
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: your life is.
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  Speaker 1: It does seem a bit stressful.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: No.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: And I go to bed basically with the same thing,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: not the coffee, but the headlines and the news stories.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: And I take those to bed with me at night
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and have nightmares about them. Get up in the morning,
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: get ready for the show. And then inundated with what
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: happened after 8 PM at bedtime and, 2 30 in
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: the morning when my eyes woke up at any event
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: that's my troubles and i'll i'll deal with them but
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: the troubles we are dealing with now as we fast
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: approach an election which has really been impacted on inflation
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: and affordability inflation it's rearing its pesky head it has
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: been for quite some time not as bad now as
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: it was but and i know you're going to talk
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: about it in the context of corporate corporate profits but
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: you know it's this this word out there affordability seems
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: to be independent of inflation because i think you even
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: pointed out a bunch of times here brian Yeah, the
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: price of the bag of chips is more expensive now,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: but it's never going to go back to where it
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: was before. The increase in price just slows down as
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: inflation rolls back or is dealt with. And so we
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: just have to get used to where we are now.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: I don't see prices getting rolled back anywhere.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's not very likely to happen because if
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: you think about where those actually come from, those prices
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: are all budgeted in by companies that are out there
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: trying to maintain their profit margins and trying to continue
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: to exist and keep their employees paid and all those
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: other things that we all want to do. And the
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: companies themselves are experiencing inflation just on things like office supplies.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: Wages have increased a bit, and it's been tougher to
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: keep employees. So it's costing everybody more everywhere. So for
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: a company to come in and say, hey, we want
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: to do everybody a solid, and we're going to drop
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: prices by 20% just to go back to 2022 or
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: whatever the date is, it's just simply going to exacerbate
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: the problem that is causing all this anyway. that does sound,
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: I mean, I hear what that sounds like. That does
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: sound like, you know, it's, it's simply companies keeping profits for,
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: you know, for themselves. But at the end of the day,
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: inflation affects absolutely everybody. And they're, they're for sure. There's
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: always a little bit of profiteering that goes on anywhere
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: that just comes along with, with capitalism. But at the
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: same time, you know, it's not limited to just consumers.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: Anybody trying to function in this economy is experiencing more
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: expenses to keep things going.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: Exactly. And, The practical reality is Republican, Democrat, independent, libertarian,
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  Speaker 1: it doesn't matter who's in office, no one can deal
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: with that concept. As long as we live in an
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: environment or in a system that allows the companies to
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: fix pricing, to establish what the prices are, the companies
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: that have to compete with their competitors and otherwise maintain
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: some sort of reasonable price compared to the other guys,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: that never goes away, which is always something I like
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  Speaker 1: to point out. But if you start taxing these companies
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: at a much higher rate because, well, we need to
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: tax those evil corporations because if they make all that money,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: That doesn't solve the problem either, Brian, does it?
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  Speaker 2: No, because all corporations do is simply pass it through.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: That's the difference between consumers and producers. When you're the consumer,
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: which is everybody, and oftentimes corporations themselves are the consumers
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: because they can be at the end of the chain
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  Speaker 2: just like anybody else. They have to go buy raw
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: materials with which they make stuff for other people to consume.
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  Speaker 2: So everything rolls downhill. The price increases or tax increases
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  Speaker 2: or whatever we want to do to handle this simply
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: just get passed on to the end payer.
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  Speaker 1: Well, and also the other thing is I think we're all, including,
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: I guess, corporations, living perhaps in a short attention span
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: theater because the statistics bear out that inflation-adjusted family income
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: is 70% higher than it was in 1970. More people
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: are graduating from school. More people are attending college. More
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: people are spending more. And that's one of the things
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: that I saw this article did not change. In spite
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: of the fact that everybody's fed up and looking for
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: some sort of quick fix, people are still spending. I mean,
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: they're keeping the economy afloat. So poverty rates have declined.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: It's just compared to, see, a moment in time ago,
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: we're all so much better, but we don't appreciate it
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: within the context of how we used to live versus now.
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I like to call that phenomenon grumble and swipe.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: And what I mean by that is, I think you
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: know where I'm about to go.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: I do, go ahead. I've probably said it before, yeah.
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  Speaker 2: But that's, you know, all of us, even people who
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: are doing just fine, we will look at the cost
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: of a nice steak at Kroger or wherever you happen
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: to shop, and we will grumble about it, and then
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: we swipe their credit card anyway. Because many people, while
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of people out there who truly are
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: suffering and can't make ends meet, can't get their hands
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: on $ 1, 000 if the car dies, something like that, there's
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: a huge amount of people who are doing just fine
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: other than they have to grumble at the credit card machine.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: And this is where we keep coming back to this
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: K-shaped economy, where there's really two groups of people in
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  Speaker 2: the United States. There are people... who have the ability
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: to live on less than they are making, and there
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: are people who have no choice except for to spend
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: absolutely every last nickel that comes in the door, or
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: worst case scenario, have to sell assets or just run
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: up credit card debt to make ends meet. So there's
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  Speaker 2: a group of people out there doing just fine, and
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: I can verify from my own experience sitting at my
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: table doing financial plans. There are just as many people
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: talking about buying that second home or the acreage in
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: Kentucky or Indiana, middle of nowhere or whatever, and a
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: lot of that is coming from the wealth that has
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: grown over the decades. People have said, I want to
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: do things differently. and I have the money to do it.
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  Speaker 2: The headlines tell me I'm supposed to not be able
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: to sleep at night, but I'm doing okay, and nothing
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: has really caused me to change my spending outlook. So therefore,
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go ahead and do these things anyway.
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: And that's why I believe real estate prices have stayed
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: pescally high, because people still have the ability to pay.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: It's just like anything else in the market economy. Prices
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: settle where people are able to pay.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Well, and you know, Live on less than you are making. Now,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: of course, if you're truly on life's margins, you're eating
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: everything that you make or all that's going to life's necessities, clothes, food,
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: and shelter. But if you have the ability to not
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: spend everything you're making, that's where, well, sound financial planning
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: comes in because that's the money you need to sock away.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: I wanted to spend the 401k allocations that I've been
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: socking away my whole life Every month that they were
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: taken out of my check, boy, if I only had
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: that extra money, you know, but I tried to maintain
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: a measure of discipline along with my wife in not
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: doing that. So you act and you spend as though
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  Speaker 1: you are not making nearly as much as you're making.
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  Speaker 1: The rest of it goes into your future. That's the
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  Speaker 1: only recipe for success, isn't it, Brian James?
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And honestly, I think that goes all the way
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  Speaker 2: back to when we quit being hunter gatherers and we
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: learned to grow stuff ourselves and therefore we could store
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: it for the winter. And that all of a sudden
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  Speaker 2: created what we know as free time. And we got
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  Speaker 2: art and we got leisure and we got all this
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  Speaker 2: other stuff. Obviously, I'm going back thousands of years. But
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  Speaker 2: to keep that ball rolling, then, yeah, you absolutely have
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: to find ways. So, for example, if you if you
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: if you are raising young people who are just getting
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: out there in the world, The sooner you can convince
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  Speaker 2: them that they need to be putting 15% to 20%
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: of their paycheck into a 401k, into a retirement plan,
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  Speaker 2: the better off they're going to be. Yeah, money's going
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: to be tight for those first few years, but after
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  Speaker 2: they work hard, they maybe switch jobs or get raises
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: and those kinds of things. It starts to come out
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  Speaker 2: of the wash, and that also primes the pump. They
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: will start to see that first comma show up in
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  Speaker 2: their net worth. And then all of a sudden it's
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  Speaker 2: five digits and then it's six digits. I got a
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  Speaker 2: hundred thousand dollars in my 401k and I'm 26 years old.
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  Speaker 2: That's a pretty good role to be on. That's how
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  Speaker 2: you prime the pump to get people going. But we
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  Speaker 2: can't wait till we're in our forties and fifties to
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  Speaker 2: do it.
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  Speaker 1: Well, if you had to just, and I don't mean
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  Speaker 1: to put you on the spot, but you deal with
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  Speaker 1: people every single day, you're the financial planner, you provide
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  Speaker 1: recommendations on how to reach a comfortable retirement. If there
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: is a category that you could point to, or a
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  Speaker 1: big mistake area that you run into when trying to
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  Speaker 1: convince people to try to hit that target savings percentage
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  Speaker 1: per month, what would you say it is? Where are
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  Speaker 1: we collectively making our biggest mistakes in terms of our spending?
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  Speaker 2: By convincing ourselves that we can't afford to save. If
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: you're in a situation where you have convinced yourself that
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: you don't have the money to save, then you probably
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: need to save more than the average person. That is
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: something that if that kind of mindset takes hold in
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  Speaker 2: our early 20s, it will never go away because that
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: can kick in as soon as you're trying to make
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: that first rent payment and things feel a little tight. Well,
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: a few years later, now you're maybe making a little
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: bit more money, but maybe there's a marriage, maybe there's
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: kids in the mix, and things just get progressively more expensive.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: We can always, always, always look at stuff and say
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: that that's going to cost money. I cannot afford to–
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: I have to put out my long-term goals because short-term
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: takes precedent. We can do that right up until we're
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: in the grave, and a lot of people do tend
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: to do that. I would also point to people who
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: are of some means and have some assets. They tend
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: to have no idea what they're spending on things because
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: they've never been forced to have a budget. Right. Having
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: a budget is work, it's a pain in the butt,
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: but unless you're, if you're not forced to do it,
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: you may have no idea how much more you're spending
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: on gas right now or a steak at the grocery
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: store than you used to.
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: Brian James, we'll pause, we'll bring him back, and we'll
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: talk about the price of gas. Even after the tax holiday, yeah,
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: I know, it was $ 85 to fill my 16, 15-gallon
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  Speaker 1: tank the other day. Not a very happy feeling when
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: I walked away, or when I drove away from the pump.
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  Speaker 2: 815-5KRC, the talk station.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: 818-55-KRC, The Talk Station, Brian Thomas with Money Monday's Brian
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: James from Allworth Financial. Hey, real quick, Brian, I know
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  Speaker 1: I mentioned price of gas. I know it's on the
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: topic list, but can I do the third topic first?
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: Because it kind of dovetails a little bit more closely
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: with what we were just talking about previously. Retired Americans, well,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: not spending money because they're afraid of running out of money.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: Is this.
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  Speaker 1: They think they don't have enough or are being too
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: cautious with spending, or do they really not have enough,
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: or is it just impossible for people to figure out
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: whether whatever they've got saved away is going to make
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: it for the rest of their life?
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: Or D, all of the above. All of the above.
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: That's in the situation. Yeah, there are people out there
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: who truly can't afford it, and they know that, right?
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: There are folks out there who are trying to make
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: it on just a Social Security check or just a
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: couple Social Security checks. And that might be as low as–
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: that can be a couple thousand dollars even lower for
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: certain people. There's also other people out there who have
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: simply never– and this is where I– this is why
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: I have a job. People who have simply never stood
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: back to look at what they've built for themselves and
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: cannot see the entire forest because they're staring at one tree,
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: which is somebody telling them that they're about to run
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: out of money. And that's usually a politician or the
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: media or something like that. And, you know, so the
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: so yeah there there are plenty of people out there
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: who are not living their lives I often say that
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: my career after three decades has turned into sitting at
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: a table, begging people to go spend their own money,
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: because we've put a plan together, you've built a you're
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: really solid nest egg and yes the headlines are scary
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: out there, but it hasn't it doesn't necessarily affect what
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: you need to do so. Yeah, this research out here
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: comes from Prudential, and they found that about 61% of
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: retirees who have at least a half million dollars in
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: investable assets still feel uncomfortable spending for that enjoyment. So
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: about 3,000 Americans of ages 50 and older, some retired
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: and some approaching retirement. But yeah, so almost two-thirds of
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: people say that they're not ready to retire psychologically because
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: of the financial concerns.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Well, I suppose, and I don't know what $ 500, 000, what
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: does that get you in terms of interest generated annually?
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: Because I think many people are sort of reluctant to
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: tap into principal.
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's absolutely true. There is a notion– so people
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: retiring today are coming– having been raised by a generation
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: that retired off of pensions, which was one thing, and
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: another mindset was dividends. Every now and then I'll hear
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: somebody come up with the old idea that I don't
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: want to spend my principal. I want to only spend
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: the dividends. Well, dividends aren't as much as they used
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: to be because if I am the leader of a
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: publicly traded company and my job is to increase that
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: stock price, I can't tell a sexy dividend story and
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: get as much pop for that stock price as I
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: can a growth story. So dividends are not the focus anymore.
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: You really can't get... 3%, 4%, 5% across a diversified portfolio,
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: lots of things. You can get it here and there,
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: but you're also going to see a volatile portfolio. So
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: stocks bounce a lot more. So not spending my principal
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: doesn't mean what it used to mean because I can
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: spend only the dividends and then the stock can drop
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: by 10%, 15% anyway, just because the market is more volatile.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: So yeah, there is a mindset out there that I
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: want to pretend that I have some kind of guarantee
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: and I can't find it. Therefore, I must not have
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: enough money and therefore I'm not going to retire a.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: So how is a retired American who's concerned about spending
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: any of that money to be convinced that it's okay
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: and it's safe to do so? There can't be a
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: magic number. You would have told the whole world about
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: it prior to now, Brian.
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, as I often say, if there was a black
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: and white 10-step program that everybody should follow, we would
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: all retire based off of TikTok advice. It would be
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: just that simple. But, you know, so everybody has their
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: own number depends on your own situation. And that starts
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: with knowing what you spend in the first place and
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: then figure out and run a couple scenarios. First off,
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: figure out what's the hunky dory outcome. Here's my assets.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: Here are my income streams, social security, pension, maybe a
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: little bit of part time work, rental income, whatever else
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: you've got. And then here's what I need to do
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: with it. The variable in all that that we cannot control,
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: nobody gets to, is what are the investments going to do?
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: We just know the one guarantee I can give is
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: they're going to go up and they're going to go down.
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: So run the hunky-dory outcome. If nothing bad ever happens again,
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: here's how inflation looks in my world over time, and
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: here's how my assets grow. and then run it again,
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: but knock off 20% to 25% as a stress test. Basically,
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: you're pretending that you retired in 2007, and then the
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: market punched you in the face immediately. See if your
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: ship still floats. If you are, then simply understand market history.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: If your plan cannot take it, if the ship sinks
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: and you run out of money earlier than you run
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: out of life, then that's a problem. It might mean
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: you need to adjust your spending or your retirement expectations.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: Something needs to change.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Well, at minimum, get a financial planner to help you
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: navigate the psychological challenges, apparently, as well as give you
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: sound advice. And finally, something over which we seemingly have
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: no control, the high price of gasoline, even after we
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: got a relief from the gas tax holiday here in
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: the state of Ohio. I know other states have done
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: it as well, but I paid $ 5. 60, I think, a
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: gallon the other day. Yes, it was premium, but this
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: is my world. But that's higher than before. Brian?
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it absolutely is. But if you notice there recently,
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: it's actually come off its peak. So gas has dropped
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: a little bit. But, you know, but also we're hearing
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: the drumbeat that gasoline is pushing prices higher. So the
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: latest CPI index was up three point seven percent over
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: the past year. That's up from 3.4% in August. So
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: not only are we well off the 2% that we
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: were shooting for, the Federal Reserve really likes, we actually
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: seem to be accelerating. So prices increased about 0.6% in
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: September alone, and gas was responsible for about half that
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: monthly increase. Now, literally the last couple of weeks, it
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: has pulled back a little bit, but it's still central
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: to this entire report. Those price pressures, though, Brian, it
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: goes beyond fuel core inflation, which excludes food and energy, which, again,
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: this is why we do it. People hate that, you know,
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: that there's a number that excludes those. But we have
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: to separate things out because gas is extremely volatile. Those
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: core inflation numbers were up point three percent in September,
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: two point six percent over the year. So gas is
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: driving everything further, but it's not the only culprit out there.
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: Brian James, appreciate your sound wisdom and your willingness to
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: talk about these important issues every Monday on the 55K
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: RC Morning Show. We'll do it again next Monday, between
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: now and then. Thanks to all of you for learning out.
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: Have a great week, my friend. Happy fall to you.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: We'll talk to you in a week. Thanks, man. It's 820.