The Yeah But Bull Market (EP.356)

26:03That, that blew my face right off my head. So I was, I'm not going to lie. I'm surprised too. So it's not like these insurance companies are rolling in it. They're paying out so much more in claims than they're taking in, in a lot of ways. And well, also, this also feeds into the feelings part of inflation because insurance, you don't see any benefit from that. It's like, wait a minute, why am I paying$400 more a year for something that A, I don't even use, God willing, and B, I don't derive any, I don't like perceive any benefit from that. And when you do use it, like in my case, when I had the fender bender, I thought, well, hey, I've been paying into insurance for decades now and never, never filed a claim.

26:43So it, and the other thing, the last one is mother nature, right? So the natural disasters and climate. So I think the number was in the Hurricane Ian in Florida, North Carolina, it was like 360 ,000 cars were damaged or destroyed. And the Wall Street Journal had a piece about this for how it's affecting home insurance, too. So it's not just auto insurance, home insurance, average annual home insurance cost rose 20 % between 2021 and 2022 or 2023. Another 6 % increase is projected in 2024. so they say rates rose by 10 % on average in 19 states in 2023 after a series of big payouts related to floods, storms, wildfires, and other natural disasters across the US so this is home and auto so my question is what stops this?

27:33What slows this down? Beats me remember that phrase? like when you know the answer to something you'd say beats me you don't hear that much anymore but but it seems to me that a lot of these trends for again more electric vehicles and more technology and cars and people still driving these bigger vehicles unless we ban cell phone usage in cars somehow so you can't text and look at your phone like an idiot what's going to stop this trend i don't think it's going to get better i'm just learning about it i'm just catching up so yeah i don't know i have no idea Anyway, but that's kind of like the other stuff for inflation makes sense to me.

28:17Like I think the trend is still – like if you look at the wage growth, that's still going down. The good news is it's still higher than inflation. But I think the other good news is if you're worried about the 1970s redux of – people keep sending us the chart where it shows the 1970s inflation spiked. Then it fell and it spiked again saying we're following that chart. This is it. But I think wages continuing to fall is your one big case against that, right? Wages are the thing. They are. Right? So I think that, and a lot of people were saying this. In fact, this is something that a lot of people got right about inflation.

28:54A lot of people were saying that the last mile was going to be the toughest part of it. And that's proven to be true. Yes, going from three to two. I still, I'm still in the camp that three and a half percent essentially is the long-term average and we're there. If I was the Fed, they can't say this, but they could, eh, we're there. I'd be worried again if it was above four, I guess. That's when I'd call it hot. Well, you see the thing, the last week on TCAF, we were talking about a chart from Michael McDonough over at Bloomberg. And he shows the components of CPI that are rising at more than 4%.

29:35and that's going a lot higher. More than you'd think. Yeah, so that part of it rolled over and it really is re-accelerating. This is another area, though, where I feel like information is both good and bad. How many people in the 70s knew all the components of inflation? Five? Like five economists in a room somewhere? That's kind of cool and kind of, that we can all just look at this data now whenever we want, if you want to. Yeah. Thing is, there's a lot of people who don't even believe the data. Well, yes. A lot of people, yes. A lot of people. Yes. Obviously, the data is imperfect, but the trend, that's what you want to understand.

30:21True. And there is true, and certain components of the data are certainly imperfect. Yes. But in the aggregate... And we've always said, no household's actual average inflation equals to the overall average of the country. It's impossible because of the standard of where you live and what you spend on housing and what your household budget looks like. It's impossible for anyone to have the actual inflation rate of the average. It doesn't happen. So getting back to the insurance stuff, what's going on with home insurance? Well, that's the same thing. I mentioned that too. It's just for that, it's more climate change stuff, it seems like.

30:59and houses getting more expensive to build, and obviously the inflation component. If housing prices rise 50 % and your house gets destroyed, guess what? The insurance is going to have to make a bigger payout. So some of this is just general insurance, and some of it is these idiosyncratic factors in these spots where it's not going to—this is another one that's—it's not going back, that's for sure. Unless, I mean, I guess you could see with autos more of auto prices falling, But unless everyone decides to turn in their SUV and their truck for a Honda Accord, like my dream is, these rates aren't going back.

31:38Here's another one that's not going back. We got retail sales yesterday. Warmer than expected. Look at the, again, Michael McDonough has this great chart. He breaks it down. Non-store retailers versus general merchandise stores. And non-store retailers, that's online. They got to come up with a better name than that. I keep seeing non-store retailers. Why don't we just call it e-commerce? Yeah, they must have came up with that name before. Or online. People's done a lot online. Yeah, it just doesn't sound right. You know, but what's interesting is the online piece of it is just, that's a secular shift higher, and there's no slowing that one down.

32:15But look at the jump we had during COVID. And a little bit of that came back as the economy reopened, but we're pushing back towards all-time highs. If you wanted like one graph to understand the economy, it's this, isn't it? We just keep spending. And obviously higher inflation is a piece of this too, but we just, we love to consume in this country. What was in this chart, did anything stand out to you in terms of the components? It's very pretty. The colors are very pretty. Colors are pretty. I mean, it's the non-store thing, right? Yeah, that was a big one. in March? Was it Cyber Monday? I don't know.

33:01That is a good question. We like to spend. Okay. Another one from Torson Slock. Getting back to the travel boom. Because of significant rise in the stock market and significant cash flows from fixed income, U.S. households have more money to travel on airplanes, state hotels, eat at restaurants, go to sporting events, amusement parks and concerts. That's why inflation in the non-housing service sector continues to be so high. He shows, again, a record high share of the population is planning to go on vacation in a foreign country within the next six months. And this, this is a, what a chart, it's a massive rise from, so it's showing more than one in five people, almost one in four people are planning to leave the country for vacation in the next six months.

33:43And still we could trace this back to COVID it's a, we're what three and three years removed. So someone wrote in, I talked, I complained a couple weeks ago that the JW Marriott and Marco is just ridiculously higher price than it was even a few years ago. And it's called capitalism, son. Someone responded and said, it used to be seasonal travelers, right? And that's why you'd get a spike at spring break, probably, and some other Christmas or wherever. But now it's year round, people coming to visit. and I think that's part of it. By the way, just real quick, I don't want to gloss over this on the inflation part.

34:24You know who thinks inflation is going to be higher for longer? The market. Look at the bond market. It's hard. Well, you say the market does, but it hasn't impacted the stock market though. So why is that? Well, I don't see that as a, I feel like you're deflecting. I'm talking about the bond market. Okay, so the two-year yield is back to, oh, wow, 5 % again for the two-year. 10 years, 4, 7. And the 10 years, yeah, I mean, the bond market is, remember the meme, this meme with the bond market, something like that? I just have trouble trusting the bond market because it was caught so off sides the last time when rates shot up to 5%.

35:02So you don't trust the CPI subcomponents going higher. You don't trust the bond market. What do you trust? I have nothing, no one. That's why this is so hard, because this year, none of these years have worked out how anyone thought they would. This year, we're going to have six rate cuts, but it was because the economy was going to be slowing. And if anything, the economy just... Here, listen, you could say these two things. Clearly, inflation is... Well, maybe not clearly. Inflation is not going in the right direction temporarily that we would hoped. And the bond market is confirming that. You could also say that that doesn't mean that the bond market is right.

35:40Yes. But for now, that's how it's disinterpreting the data that we've been receiving. And I think the stock market agrees with me. Three and a half percent inflation with like six percent nominal GDP growth is way better than one or two percent inflation and three percent nominal GDP growth, right? Because the fact that inflation is not slowing means growth is not slowing. So I think that's why the stock market says, okay, game on. Earnings are going to be higher. Yeah. Listen, this is a phenomenal excuse for the stock market to cool off. And it looks like the market is taking that. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

36:15I'm surprised that the excuse isn't being used more. Like, let's do it. But I mean, I guess we did just have a 10 % correction in October. Okay, Wall Street Journal has a piece that shared pretty widely on social media. I don't think of myself as rich. Americans crossing Biden's$400 ,000 tax line. Now, this is supposed to be an article about$400 ,000 being like the line in the sand now for you should pay higher tax. And it's supposed to be a tax article. But to me, this is a how do you view yourself article. And am I really rich? So nobody views himself as rich. It's pretty incredible. That was my takeaway.

36:55So according to this article, 2.6 % of households make$400 ,000 or more. It's a very small share. They also have this chart where they show it by state. and so Michigan is, I don't know, less than 2%. New York is one of the higher ones. I guess D.C. is the highest at 6.1%, but I mean, come on. Are we really calling D.C. a state? Only for the... So they have these people they interviewed in here and this one guy says, I don't think of myself... He makes 400 grand or something. I don't think of myself as rich. I think of myself as having worked really hard. I've hit the American dream and I'm going to have to pay more taxes.

37:32That doesn't feel great to me. It's demotivating. Another person actually said, We have a pretty – Wait, wait, wait. But wait, I just – That's an interesting quote. I don't think of myself as rich. I think of myself as having worked really hard. Because in that person's mind, they don't like to be called rich because they feel like it cheapens the work that they put in. They hear rich, but they think luck. They think that people are calling them lucky. Where it's like, no, I'm not lucky. I worked hard. But it's like, but no, you're actually rich and you worked hard. That's okay. In fact, that's better than okay.

38:01That's phenomenal. That's what this country, part of what makes this country great. You could only be called rich if you're like the succession kids where like the money was just handed to you. Those are the real rich people. Well, because it's, it's, there's nothing more relative than wealth and income. And that's the whole point. This other person says, uh, first of all, that this person says in Kentucky, like our money goes really far, but they said, but we're not extravagant people with high end country club memberships or a private jet or anything like that. What percentage of people do you think actually fly on private jets?

38:28Is it the 0.1 %? 0.0.1? The 0.1 % maybe? I would say there's like multiple decimal places. 0.0. Well, yeah, I guess it was 0.1 % probably. But I guess this is another downfall of the information age is you just, it's so clear that there are other people who have these other things that you don't have. And so you don't ever get to the point where you feel rich. Yeah, because now you're not just comparing yourself to your friends. You're comparing yourself to celebrities on Instagram. And that's a tough, that's a tough hurdle to clear. So it is just kind of sad that people who are in the top 2 % or 3 % still don't feel rich for whatever reason.

39:06All right, the FT had a piece. I feel like if you really want to boil down why the economy has remained strong, and maybe why bond market yields are strong and inflation is strong, can we just blame it all on the millennials and boomers? Millennials are coming up and making more money. Boomers already have all the money. They're spending like crazy. Is it as simple as demographics? Like, don't fight the demographic wave. What do you mean exactly? Think about— I mean, well, the reason why I say that is because aren't millennials and boomers like 80 % of the population or more? That's what I'm saying.

39:38And millennials have now risen above this period where they, you know, had a tough time. They didn't have money. Now they have more money. The older ones at least bought houses. They own some stocks. And millennials are going to be inheriting that baby boomer money in the years ahead. I'm not saying there's not going to be setbacks along the way, but is that just an economic force for, I don't know, a couple decades here? Good luck fighting it? Yeah. So the FT had this piece where actually inequality between millennials and boomers is way worse than a place like England. So they look at the top 10 % of millennials and boomers in the average.

40:12And again, this is in Britain. And the top 10 % of millennials are doing way, way better than the boomers at their age. But the average millennial is way behind. And I'll scroll down a little bit and look at in the U.S. it's actually right on track and millennials are actually doing a little better in some cases so this generational inequality is way way worse in Britain than it is here their young people have a much bigger complaint interesting I thought so too so but again our millennials are either right on track with baby boomers across they break it out by different wealth percentiles and at the highest end millennials are actually doing better All right.

40:56Did you read this piece by Derek Thompson about how much people work? So he goes back to like the 1800s and the average married couple back then worked 68 hours a week. By 1965, he says, after massive tech and social changes, the average married couple was working 67 hours a week. 2003, 67 hours a week. 2020, 67 hours a week. The thing is, I actually believe the numbers in like 1800 and 1965 that people probably did really work 67 hours a week. Do you think people kind of lie about how much they work these days? Is it really work? Like, no offense to you and me, but we're not exactly out in the farm, you know, plowing the fields.

41:38Like, that's work, right? Like, actual manual labor. We're sitting in front of a computer. We read some stuff. We're on some calls. We have time to check social media occasionally. I mean, listen, I'm not saying we don't work hard. We work hard. But there's a difference between working hard in a knowledge field and working hard in manual labor, which most people used to do in the past. So I think people say they work a lot these days, but it's way easier than ever to kind of shut your brain off and coast a little bit these days than it was in the past. Totally. Is that fair? Yes. Totally, totally.

42:16Well, the real estate market's still screwed since the last time we spoke about it, seven days ago. Okay. I have a real estate question for you. So about a mile from my house, speaking of really rich people, this sounds like kind of a flex for me, but it's not. There's a billionaire family that has a huge plot of land about a mile from my house. It's like this enormous piece of land with woods all around it, and they built like a fake lake in it, and it's acres and acres of land. And they do a bunch of building way in the back. You can't even see. They're building a new house. In the last couple months, I've noticed there's these little houses that have been there forever that kind of are on the outskirts of their property.

42:52And two of them now have been knocked down by bulldozers. Two of these houses. I can't say for sure. My guess is this billionaire family is paying these people to say, go away. We want to knock your house down for more privacy. Even though they have plenty of land. They're not even close. So a billionaire comes up to your door and says, kind of like Mike, I think Mark Zuckerberg did this and wherever he built his house in California, he bought like the four houses around him and knock some down, you know, and give himself more privacy. Knowing the mortgage market right now with rates back at 7.4 % or whatever, what kind of premium price would you do on your house for a billionaire to say, I want you out of there tomorrow, I'll pay cash?

43:32Because you'd need a premium for that situation, right? Because you know, what premium would you accept? I don't know. What's reasonable? Like maybe double over what my new replacement cost would be. So if I'm spending an extra$100 ,000 a year on a mortgage, that sounds ludicrously high, but whatever. Let's double that. Whatever it is, I double it. The funny thing is, is if you calculated what it would be, the extra cost, it probably is, it's high. Actually, no. My house with a new mortgage, no, I looked at it, would be over$10 ,000. So that's over$100 ,000. So I don't know, give me a quarter mil.

44:08You'd capitalize on it, yeah. No, but wait, but I need a hassle premium. That's what I mean. Let's make it a cool million. It would be a big premium on what your price is. Moving is a hassle. So if I was selling a house, I'd be getting worried. Now that rates continue to stay above 7%, I'd be at 7.4 as of yesterday for the 30-year fixed. This is way longer than anyone thought mortgage rates would stay this high. The Redfin did their average payment on a median house at regular rates, hit another new all-time high, double the 2021 levels. I think what's going to happen is you're going to get a more bifurcated housing market where there are going to be areas where the supply is still low and you're going to have some bidding wars.

44:51Like someone tweeted to me after I wrote about real estate last week and he said, I listed my house 14 showings in two days. First offer came in 11 % over asking with no contingencies. So he said, been in the house for seven years and is appreciated 60 % with no renovation. So So that kind of stuff is still happening. But I think there's going to be other places where with rates this high, the buyers are going to be like, wait a minute, I'm not going to give up all this for the housing costs so high. So I think we're going to start seeing areas that do better or worse depending on the supply dynamics.

45:21You know what's in a correction? Home builders down 9.5%. Home Depot down 15%. That makes sense with rates staying high. Like they need, Home Depot needs that home equity to become unlocked and get 5 % rates again or something, right? Yeah, we had a few people email in. Hey, Ben, I'm curious to hear you talk about taking money out of your home. What would you do with it? I'd honestly probably just, this is the scenario if mortgage rates are at 3 % or 4 % again. Honestly, I'd probably just sit in cash for a while until I needed it for something. I wouldn't like immediately go invest it in something.

45:55I would just pull it out to have it there. So you'd be opportunistic? Yes. I wouldn't take it and immediately do something with it. I would have it there. What does Buffett say? You borrow when you can, not when you need to. Something like that? I'm being Warren Buffett with my home equity. I like it. I really wouldn't do anything. That's the right answer. When somebody asks you a question, you quote Warren Buffett. Even if the quote's probably wrong. Don't take my word for it. Listen to Buffett. Listen to Buffett's words. Yeah, that's true. You can't argue with that. No. Oh, this is a good email.

46:30Had to comment on the living full-time and vacation location. By the way, this is one that I feel very strongly about. I feel like I'm very enlightened when it comes to this. Like, I am very aware of the grass is greener bias, right? Yes. It's a big thing. Okay. I am a North Jersey native, and I've been on Oahu for 19 years. Came out here in 2005. People ask me all the time how great it is living in Hawaii. And yeah, it's a cool place. But if you're here full time, you end up living like you do in any city in the US. I do exactly what my buddies do. in New York or Boston or whatever, work, wife, kids, kids' events, house maintenance traffic, warm weather, no snow, and beach access can only mask so much.

47:16You need to live where you have family and friend opportunities, feel safe, where you can afford to make a career, and in a place that you feel culturally included. Otherwise, when the novelty of the weather dissipates, you'll be a fish out of water. It is interesting. The novelty of it kind of goes away, even a beautiful place like Hawaii. Yeah, we adjust really quickly. Upwards and backwards. So it works both ways, which is great that we're resilient. We can adjust to worsening economic conditions or life conditions. But it works the opposite way. You get used to things. Luxuries become necessities, and they become whatever.

47:49It's just part of life. I think Kahneman actually did a study about this, saying people who move to California because they want to get the nice weather, they just get acclimated to it eventually. It doesn't impact their life better or worse in the end. I also think this is situationally dependent on your personality. Yes. But generally speaking, I think we adjust pretty quickly. Yes. Like if I lived somewhere that was nice year-round, I would definitely be outside more doing stuff outside all the time. Yeah, well, for sure. And that would impact your overall mental health. It's nice outside and I feel so much better.

48:21Yes, it is true. But do we appreciate it more because we have the crappy times? So exactly. That's why I love New York. Sometimes the weather sucks for a long period of time. And every time I leave, I get like a 30 % weather premium. You know? So I don't, a lot of people, some people, when they leave New York for vacation, like, why the hell do I live in New York? I'm the opposite. Right. I love leaving and I love coming home. Black Friday savings are here at the Home Depot, which means it's time to add new cordless power to your collection. Right now, when you buy a select battery kit from one of our top brands like Ryobi or Milwaukee, you'll get a select tool from that same brand for free.

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49:41Seriously, with these savings, why shop anywhere else? Burlington Deals Brands Wow. All right, we're a Silver Linings podcast. Somebody emailed us. Over the last year, I have reflected on some of the positives. Maybe silver linings is a better term for this environment. Talking about housing. High rates kept us honest for what we could actually afford. Instead of a$700 ,000,$800 ,000 house, we may have been able to buy with 3 % mortgage. We bought a house for$550 ,000 with a monthly payment we could stomach at our 6.99 % rate. Instead of heating and cooling and cleaning a 3 ,000-square-foot house, we only have to deal with keeping up our 1 ,900-square-foot house, which is much more manageable.

50:18Also, furnishing costs are lower for our smaller home. Our property taxes increased 10 % the first year. This was much easier to handle in our cheaper home than it would have been if we had a larger, more expensive home. The three-bed, two-bath, 1 ,900-square-foot house we bought is a great starter home, which we will comfortably be able to raise two children for at least the first four to five years of their life. We are currently childless, and with the plan to have kids in the future, it's nice to be able to meet their needs with the possibility of upgrading to a nicer home in the future. And lastly, we have the potential to get an unexpected raise if we can ever refinance to a lower rate in the 4 % to 5 % range, that will be a significant cut to our cost of living.

50:54This would feel like a nice raise that we can use to pay for all the kids' stuff or have some family fun. Credit to this person for having that mentality. See, not complaining. And thank you for sharing. This is a perfect Ben Carlson glass. This person has it all figured out. I love it. That's actually the interesting thing about the don't have to clean as much. You don't get this big of a property tax increases. I like the way they look at it. This person is wise. That's wisdom. That is wisdom right there. All right. All right. How much do you need to retire? This is a study from Northwestern Mutual.

51:22$1.5 million according to 4 ,600 adults. Sure,$1.5 million. Millennials say they need$1.65 million, up from just under$1 million in 2020. So millennials have given themselves a 60 % raise in retirement. I'm sorry, this is such a dumb exercise. How would I know? I'm 38 years old. No, I'm not. I'm 39. How would I know how much I need to retire? You really don't. You don't know how much you're going to spend then. You don't know what your health is going to be. You know what? I don't know. Four million bucks. Does that sound right? I have no idea. Yeah. And the truth is, since we know that there's, I think, what, 5 % of Americans are millionaires, something like that, if you take out houses.

52:03So we're talking savings. People make do without becoming a millionaire in retirement. Yes. Millions and millions of them do it every year. They make do with social security. How much do you need to retire with? You will retire with however much money you have and not a cent more or less. Yeah, maybe the question should be rephrased. How much do you want to retire with? That's the answer people are giving. That's how much I want to retire with. All right, so anyway, what else is in here? Anything? No, that's it. All right, we haven't done an anti-survey PSA in a while. I saw somebody tweet, this is John B.

52:37Holbein on Twitter. How many people go to church weekly? Survey says it's about one in five Americans. Cell phone tracker data say it's actually closer to 1 in 20 Americans. Holy shit. Mind blown. So Kyla Scanlon tweeted a link to a Torsten Slack post from 2023 that we missed, Ben. At least I think we missed it. I don't remember going over this. There's a chart showing the structural decline in response rates to surveys. Ah, I like it. I mean, we were ahead of the game here. These things are totally bogus. People don't respond anymore. Why would they? So that's great. So people, this is watch what they do, not what they say.

53:13So one in five people say, yeah, I go to church. But it's really - And it's really closer to one in 20. Wow. I mean, do we rest our case? Is this not the coup de grace? It is. Nailed it. All right. Financial advice is really dumb sometimes. There's a Wall Street Journal article. It's like six mistakes, or avoiding these financial mistakes before you retire in the next five years. And one of them says, overspending on your children. And they talk about this guy. he says uh this this attorney has a estate planning attorney has a client who spent so much on one of his adult children that he has to work longer as a result he's using his salary to support himself and one of his kids if he didn't have to support them he could have retired already which is yeah if guess what if i didn't have kids i probably could have retired already and do you think this guy would feel much better about himself if he retired early and let one of his kids flounder and not, and not, what does he, really?

54:05He'd feel better about himself in that situation? Listen, I say to Kobe and Logan every day before I give them a kiss and put them on the bus, don't forget in 20 years, you are on your own. See you later. Kick in the rear end. But I'm sure this guy feels better about being able to help his kids, even though it's not helping his own situation. So Ben, I'm in a bit of a dry spell. I don't know if that's dry with, with things on TV to watch. Um, and I've, so I've been doing more, more scrolling. Max has gone to absolute trash shit. There's nothing there. Well, it's harder to find the quality stuff now.

54:42What do you mean? Just a general? Cause they just keep adding these other services there and it's, it's reality shows and yeah. Um, but there's nothing, there's not, I mean, it used to be a good library. I don't know what happened. Maybe it's me, but I, I can't seem to find anything. And you know, conversely, you know it's actually got a pretty decent library? Peacock. Not bad. You know, the problem is there's so many streamers now. It used to be where every month you'd get a ton of churn and you'd get a bunch of new movies here and a bunch of new movies there. And now they all own their own libraries and they're not sharing as much anymore.

55:12So there's not as much change. So when you scroll, you feel like you're seeing the same thing over and over again and nothing new because that's the best part. It's being like, oh, I didn't know this was streaming. I'm going to watch that now. You don't get that as much anymore. We got a bunch of emails. talking about why do Midwesterners go to the West coast of Florida, East coasters go to the East coast. It's the highways. Yeah. I mean, we totally missed that. It's that highway goes to this side, this highway goes that side. It was as easy as that. Ben, I've had several experiences in the last call two to three weeks where people have either just been dicks for lack of a better word.

55:51Just I am, I am of the ilk. Just do the right thing. even if it's uncomfortable, even if it is something that you're potentially giving somebody news that you don't think they want to hear. Sometimes you just owe it to somebody to just tell them the truth, right? And so I've had a few experiences with that that annoyed me. I've had some customer service issues that really annoyed me, Audi. But then on the flip side, I had two experiences that were so wonderful that almost made me even more mad about the way that certain people handled certain situations. I'll give you an example. I bought, when we were in Colorado Springs, I bought, there was a boutique, like an antique store with all sorts of really, really cool stuff.

56:39They had like Lincoln signatures and swords from Gettysburg and George Washington pictures and signatures and Declaration of Independence, like really, really neat stuff. Those would make awesome NFTs. Yes, totally. That's what I was thinking. And so I bought a map from 1964 of Long Island. And she shipped it to me. And it sort of, I guess it's glued to the parchment paper. I don't know what I'm talking about. But it fell down. And so it was crooked. And I emailed her. And her response was, I'm so sorry. We found a local restoration place or whatever. it's already paid for, just go drop it off.

57:22Wow. I was like, that's how you treat people. That's hospitality, that's customer service. And you would recommend that place to someone else in the future, right? Hey, check this place. I'm not a collector, but maybe, who knows? Maybe I'll go back. Another example, I signed a contract where the person, it's a monthly fee. The person told me the fee verbally or via email, the fee that they quoted was higher than the fee that was actually in the docusign, the legal document. So I signed it and I said, hey, just an FYI, there was a disparity. And this person said, that's on me. You know, keep it.

57:58Like, we'll honor what we put in the contract. My mistake, right? And I said, you know what? Like, good for you. I really, really appreciate that. Like, way to start a relationship. And it's just like simple things. And I don't mean to lecture, but the people that like didn't do the right thing, it was just like such common decency, like courtesy, right? Just get back to people. Like, don't leave them hanging. Just common shit. And so when you see something good, it really stood out. And I don't know where I'm going with that, but I just wanted to share. Golden rule. I tell it to my kids all the time.

58:29Right? Treat people the way you want to be treated. There you go. It's a very simple rule of life. All right. So speaking of recommendations and streaming. Oh, Neil Brennan has a new special on Netflix. He's one of the few comedians that can consistently, like, make me laugh out loud and not just say, like, huh, that's funny. Very intelligent. Humor 2. Did you watch it yet? I didn't. That was a new one. Okay. Yeah, there's a few really good bits in there. So, okay. So I saw Civil War. Highly anticipated. The trailer looked incredible, right? And I went to an AMC theater on opening night. Is AMC still in business?

59:11And there was myself and my friend and four other people. Oh, so it was empty. I mean, opening night for a movie that did decent. I think it did$26 million over the weekend, something like that. And this was an IMAX slated type of movie. IMAX did release it and it would have been great in IMAX. And I'm not going to give any spoilers. So I almost hesitate to say anything about the movie. Other than I will say that I very, very much enjoyed it. And I think it definitely got a 20 to 30 % in theater premium. Okay. Even though no one else was there. Well, just, yeah, the experience of, of the bullets wasn't buying it just being really loud and it was effective.

59:56I thought it was really well done. Okay. So last week I said a great movie plot would be listening to an old song and it takes you back to that time. And this wasn't like a deja vu moment for me. I'd never seen the previews. There was, I was having, I was having the deja vu moment and I couldn't, I couldn't remember what it was. There was literally a movie that came out on Hulu this week called The Greatest Hits that that is the plot. What is the plot? You listen to a song and it brings you back in time to – like what I said is literally a plot of a movie. So I guess it was – Oh, I love it. I guess it was too easy.

1:00:29It looks okay. I didn't recognize any of the actors, but it's like a rom-com where someone dies and she goes back to see them because she keeps listening to the songs that they like. All right. I highly recommend the Steve Martin doc on Apple. it Apple is one of them that I feel like they don't really advertise much. You turn on Apple TV, what you said, you know, you, you turn on something, there'll just be something with a really good. And so it's a two part doc. And I, I, I'm a huge, huge fan of C Barton. He was, his whole shtick was, I'm going to be like the overconfident idiot. And my comedy standup is going to be so weird that it's going to stand out to people.

1:01:05And it's, it's, the funny thing is, it's, it's not even technically funny, his standup, but the way he does it makes it funny. Yeah, you know, it's such a great point. I've never seen a standup, but obviously I found him to be incredibly entertaining. He's just entertaining and he says - But is he funny? I mean, obviously he's funny, but not traditionally funny. No, it's not like he's doing setups and punchlines and stories. He's just being a goofball. And he's like, that's what he said. I just wanted to make people happy. And they show the people in the crowd and everyone had the biggest smile on their face.

1:01:39and he's like that's all I wanted and then he gets to the peak and he walks away and it's honestly just an excellent excellent just his whole thinking about it and how he set it up and it's really really good. Okay I also got into Ripley on Netflix. I have a lot of thoughts on it. You asked me should I watch and I said no for you because it's probably too slow. So I didn't realize this. It's literally the talented Miss Ripley but instead of a movie and that's one of my favorite movies from the 90s. I think 70 % of that movie is excellent. The last 30 % is just kind of meh. But that movie has Matt Damon and Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow and Philip Seymour Hoffman and Cate Blanchett.

1:02:23So it's just, and this is before any of them were huge. And the that guy, the dad. Yes, yeah, Dickie Greenleaf's dad. So this new one, I'm going to say good things and bad things about it. The first, the bad. Well, it's hard to not compare it to the original movie because, again, I love the movie so much. But the whole show is in black and white, which Duncan, I know Duncan is a fan of black and white because he's a cinephile. Italy is one of the most beautiful places on earth, and I can't see it in color. It boggles my mind why they made this decision. How many episodes have you watched? I think I'm a six in.

1:02:57So the thing is... Oh, so you're in. Oh, I'm in. It's very slow and way more tedious than the original, but it's very good. So do you stand by the, I won't like it? I think, try an episode. See what you think. It's - You know, I really appreciate that. And that's one of my, that's one of my meaningless superpowers is when you say to me, hey, you won't like this. I love it. I don't get offended. It's the opposite. Thank you for not wasting my time. I said that to Chris the other day. I said, oh, this isn't for you. And he goes, what does that mean? Yeah, everyone has his own face. Like, no, no, no.

1:03:31I'm doing you a favor. That's what it means. You're welcome. So I have a hard time comparing it to the original because I love the original so much. Jude Law is like the most charismatic guy in the world, Matt. But the black and white really irritates me. But whatever, I can move past that. The guy who plays Ripley, Andrew Scott, he played Moriarty on, did you ever watch the Benedict Cumberbatch Sherlock Holmes? Mm-mm. It's really good. He plays the bad guy in that. He also is the priest in Fleabag season two, remember? And he's so good. He as Ripley is so creepy and good. He's better than Matt Damon as Ripley.

1:04:04All the other characters in the movie are better than the characters that are on the TV show. But him as Ripley, he's so, so good. And so, yeah, it's like the movie, but more slow and a little tedious. And they made some different choices, but that's for Matt and Ripley. But if you're like a film person, you're going to say this is the most beautiful thing ever. The black and white thing. The only thing times black and white has ever worked ever in anything is Schindler's List and the Three Stooges. That's it. Otherwise, color. Wait, no, no, no. I mean, there's others, but Casablanca. I know you won't see movies from the past, but you really should see that movie.

1:04:39I watched a little bit of it. I can't watch movies before 1970. So, but let's say Netflix did an A-B test and they said, here's Ripley in color and here it is in black and white. How many people would choose to watch it in black and white? If you had two options. Duncan. One percent, maybe. Yeah, yeah. That's all I got. All right, Animal Spirits at the Compound News. Thank you for listening. Ben, I'll see you tomorrow. That's right. I'm coming to New York. See you then. And we'll see you next week.