If you think your finances are no laughing matter, you might be spending too much time watching the news or reading financial prospectuses. Because lately, we’ve noticed a lot of laughing going on as comedians talk about money, and people in the financial world using humor to communicate about financial topics. In this article, we profile three examples of people who are connecting money and humor, plus a fourth well-known comedian who gives us a worthy financial example to follow.
“The truth is funny,” insists Kathryn Cicoletti, aka Ms. Cheat Sheet, who spent over 10 years as a hedge fund insider. Working as a research analyst and then moving into a sales position, Kathryn created custom portfolios for institutional investors. A top revenue producer on her team, Cicoletti says that “commissions were good… but life was not.” Her lack of work-life balance crushed her spirit, and not even her half-a-million-plus annual income could resolve her growing dissatisfaction.
As Cicoletti grew increasingly frustrated with the industry, including how many Wall Streeters manipulated rather than educated their main street clients, she staged an exit. She started a blog to rescue her sanity, built up her savings, and left to start MsCheatSheet.com (formerly Makin’ Sense Babe). Now she is studying sketch writing and looking for ways to entertain as well as explain the confusing world of finances.
With her new platform, Kathryn combines no-nonsense analysis of business and economic trends with witty skits, videos, and jargon-free explanations. She parodies Wall Street firms with her irreverent Horse$hit Asset Management system, pulling back the curtains on the ways that financial corporations and salespeople can be self-serving rather than focused on clients’ best interests. In one of her videos, she role-plays a too-typical broker or advisor with a glib attitude:
“We convince you to move your investments to asset classes that have already had huge gains for the year, because you’re more likely to buy something that’s already made a lot of money, and we like to capitalize on your stupidity! And no, we don’t care if we recommend a stock or fund that loses a lot of value, we get paid the same commission regardless!”
In addition to outing financial salespeople for their use of confusing charts, jargon, and other questionable tactics, Cicoletti dives into investment news details, such technology updates, instructions for investors to check their mid-year portfolio statements, reasons why your 401(k) is likely to underperform the market, and an insightful perspective on a stock sell-off in China.
Jason Zweig is a WSJ columnist known for his humorous perspective as well as his analysis in articles such as, “Gold: It’s Still a Pet Rock.” He is also the author of Your Money and Your Brain, a book on the neuroscience of investing, and editor of a revised version of Benjamin Graham’s classic on value investing, The Intelligent Investor.
Now Zweig has moved into humorist territory in an homage to Ambrose Beirce’s satirical The Devil’s Dictionary (Beirce was a contemporary of Mark Twain), which poked fun of topics such as government, church and family. Zweig takes on Wall Street in his own satire in his latest book, The Devil’s Financial Dictionary.
Some of Jason’s more succinct “gleefully cynical” definitions include:
BIASED (adj.) Human.
DATA (n.) The raw material from which Wall Street fabricates distortions for marketing purposes.
FORECASTING (n.) The attempt to predict the unknowable by measuring the irrelevant; a task that, in one way or another, employs most people on Wall Street.
IRRATIONAL (adj.) A word you use to describe any investor other than yourself.
MUTUAL FUND (n.) A fund that is not equal: its investors share all risks equally, whereas its managers share all fees exclusively.
REGULATOR (n.) A bureaucrat who attempts to stop rampaging elephants by brandishing feather dusters at them. Also, a future employee of a bank, hedge fund, brokerage, investment management firm, or financial lobbying organization.
STOCK MARKET (n.) A chaotic hive of millions of people who overpay for hope and underpay for value.
THRIFT (n.) The obsolete practice of spending less money than you earn; once believed to be a virtue, now regarded as a disturbing form of deviant behavior.
John Oliver is a British-born comedian, whose Last Week, Tonight show on HBO has enjoyed enormous popularity. While Oliver asserts the #1 focus of the show is a comedy (with sometimes off-color humor), ironically, many viewers find themselves also tuning in for the enlightening-yet-hilarious investigative journalism.
Oliver has a talent for tackling complex topics and bringing them into the limelight, such as civil asset forfeiture, government surveillance, congressional fundraising, and, most recently, retirement plans.
In less than 3 months, the YouTube video of John Oliver’s retirement plan show has been viewed almost 5 million times. In the segment, Oliver tackles:
Why terms such as “financial adviser, financial planner, investment consultant, and financial analyst” may not indicate any special credentials or training.
The Department of Labor’s new fiduciary law, which makes it “currently legal for financial advisers to put their own interests ahead of yours… unless they are a fiduciary.”
The wealth-killing compounding effect of fees over time. Demonstrating how fees can reduce an investment account by as much as two-thirds over 50 years, Oliver says, “Think of fees as termites, they’re tiny, they’re barely noticeable, and they can eat away your… future!”
The poor performance of actively-managed funds that may lag behind portfolios randomly chosen by a Orlando the stock-picking cat.
How “normal and customary” broker fees on a 401(k) plan can siphon a million dollars in fees from 35 employees contributing just $6k a year over 30 years. (Disgusted with the fees, some of which were rather hidden until a financial expert analyzed the plan, Oliver publicly vowed to dump their brand new 401(k) provider as soon as they are able.)
Some of Oliver’s advice is common sense and solid – start saving now, work only with advisors who are fiduciaries, and don’t let your account returns be compromised by high fees. We hope millions of people may be paying more attention to their finances because of Oliver’s show, yet we urge people to look beyond “typical” financial products and advice to obtain substantially better, more predictable results.
While you’d be much better off following Last Week Tonight‘s advice than doing nothing, the recommendations reflect “typical” financial planning that we believe has failed the majority of Americans. A few areas where Prosperity Economics differs from Last Week Tonight’s recommendations include:
avoiding stock market risk altogether;
choosing alternative investment and savings solutions that exist outside of the typical Wall Street brokerage environment;
focusing on creating cash flow rather than accumulation;
paying more attention to saving/investing results rather than simply lowering fees on products with risk;
finding meaningful work and remaining productive throughout life rather than having full “retirement” as a goal; and
following principles that have worked for many successful investors long before there was such a thing as financial planning.
For more on Prosperity Economics, we invite you to download our complimentary Prosperity Accelerator Pack.
Jay Leno’s advice on saving money is no joke. Leno, who has turned his car hobby into a new CNBC show, Jay Leno’s Garage, has built an estimated net worth of hundreds of millions of dollars. However, the secret to his wealth may have just as much to do with the financial habits started in his early days as a mechanic, as with his talk show and comedy success.
We’ve all heard of celebrities seem to spend their money as fast – or faster- than they earn it. In contrast, Leno’s approach to his earliest paychecks have created tremendous financial freedom for him. As he explained in a USA Today article:
“I had two jobs as a kid, one at a fast-food restaurant and one at a Ford dealership. And I’d put the money from one job in one pocket and spend it. And the other paycheck I’d save,” he says. “I do that now. I have always banked my Tonight Show money and lived off the stand-up. I have one credit card, no mortgage, and I don’t lease.”
Today, Leno is known for his generosity as well as his wealth and celebrity. He has supported a number of colleges and universities, according to an InsidePhilanthropy.com article. Leno’s keen interest in historic vehicles has led Leno to sponsor a scholarship at McPherson (Kansas) College, which offers a four-year degree in auto restoration. The Lenos (Jay and his wife, Mavis) have also actively supported women’s rights and animal rights. And he has donated a number of his collector cars to charitable causes, as well. In August 2012, he auctioned off his Fiat 500 for $385,000 to help wounded war veterans pay for housing, with proceeds going to the Fisher House. Leno has also auctioned off tours of his garage (his personal car collection) for charity.
“These machines are really my only indulgence,” Leno explains to the USA Today reporter in his garage, referring to his cars. “Other than that, well, I’m still the kind of guy who goes to McDonald’s with clipped-out coupons. My wife, Mavis, will take me out to a nice restaurant, but the whole time I’m going, ‘Food costs this much?’ “
We thought we’d leave you with some laughs. Here’s an “oldie but goodie,” a Saturday Night Live skit in which Steve Martin and Amy Poehler get some valuable financial advice. Enjoy!
If thinking about your money makes it hard to laugh… if you feel stressed by market ups and downs and frustrated with low interest rates and poor results, you’re not alone. If this is you, we invite you to explore Prosperity Economics. Download and read Financial Planning Has Failed, and reach out to us if we can help you grow your assets, increase your cash flow, or start a plan for long-term savings and permanent protection.