The myth might end up being better advice than the actual optimal to do, which is it’s kind of funny people make this this is start start it without dividend. And and it’s like it’s just totally misleading people who have this mentality and don’t want to spend money because they want to accumulate wealth. They can end up with a lot of wealth and an inability to spend it because there’s so anxious about about wanting to live fully and wanting and wanting to save even when they’ve surpassed any amount of while they could ever need. They still can spend it because of how this mentality this says the rational reminder podcast, a weekly reality check on sensible investing and financial decision making from two Canadians were hurt by by may, Benjamin Felix, chief investment officer, and then bore a Lodi portfolio manager at P. W. L. Capital. Good to be back with your ban. It feels like a long time. It has been a while band. It is very good to see and good to be back. Ring, Yeah, you’re in a different location today. This is my first time recording from our Montreal office. First time. Everyone, no. So you’re right. Well, some fresh space. Let’s get into get into today’s topic. So real quick before before we jumped the topic, we we have AA new idea. They’re going to be trying to the podcast. We just want to give listeners the heads up to know it’s coming. We’re going to have some PWL client on the podcast to talk about their experience with PWL stuff like the planning work we’ve done for for and and you know it’s interesting and this was probably going to sound hyperbolic, but I don’t think it is how working with pdl has changed their lives. And and that’s something that I think we we cannot know. But when we started reaching our clients to ask if they’d be interest in doing this, a lot of them they’ve ve agreed to do it and a lot of them have come back with points that they want to discuss that were even more interesting than I think we had anticipated it just in terms of the impact dead working with us has had on on literally on the trajectory of their lives. So I think it’s going to be I need to be really need as you can imagine, there’s a whole legal and complaints angle that we have to sort out. But we’re we’re working on that right now and you can be sure they’ll be a disclaim for those episodes. 对。But we think it can be a lot of fun and and hopefully interesting for listeners to here that this is something that has come up in in comments in the Russian miner community in the past that people would love to hear client stories and then client experience. So we’re we’re going to we’re going to make it happen. Yeah, I’m not too surprised frankly, that you know people have said that it’s had a profound impact on their life. I think you know especially we are coming from a situation, maybe we’re working with an adviser and advisory firm that left a really unpleasant taste in your mouth and you really set you back in your financial goals to be able to you know come to a place that’s a better fit and deliver a higher level of service. Yeah for sure it will change your life. I think some of the feedback that we’re seeing is, is around just clarity in making important life decisions and people realizing that they there were things that they could have been doing with their lives that they were not doing because they didn’t have clarity. Other financial situation翻译way Yeah you say Yeah it’s going to be interesting for sure Yeah I didn’t imagine also real quick that that July 2026 was the biggest month ever for rational。An reminder, podcast views and downloads, s audio o downloads and YouTube views combined, they hit three, three, 385000, which breaks are a previous record. So just just kind of need and wanted to say thanks, everyone, for for tuning in and making that happen. Yeah, that’s exciting. Big number. Yeah, it’s a bit a big now. I remember when we first launch the podcast that we got like a few hundred downloads and very like, wow, that is amazing. So Yeah, we’ve come a long way for sure. Yeah, pretty, pretty cool. And then last last thing I keeps saying real quake. But last thing here, I was on a couple of other podcast recently. I was on the aced coffee hour podcast and that that should when this comes out, I think that will have come out the the previous Sunday. I was also on the investor podcast, which is a Montreal based podcast that is usually a French language podcast. They made their first ever exception for me to do an English episode. They gave me a little bit grief for that. But that’s okay. And that was a really fun conversations that I was that that’s actually why I’m in Montreal right now. Ice coffee hour is based on the loss Vegas. So I actually went there to the studio of record, which is a very cool experience. It and and investors as well as a person’s studio so they do all the recordings in person makes me want to do our our own studio. And but I don’t know how we I don’t know how we’d work for logistics on that one with you and I living in different cities. Yeah that would be a challenge. It’s interesting the way that some of these podcasts are actually, you know asking guests to travel across the country, across the continent to do our life recording in an era where certaines quite possible, as we’ve demonstrated, to do it remotely. But it’s a different view. I think it’s you know you you have a little bit more control over the audio video for sure, but I think it’s probably a quite a different field. I’m sure you found them being in the studio or sitting across the table from the person interviewing you rather than doing it online. So mean, listen, when we have guests on on this bug case, we will chat with them for a bit beforehand. When I was in lost Vegas for the ice coffee on our podcast, we, we played in a pool before recording and just kind of hung out. They said that the tradition, I always do a do a game of pool. I was a lot better than I thought I would be. They asked me if I ever played before. As I got, I am terrible, but I, I was pretty good. Good, you go. You never used me to use the rake with it. You can probably reach all the way of the pocket on the opposite, eh it’s true有点，yes. Well, I mean, what we will see maybe that one day will there will be a rational major studio. Well, maybe will put it right in between Ottawa, Toronto or something will drive to king’s in every week to record it or something. So呃呃，under our main topic. So this is this is a topic listeners may may have seen me talk about a in a YouTube video. It’s a video that I posted a few weeks ago now that it is performed quite well. A lot of people watched it and a lot of people had a lot of things to say about it. So I’m excited to talk through the points and get your perspectives. And but Yeah, tons of comments on the YouTube video. There’s a whole thread in the rush reminder community talking about this video. I it gets I mean, it’s kind of set up to be AA video or a topic that won’t generate lots of discussion. So the topic is the biggest myths in personal finance. And it’s really like I tried to think about like, sorry, I go and no, I was just going to say, I mean, these myths you know there are so many I think misunderstandings and let’s call it misleading advice, right? It’s mostly there’s a grain of truth in all of them but there’s usually this sort of subtle point is missed. Yeah I think all of us can can can benefit from getting off on the right food and not but there’s prae any of these when we start our investing journey. So Yeah so I try to think through what are the what are the most persistent maths in personal finance that, like you said, that that lead people to make financial decisions that we evaluated as bad if we had more information about the decision that was being made. What one example in this one is probably the most controversial one, at least based on the comments on on the video, is that you should you should save as much as possible, as early as possible to benefit from compounding that, that is foundational personal al finance advice that a lot of people agree on. But I would say that it’s so it’s at least incomplete. And then I explain why and we’re going to debunk nine more myths, kind of like I want to to hopefully help listeners make better financial decisions. I did talk to James Parkin, who’s one of PWSSO founders, about myth one we had lunched together today and I’ll share he is some interesting insight on on this one. So the first myth is that you should save as much as you can when you’re Young to benefit from compounding. And this is as I said, it’s it’s just taken as an absolute truth and personal finance. It sounds reasonable. And like you said then like a lot of these mess, it does have elegance of truth. A longer time horizon certainly makes compound interest more powerful. And to be completely clear, compounding is definitely an important tool for building wealth at long horizons. But the strategy of saving as much as possible, as early as possible, neglects what I think is even more important consideration, which is that when you’re Young, your income is is typically at its lowest point for your life and will likely steadily rise over time as your career progresses before tapering off as you approach retirement. Now that that statement turns out to be one of the most controversial pieces of this, again, judging from the discussion that stand from this, from this video, a lot of people said, we don’t know that your incomes going to rise over time. And there’s a lot of there’s a lot of pessimism. And a lot of it seems to be related to I right now what it a lot of pessimism about whether we can expect our incomes to rise over time and whether we’re going to have jobs in the future. And which is, I mean, it’s a Faix point. I guess I think, I think a lot of long term decisions require a little bit of optimism. Otherwise you’d behave very differently. And if you were truly pessimistic about some of these things, you wouldn’t save it all. And and and I mean, honestly, I have heard that response from some Young people. You know what’s the point of saving? I’m not going to be able to retire anyway. And Yeah I mean, that’s a sad thing to here right is someone you know you’ve got kids ban minor older than yours and that is not a place where you want to be when you’re in your late 20 years, early thirties. But it’s it’s a real fear, so we can’t dismiss it. Yeah Yeah so so so the the premise of this myth is is when you your younger incomes low, your standard of living is probably the lowest that it’ll never be throughout your life. You grow up, you have your parents taking care of you, but then you’re at this point where you’re a Young adult, maybe your parents are supporting this and you in your living standards just at the lowest compared to your eventual peak earning years in your retirement, at least it in a typical economic life cycle of a of a human. So at that stage of life, life early on in life, the marginal utility that’s like the the amount of additional satisfaction you can generate from each dollar that you spend on improving your standards of living at its highest, the marginal utility of consumption is that at its highest when you’re at this stage of life. So you think about like an additional five utility spent at age 25 might mean living in a safer area, in a nice room apartment, eating better food, healthier food, maybe more vegetables, maybe organic produced, I don’t know whatever berries, stuff like that, it might be better mean getting a better education, driving more reliable car forming core memories. This is what I talk to to James about at lunches that he looks back and he was a pretty aggressive saver, but he looks back and a lot of his friends who are now older, getting closer to retirement age, they have all these fond memories of all the traveling. They when they’re in the 20 and and and he doesn’t doesn’t that that he looks back now. And like I, I, I wish that I done that which was a pretty interesting, pretty interesting and come for him for him to make and that stuff to stay stay with you forever though those core memories that you look back on and you can you can you don’t get a better chance to do stuff like that because you’re only Young once. So if we take that same 5000 8:25 at age 45, it’s going to yield a much smaller, increased your standard of living. That means like if if you’re saving as much as you possibly can when you’re Young, when your income and standard of living are comparatively low till later in your life, you’re sacrificing more of what matters when you can least afford it. And so that this is a line that the neck, the writer that I’ve been working with at PWL. Road, which which I think is pretty good, you’re effectively, I think it’s very good, not just pretty good, Nick, this is AA great line. He says you’re effectively robbing from the poor, which is your current lower income self, and giving to the rich, which is your higher, higher income future self. Another way to think about this, and I wrote this one, I think it’s pretty good, is that is that money is not the only thing that compounds over time as people worried if you’ve invest now, I think what the compounding think about the exponential growth, how much more you’re going to have later, which is true. However, skills, experiences and health as some examples also compound over time. And so I think focusing on only wealth accumulation, this is the bigger picture of living a living a good life Yeah to clarify that one, the ban. And when you say health compounds over time, I mean it for most people to deteriorate rates over time. And but it’s the same point, right, which is enjoy your money when you are Young and healthy verses saving it so you can spend more when you may not be able to as active with the funds right? Yeah everyone’s health does deteriorate time when you poor lifestyle problems. When you are Young, you need to deteriorating health at a much quicker pace over time. So you can let you know if you eat poorly through your 20 years because you want to save money as you’re living on Roman noodles. And that gives you Carry style problems or vascular problems or whatever when you’re in your forties or fifties, that’s a problem. The compounds. And Yeah, there’s not a whole lot you can do about 20 years down the road. But if you’ve been eating whenever kale instead of Roman, then you might not have had the same health outcome. Yeah, I mean, it’s it’s a good point. I mean, certainly don’t. I would never recommend to someone that day, you know make ATFSA contribution instead of eating properly. I mean that I mean, I don’t know superficially, maybe that seems like a responsible decision, but it certainly isn’t if you take the long view. So Yeah, I think think that you and I did get lots of criticism for this point because people say, well, you should say as much as you can even if it means making sacrifices. But it Yeah that since pathological, and I know really, really interesting thing about this, that it is come up in some discussions I ve had since making this video, is that people who have this mentality and don’t want to spend money because they want to accumulate wealth, they can end up with a lot of wealth and an inability dispended because there’s so anxious about about wanting to live fruit and wanting and wanting to save, even when they’ve surpassed any amount of while they could ever need. They still can spend it because of how this mentality, I think that’s a chronic problem that wealth advisers see. I mean, obviously, look, we are not seeing a cross section of the population. Sure. We are working with people who are on the well off side, of course. So this is not a problem that affects everyone, but it is a problem that affects people who save aggressively and invest wisely over time. They end up in the position that they had hoped they would be, and they’re not able to enjoy it. I see it all the time, right? It’s fascinating. Yeah, it is. But but it’s it’s not really that surprising, I think, when you think about it because if you spend your whole life nurturing and developing a specific habit, it’s a bit naive to think you’re going to be able to just flip a switch at some point and become a spend drift, right? It’s just no longer in your nature, but I will see that one of the most important jobs, I think I do with my clients is to try to get them to think about that a little bit differently once they are in or close to retirement. And you know we do the projections, you know 150% funded retirement, and we tell them, look, you can spend as much as you want realistically, and you’re going to not going to run out of money as the chances of you depleting your portfolio or a remote. So now we have to think about, you know, what do you truly enjoy spending money on? Because just to tell people spend more money is insulting. And on help rush, but to help them say, and I was working with the client recently, you was like this, they have really felt now they even enjoyed a luxurious travel, you know, flying business class and staying in nature places and found we love this and that’s how they spend their money, right? But I mean, to bring all of this back full circle is like, I think you should try to enjoy some of those experiences when you’re younger too because like I mean Yeah there’s nothing more sad I think then looking back on your life and regretting not doing things that you wish you had done especially if you’re at the age where you know you’re never going to do them now right and certainly I work with people who no, they get into their late seventies, let’s say maybe a bit older and travel is just not a thing they’re going to do anymore. They just thrown done. I’m not getting on a plane anymore and having my knees broken by the person in front of me. I don’t have to tell you this then. But you know, for those people who if they didn’t travel when they were younger and they kept saying I’m going to put this off until I’m retired, there’s a little bit of regret there. 嗯，yes, Yeah, I’ve been thinking a lot about this. I actually, I started writing. I ve never had time to to really put put a lot of time to do Yeah, but I started reading a video that follows from this about why spending decisions are controversial because people have polarizing views on the views on as