I spent all day in the emergency room (ER) last Saturday.
Not for myself. A family member endured a stroke, and I wanted to be there for moral support.
As anyone who has been through such an experience knows, there are lots of lessons hidden in this type of thing. I’m still working through some of them.
Today I want to share with you what jumped out at me very quickly in the ER. It isn’t pretty. But I think there’s a valuable insight we can take away from this.
To set the stage, there aren’t actual rooms in the ER. Patients have their own spaces separated by shower curtains.
So you hear everything going on around you. And when you’re there for over six hours, you pick up on quite a bit. Here’s what jumped out at me…
There’s a big underbelly out there.
By that, I mean there’s a part of our society that is just scraping along – day by day. I suspect they don’t have vision. Or aspirations. They probably lack hope.
I don’t say this to be judgmental. It’s just a hunch based on my observations.
Whenever a new patient enters the ER, a healthcare worker asks them as series of questions. One of those questions is, “do you use recreational drugs?”. And if the answer is yes, they ask for specifics.
I overheard four or five of these conversations last Saturday. All but one of them answered “yes” to this question. And heroin was the hard drug of choice.
What’s more, the healthcare workers seemed to expect this. At least, as best as I could tell.
And I couldn’t help but wonder – how does one get to that point? The point at which you are in and out of the ER because excessive drug use is destroying your health…
Of course, this is a very nuanced problem. But I think at least part of it is economic in nature.
The government school systems are silent around the subjects of money and finance.
Public school students spend twelve years trapped in the classroom… yet, they learn absolutely nothing about the one subject that’s critical to building a self-sufficient life. A life in which we are in control of our time, our decisions, and our destiny.
That’s why we created our newly updated Finance for Freedom course. It’s the financial education that every high school and college student should have received.
And I mean that.
We have put together a program that will help anybody master their finances in thirty days, regardless of their current situation.
It all starts with learning the secrets of money. We work up to basic personal finance. Then we take a deep dive into asset allocation, specific investments, and the principles of building monthly cash flow.
And in honor of all those people who make up the underbelly of our society, we’re going to offer the course for just $21 this week. That’s 30% off the normal price.
Just go right here if you would like to check out our offering: https://membership.phoenicianleague.com/courses/finance-for-freedom
Please use coupon code “ER” at the checkout page to get the 30% discount.
I firmly believe that many of our problems today are rooted in economics. Let’s help spread financial literacy far and wide.