There's a lot happening these days, but I have just the thing to get you up to speed on what matters without taking too much of your time. The 7 From the Washington Post is a podcast that gives you the seven most important and interesting stories, and we always try to save room for something fun. You get it all in about seven minutes or less. I'm Hannah Juhl. I'll get you caught up with The 7 every weekday, so follow The 7 right now. I'm Nicole Lappin, the only financial expert you don't need a dictionary to understand. It's time for some money rehab. Today, we're talking about funny business. Not like Sam Bankman-Fried on trial for fraud funny business, but legit funny business, the business of comedy. And to break down everything you ever wanted to know about how you can be paid to be hilarious, I'm talking to one of the most hilarious Guys, I know Josh Johnson. He's a stand-up comedian and a writer on The Daily Show. And this deep dive will be a two-parter. Tomorrow, you'll hear from Brian Khalil, football player turned producer, who goes beyond comedy and tackles the media landscape at large and explains how you can actually get your big idea to the silver screen.

But until then, here's Josh. Josh Johnson. Welcome to Money Rehab.

How are you doing?

Are you ready to talk about derivatives and currency?

I'm ready to be taught about derivatives. I know what you're saying. I think I understand currency. So any help that you can give me is going to be phenomenal.

You don't need my help. You are crushing it. We first met for our listeners, a little BTS, when we hosted Advertising Week, not to be confused with Ad Week. Advertising Week, the most fun gig I assume you've ever had.

It's up there. Top five.

No. Really?

A lot of stuff that I do is the same. So to be able to a different thing was fire.

I had a blast. I do a lot of these business conferences. As you know, I rarely think people are actually legit funny IRL. Normally, it's just people who think they're hilarious and only make themselves laugh. But it got me thinking about the business of being a comedian. And we talked a little bit about this there, but I wanted to open it up to our listeners. I'd love if you could help us follow the money trail from the beginning. If someone wants to be a paid comedian, where do they start?

You definitely start not being paid. When you start, there is no money. And to be fair, you probably don't deserve money because you're not good yet. A lot of people who make the transfer from... The two most interesting transfers you see in comedy are One, which is a little bit obvious, which is theater. A lot of people are actors and they get into it, so then they don't really have as much of the stage, right? So they can at least have presence from the beginning. The other one is law. What? Yeah, a lot of law students and lawyers quit the law and become comedians. Some even like Moonlight doing stand-up and stay in law.

That's really weird, don't you think?

It's very weird, but this is a stretch. It's a long walk, but stick with me. I think it does make sense because when you are a lawyer, you are presented with evidence and you have to convince people of your side of things. The same thing works for comedy. With comedy, we all saw the same thing happen. But now I have take, and I have to express my take to you in a way that makes you either agree with me or makes you laugh because of how dumb it is. It makes sense why law students would be so good at transferring that skill into comedy, but then just to get back on track with the money trail.

Wait, can we not go back to the money trail for one moment? I'm still hung up on lawyers trying to be comedians. I feel like that's comedy. I have I've only met very boring-ass lawyers with no or negative personality. I have a girlfriend in New York. When we were out dating, she was like, My type is like, lawyer, consultant, banker, somebody with a 401k. I was like, I would rather blow my brains out. I think those dudes are notoriously boring.

It's not all of them, but the ones that do it, it's amazing. It's a lot like how there are athletes who are very good at multiple sports, but most athletes can do one sport and that's it. I feel like most lawyers are good at the law, and that's where they should stop. But every once in a while, you'll get a lawyer who just the way that their mind works is also acutely primed for jokes. I don't really get it, but it's a theme with a lot of my friends. I have four friends that were lawyers and do comedy now.

Do they do your deals?

No, they do not. I'm sure they do their own deals.

That's helpful. All right, back to the money trail. You want to be a comedian, you're going to be working for free.

You're going to be working for free, especially as a stand-up, for a good amount of time. And there are certain things, I don't know how you would relate it in another industry, but there are certain things that are never going to pay well, but the practice that you get or what you get in return is invaluable. So we're hopefully getting close to being out of the era of no pay for exposure, because now with the Internet, everyone can self-facilitate their exposure. So for instance, if you have a great idea that people like and you just put it on YouTube, you will gain a following that then can be monetized. But there are going to be things like when you do spots in the city. So let's say you are a standup and you're doing several spots in New York or Chicago or Austin, Texas in a night. So let's say you have six spots, which is a lot.

You have six different appearances, that means?

Yeah, like six different 10 to 15 minutes spots at clubs. Clubs.

At different clubs.

Yeah. And so it's a lot of running around. So you have to already take out the money that you're going to spend on Ubers to get from one to the other to make sure you're on time. But you're also going to get paid, especially if it's a weekend, you'll probably get paid pretty well for that 10 or 15 minutes. So let's say it's 100 bucks or something, right? So then in one night of six spots, that's $600. And then hopefully, you only spent 60 on Ubers because in New York, a lot of the clubs are close to each other. That is good for that one night, but it's not going to be every day, and it's at the higher tier of everyone wanting to book you. So then you have to make money through going on the road and doing whole weekends at certain clubs that are more feature, headliner-type clubs. So a lot of clubs in major cities will be showcase, and they do that by basically having a bunch of comedians on one show. And that way everyone gets paid a little and the audience gets a nice little smorgasbord of comedic taste.

But then when you go on the road and you go to a place that is a bit smaller, so let's say you go to Pkepsi or you're in even Boston or something, and you're at a headlining club and you're doing the whole weekend, they will make door deals. They will have a guarantee or a split for you to where if you are a hard ticket seller and you're bringing in all these people, you get a split of that revenue. And the more people you can guarantee bring in, the higher your split is and everything. And so those appearances are ideal, in a sense, to be making money. And then you still have to be really smart as you go because there's no union and there's no pension. So you have to be figuring out what your IRA situation is going to be. And if you are making enough money, you will usually incorporate. And then that way you can get into a SEP IRA, and you can really save up some money.

Okay, Josh. Talk dirty to me.

I know. I mean, the likelihood is actually so slim. So I'm trying to both give a trajectory, but also let people know this is after sometimes years.

All right. So door deal is something that I've never heard about before. The door deal is essentially a revenue split, but you have to get to a certain level of fame to even ask for that?

Yes. Or let's say you're working with someone who is used to doing a door deal because maybe it's out of the kindness of their heart or because they gave you a very low guarantee. Because the guarantee to the split is basically if a club is giving you a chance, right? Let's say you are four years in, you're doing your first headline weekend, which means you have an hour of actual stand-up that you can do, and everyone loves you and wants to come see you. So you have someone opening for you, and there's a host, and you're the headliner, this is your show, right? If a club, they're taking a chance on you because you have no market history, they will probably offer you a decent guarantee because that's their way of saying, Look, we like you and we believe in you. We don't really know who you can bring here. So we are going to just take this one on the chin as a show of goodwill for a future relationship, and we are going to give you this guaranteed money. So that way, whether one person walks through the door or you sell out the whole weekend, you at least have this money.

Then past a certain point of sales, right? So let's say in a weekend, you bring in $6,000 worth of sales for them, and it's blowing everyone out of the water, and no one saw this coming. You can have something in the contract where in case I sell really well and I'm bringing you a lot of money, after a certain amount of money where you definitely get your guaranteed money back, that's when we start to split things. And so to your point, more Fame or the more of a history someone has in a market as a ticket seller, the better deal split that they can get. So there are some comedians out there that do... I'll take all the door because I'm that famous. I know everyone's going to come through and everyone's going to buy a ticket. You're going to be sold out all weekend, and we're going to add shows. I'm going to take the whole door and you take all of the drinks. You take all of the food sales. And they're making so much money in that sense that they don't mind that thing. But when the jury is not out on you as far as how many tickets you can sell, that's when the negotiation is you're not the A-side, as boxers would say.

Does it typically take four years, though, to get your own headlining show? I mean, that feels like a long time.

I mean, it's so different for everybody. Some people are headlining in two years, some people are headlining in six. It's such a personal journey because it's such a loner thing, and there's no meritocracy to it.

If you suck, you never headline.

There's no graduation process. If no one wants to see you, no one's going to come see you. And then the other way that I know some people make money is going ahead and putting on their own show, not waiting for a club, not waiting for anyone to give them an okay or a cosign, and they will rent out a space and invite all their friends and family and everything. And in those few instances, you wouldn't be able to do that across the country, probably, but in those few instances, that can be the beginning of your market history that you can send to other buyers and be like, I sold out this 300-person theater. That's at least impressive enough if you're in the same market that they're like, Okay, we'll give you a chance.

It's like proof of concept.

Exactly. Then past that, there are so many different ways because obviously, you can montage your channels on the platforms and everything. But then you get into acting, you get into all the other ways that comedic actors make money, sketchwriters make money and everything. So as multifaceted as you can is going to be your chances of bringing in the most streams of revenue. But it is very difficult. And I know some people just want to do their one thing. There are a lot of comedic actors who are like, I like acting. I don't really want to be trying to travel to Skoki, Illinois, to do a weekend of stand-up. I'd rather be in a movie. So I'm just going to keep auditioning.

But you talked about different spots in one night, like six different spots or something like that. Is it a typical loop that comedians know, like in LA, the Comedy Store, the Improv? Do they just hit one after the other?

A good example is this weekend on Saturday, I have six spots, but two of them are at the Comedy Cellar, and four of them are at the stand. So all in New York, luckily, this is not a case where I have to jump back and forth. I'm going to be at the Cellar, and I'm going to do those two shows. And then later, I'm at the and that's for four shows. So I'll be doing their downstairs, doing their upstairs, doing their downstairs, doing their upstairs. And so all of it ends up being six spots in total. But thankfully, I only have to go to two places to do that. So there are some people that are running all over. They're running from the city to Brooklyn. And that has its time and its place, especially if you're not on the road that weekend or you're working on something, like when people are working on their special, because I did forget probably one of the biggest ways of making money and expanding your profile. If you do a comedy special for, let's say, a streamer, or if you put it out on YouTube and it does really well, that thing helps overall to expand your profile because now people either discover you on Netflix, Peacock, HBO, or whatever, or your fans who are already looking for you to put something out, come to those things and watch them specifically because you're on it.

Usually, specials, if they're not self-produced and you're doing it with a network, with some studio, they will pay you out a large chunk. And so there are a lot of comedians that will live off of the money from their special show, ideally for a year or something. It's almost like a book deal in a sense, where it works the reverse way, where in a book deal, you're getting some advance to live off of while you write the book. With your special, you've done all this work and all this touring and all this practice to make a really compelling hour of comedy that makes people like you and want to come see you live. But then the other benefit is that that's special. If once again, it's not self-produced and just put out for your people on YouTube or something, if it's done with a streamer, is paying you back, in a sense, for all that time and all the money that you spent touring and all the spots that you did and everything.

Well, you've done two specials.

Yes.

So essentially, you had to put the money and you recouped it.

Interestingly, the first one that I ever did, which was with Comedy Central that Trevor produced, that one, I didn't have to put up any money. That one was Comedy Central coming to me, and I had a long relationship with them and done a lot of different spots for them. And so they were like, We want to do a special with you, and Trevor's going to produce, and we'll put it out on Paramount Plus when Paramount Plus comes out, right? Then pandemic happened, and I was like, Oh, but we still ended up making it. That was a situation where I didn't have to put up any money, so that was good. I just got paid and then was able to use that money to take care of myself and pay off stuff. And then this most recent one that I did with Peacock was me essentially putting up the money and then licensing it to them. That was probably my riskiest move so far because I was going to go to them with it, but I'm glad that they enjoyed it and wanted to put it on the streamer.

That's a huge investment and a bet on yourself. Approximately, how much does that stuff cost?

It depends on what you're making and if there's a concept behind it, because if you are just shooting a special that has three, four angles and some good cameras, it's on the lower end, ideally, unless you had to pay for an audience coordinator, all this other stuff that luckily we didn't have to do. But it can cost anywhere from, I'd say, 10 grand to a million. Some people who are doing really special, different, huge type stuff, especially in the venue that they're doing it, like someone shooting it in MSG. Msg is this union house, so that brings the money up really, really high. So, yes, some people are spending half a million dollars on their special, some people are spending 12,000.

You spent millions of dollars Obviously, you're on the higher end.

I try to make it look like I spent the full million.

So let's say you spent 10 grand on your special. Then you go out to different outlets and say, Pay me what? How many X that to license it? A hundred grand?

Basically, when you go to market, it's just like with anything else. It's almost like with a stock where your special is your stock, almost. You're just like, Hey, look, I think it's worth this. And I think the return that you're going to see is this many eyeballs on it. And no one knows it for sure. You cannot prove it. All you can show is your profile overall. So if you're like, Okay, on aggregate, I get this many views in a year, just on my own channels and my own YouTube and everything. And then over all of social, over all of the Internet, I have this many followers. So maybe you hit a million two or whatever in a year. You can give all that information to them along with the special and be like, Hey, this is what I'm doing in the market. And then if they respond to that, they respond to it. And then the price is usually up to the buyer, you take it or leave it. So it's not even necessarily that you obviously want to make your money back, and then some. But I've heard of people spending 30K and getting 400 back.

It depends on who you are and how much they want to be in business with you. So it's really difficult to have any metric. Then you'll see people who have to just put it out themselves because no one really wants to pay them what they know it's worth. So then they'll put it on their own website, charge their fans five bucks to see it, and then end up making all the money themselves. Which is also sometimes ideal. You still own it in that regard.

But there's no negotiation. If you say, I want 100K, and they say, You're going to get 50K, that's the end of it.

I mean, it is a negotiation, but I think that unlike with movies, specials are... The barrier to entry is much lower. And so I think that a lot of these studios and streamers look at these things as like, is it going to be an asset? Is it going to be a liability? Cut and dry. And then however many views they think they're going to get, however many subscribers they think they're going to get, they tally that up with what they're willing to pay in their budget. And so it's not as if it's not a negotiation. I've also seen people go back and forth for months, but it does end up becoming this take it or leave it. And sometimes that's what the comic does. Sometimes the comic or their team shows up with a, This is what we need, take it or leave it. And it's not always the best strategy, but I think that to a certain degree, you have to look at what you spent, you have to look at what you need to live, and you can't accept anything lower than that. That doesn't just go for specials. That goes for all of comedy, all of touring.

People are worried about setting their prices because you are the independent contractor to everyone that you come in contact with. And so because of that, I have friends who are like, I'm doing my first ever private gig. I don't know how much to charge them. That's the thing I say to them. I'm like, How much it costs to get there? Do you have to put yourself up? You're going to have to eat. And then how much does it cost to get back? You cannot ask for lower than that. So it's like that's the bare minimum that you know you need to ask for versus what you might be able to get. So the way that I do business personally, I I'm never trying to gouge anybody, but I know exactly what I need to be whole and then what I need to be calling it an income, and I just can't accept anything lower than that. And then if we don't do business yet, then that's okay. You'll either come around or I'll raise my profile up enough that that number won't seem so scary to you a year from now.

You know your worth.

Yeah, exactly. And then sometimes you have to guess your worth, especially when you're starting, you're like, they're willing to pay me. That's crazy. Oh, wow. I've definitely had some gigs before early on where I was like, oh, they don't know what they're doing. They make a mistake.

We all go through that, all industries, the imposter syndrome. But where do you think where real money is? Touring, specials, sitcoms, late night. Where is the real money in comedy?

I think a huge portion of it is in writing because in that way, you can be part of a union. And if you're part of a union, then there's definitely still negotiations, especially once you lift yourself above that base level, that entry-level job or that first time working somewhere. But past that, you have this huge backing to fall on in case anyone does try to underpay you or you have a huge amount of resources in your other union members for advice on what you should be getting paid per what you're doing, because those are conversations that you need to have. I think sometimes knowing your worth becomes this really esoteric idea as opposed to like, no, people pay this much for this.

Like a comp.

Yeah. Exactly. I think that there's a lot of money in writing and in a writing job. Then the other side of it is probably touring. If you mix touring and writing, you're bringing home, at least in most cases, a substantial amount if you're doing both consistently.

So you're rolling in it.

You could be. I mean, it depends on how you- Are you?

Joss Johnson.

Oh, me?

Because you're doing both.

I don't roll, though. I just want to make sure my mom and my aunt are taken care of, that we're taken care of here, and then the rest is like trying to learn how to invest. I don't really roll.

But I still think there's some comedy jobs that folks don't know about. I recently learned that comedians are getting hired for punch-ups. Can you explain what that is?

Yeah. So there are instances with a script where, let's say, you have a really good relationship with an executive producer or a director, even just a company that's green-lying a project. I've seen some people do punch-up actually on set and everything in between lines, they're like, Hey, maybe try some of this or something. I've done instances of punch up before, but then sometimes people will pay you to... They'll either pay you or they'll bring you in as a writing partner to give a punch up pass to an entire script and is the scenario funny enough? Are the arcs funny enough? So it's usually done for comedies and romantic comedies, stuff like that. But those are instances where you may not even see the person as a final credit or something, but they were able to make their contribution and get paid at the same time. I've done way, way less of that work, so it's not a world that I'm too familiar with. I either come from writing the script myself and trying to pitch it to a network or being brought in to a collective that's working on an idea. But punch up is definitely a way to make a decent amount of money.

Corporates are their own form of touring, but they fall more under appearances, and corporates usually pay a really good amount of money. Those are like golden eggs if you can get them because you have to probably be pretty clean and everything, but also maybe even extra vanilla. I think that people don't realize how So even when it's a comedy night, there are still companies that are worried about all the same standards and practices as the workplace. So you have to bring them a show, but it has to be really watered down.

For the Microsoft corporate retreat in Aspen or something, to entertain executives, essentially.

Yeah. But if the Microsoft corporate retreat in Aspen is flying you out and paying you, you can be assured they're paying you substantially.

And do you need a portfolio to get these gigs? Do you You need writing samples when you go out to try to get the comedy gigs on the road? Do you send a tape or a link to a YouTube? How does it work to just start?

So basically, when you are just starting, let's say you have never been anywhere before, you used to need to send a tape tape.

Like a VHS.

And then it became a DVD, and then it became a link to an unlisted YouTube video. But now, I think a lot of people social profile is their portfolio. And so people will maybe apply for a festival, right? And then, yes, they can send in some YouTube link, and maybe it's their late night appearance or something. But Overall, they're going to check out the rest of your social and see how many people you bring to the table. Because if you're putting on a festival, you would want your lineup to not just be really funny, not really just have a lot of character in it. You want to make make sure that the full scope of who you're bringing in will also bring the people in because it makes your job as a promoter easier to just say, Hey, Nicole is coming this weekend. She's hilarious, and she's going to be on the same show as these other two people who are also great. So now fans of you and those other two people all come to the one show, which makes it easier lift on everybody because you don't feel the pressure to sell out a show by yourself, and they don't feel the pressure to sell out 15 shows over the course of a weekend.

By themselves.

When you say festival, is that like I went to Cluster Fest in San Francisco? That's like a comedy festival. It's like Coachella for comedy.

Exactly like that. Then a lot of places will either want a writing sample. Let's say you're trying to write for a narrative show. Let's say you wanted to write for Black-ish or something. You would either write a spec script or you would already have a writing sample from something else that you've written for them to read, but they basically want to read what you write to see if your voice fits in the voice of the show that you'd be on and to see what your skills are as a writer. Do you understand ABC plot? Do you understand all the different ways that their show works and how their jokes run? Because every show is going to have a slightly different type of humor. So I'm not saying it's not funny, it just might not be their thing. So if you bring a very It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia type of humor to a show that's for kids like Caillou, they're going to be like, This is great, but it's not what we do. Then as far as portfolio overall, I think a lot of people, I'm not a hiring body myself, but I think a lot of people look at your social.

There was even a day in the past where people used to get hired off of RIP Twitter, and they would check your jokes. They'd see if you were a writer and you wanted to on a late night show, there were some people that got hired from their Twitter, and then some of it was, yes, you sending in a writing sample, which is for late night, it's usually just writing a collection of anything that they ask you to. They might be like, write a page of jokes, two sketches, and one desk piece for the host to do. So that's your packet. But then past reading that, they might go on your social and be like, Oh, this person is funny every day. This person is consistently posting funny things. That they'd be great to have in here.

So I'm a huge comedy fan, as you know. I just love going to it all the time in LA. When you were in LA, I did buy a ticket to your show. I don't remember why I was an asshole and didn't end up going. It was probably I was heartbroken or I don't know, in the futal position for some for a certain reason. But I love to go out to the main clubs anytime I get a chance. And some of the bigger people, like I would see Jud Apito or whatever at the improv, doing it essentially for free to test stuff out. When you get to a certain level, you just don't take the fee because it's super small, too. I was surprised. It was like 50 bucks or less.

Yeah, and that's what I was alluding to before, where even at a certain level, there are things that are not going to be profitable, but you do them to work on your next show. There was one time, I think it was George Lopez did a whole weekend of shows, and this is him being George Lopes. He could do a big, big theater, if not in an arena if he wanted to. And he still did several shows for this one club because they always showed him love on the way up early on, and he just wanted to make them a week's worth of money. So them being able to get all that money from drinks, all that money from food and keeping the door is like, that's huge for a business. You're essentially donating thousands and thousands of dollars to that business. And so there are always going to be little things like that where if you've built a sense of community, I think you do go back and you try to keep those places open. And it's what makes it a real hierarchy and system for the people that are going to come up after you, because George did that out of the kindness of his heart, but that gave a lot of opportunities for those local kids who are just starting out, that they will still have a club.

That club has got a big boost in revenue now. They're definitely going to stay open. They can afford opportunities to showcase young people.

Hold on to your wallet. Moneyrehab will be right back. There's a lot happening these days, but I have just the thing to get you up to speed on what matters without taking too much of your time. The 7 From the Washington Post is a podcast that gives you the seven most important and interesting stories, and we always try to save room for something fun. You get it all in about seven minutes or less. I'm Hannah Juhl. I'll get you caught up with The 7 every weekday, so follow The 7 right now. And now for some more money rehab. Speaking of showing love, congrats on the writer's strike, dude.

Thank you. I don't know what to say or do when people congratulate me because I am happy. Or am I not supposed to? No, no, no. You're doing the right thing. I'm saying I'm weird because I feel like I did everything that was asked of me. I went ahead and I did not work, and I went and pick it and everything. But there were just so many other people I was watching work so hard that whenever someone congratulates me, I'm like, yes. But you know what? It feels like when somebody says, Congratulations to the dad after the baby's born, it's like, my man helped. He out here, he was definitely there, but like, no, he didn't... That heavy, heavy lifting. I'm like, I'm happy for all the people who were strike captains, all the people that were organizing, and all the people that were negotiating that they were able to do such a great thing. I know that that's part of the whole thing of a union is that everyone tries to pull their weight in different ways. I did a benefit where we raised some money for the entertainment fund. Then that was my way of trying to use the stand-up and the following that I've gained to help in a way that I felt was unique to me in the moment.

But so many people put in so much work.

Are you excited to go back to The Daily Show?

Yeah. I miss all of my friends at the show, and I miss seeing them regularly. So this is going to be really fun. And then I also think it'll be cool to be in a place that's familiar again than I haven't been in a long time.

Do you think anything's going to feel different after the strikes?

You know what it probably will feel like is like another reunion? We had such a reunion feeling after COVID. I think that it'll feel like that again, except there was no pandemic this time. I'm sure there's to be a bit of a buzz that we're all back and everything for quite a while.

Typically, what does your week look like at the Daily Show? I know that when we were hosting Advertising Week together, you would get prompts that you would need to send jokes back for.

Yeah. Basically, the way that it works now is I go in to the office at 9:30 or something, and then we work all day on making a show, and then we tape the show late afternoon or evening. Then I usually am done by, I'd say six is a fair assessment of things, like nine to six. Then I'll usually have some shows at night. Then that's when the standup starts, and then I'll do as many shows as I have that night, and then I will head home and prep for the next day, which usually just means reading or watching whatever news happened that night, that specific night that is worth talking about tomorrow, potentially, because there's a whole... In all of late night, there's a 36-hour news cycle. So even if something happened yesterday, if it's big enough, we talk about it today, or if it's breaking, we might be able to talk about it before taping. And it does become a bit grueling after a while because I'm also doing the shows at night. But the show itself is just phenomenal. So that's going to be fun to return to.

Can you watch or read the news without trying to find the funny?

Oh, yeah. I've definitely read things where I'm like, There's nothing here.

But you're always looking for it.

I feel like I'm looking for it a decent amount, and it just is not even so much a want anymore as a reflex. And then after a while, I feel like you either gain that thing or lose that thing over time. Before I worked at the show, I wasn't actually that politically engaged or much of a newsreader. I would read the big stuff that was happening just like everybody, but I wasn't concerned about what was happening in Kuwait until I started working at Daily Show.

I've long said that the reason The Daily Show works, and again, you'll forget more than I will ever know about it, is because The writers know the news. You have to really know it in order to make fun of it. The same thing with finance. In order to make it light, hopefully, and fun, I really need to understand it first. You need to know the rules before you break that. Is that fair?

That's very fair. I also think that, sadly, there are so many cyclical things, whether it's finance or it's the news. There are so many things that happen in a cyclical fashion that you can start to not necessarily predict them, but you know what they start to look like as they're happening. So that way it's even easier to make it make sense to people because you can literally say this thing happening right now, even though it seems unprecedented, is exactly like this thing that happened before. And you can explain why. And maybe they lived through the thing that happened before, so now they realize, oh, these are the same. I thought it was super different because it's Bitcoin now. But no, it's actually the same. This guy is scamming. Okay.

All right. I end all of our episodes by asking every guest for a tip listeners can take straight to the bank. What would one tip be? It could be anything money related, any lesson you've learned about budgeting while having precarious income, negotiating, I do think that the thing that I said before, that is advice I tell everybody about just do the math on what you cannot afford and then make that your price above that number.

I think that that's good advice. But to give you a new one, I will need you to tell me if this is good. I think it's good because it sounded good, but I don't know if this would be bad to repeat. Okay.

All right, the table is up to your end. Let's go.

I was told that if you buy from a company a lot and you believe in in that company, or if it's a big item purchase and you went ahead and made it on that company, you should double down and you should also buy stock in the companies that you buy most frequently from because you're already ensuring their success by giving them your money on the product end.

I would say that is really good advice in some, but not all cases, especially if you see some consumer products that are really becoming popular or popping off, and you haven't haven't seen it become more mainstream, and they are a publicly traded company. I saw this happen with Lululemon. Oftentimes, investors' kids spot trends and things early, so then their parents. But consumer spending is a major part of the economy. And so if people are spending on something, that's a good recipe for having the stock become successful. I'm not saying your one purchase is going to be driving top-line revenue for the company necessarily, but it is good to really keep your eyes out for what's trending out in the world and if that thing is part of a publicly traded company.

Because I know in some instances, depending on when you do it, it could be really bad. I bought a Peloton in the pandemic. But if I had bought stock in Peloton, I would have bought high and then it would have dropped when we went back to work. So then that would have been bad. But then when I look at Apple, I'm like, if I keep getting these phones, I might as well double down and get a little stock.

Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth to that. But generally, Josh, buy low, sell high.

That's what I always hope to do. In fact, I feel like that's why I'm glad I never got into crypto, because as it was plummeting, there was a part of me was like, this is the dip. Even with NFTs, I was like, this is the dip. And because I didn't fully understand it, I never got into any of it. I think I put in at the most $300 at one point just to track what $300 would do, and then the 300 quickly became 30.

I mean, look how funny money is.

It's not funny for the person losing it, but for the rest of us, wow.

Money Rehab is a production of Money News Network. I'm your host, Nicole Lappin. Money Rehab's executive producer is Morgan LaVoy. Our researcher is Emily Holmes. Do you need some money rehab? And let's be honest, we all do. So email us your money questions, moneyrehab. Com. @moneynewsnetwork. Com to potentially have your questions answered on the show or even have a one-on-one intervention with me. And follow us on Instagram at Money News and TikTok at Money News Network for exclusive video content. And lastly, thank you. No, seriously, thank you. Thank you for listening and for investing in yourself, which is the most important investment you can make.