I always try to steer clear of political topics at Wealth and Wisdom. This is a blog focused on wealth and life balance through entrepreneurship. It doesn’t matter if you are liberal or conservative, a democrat or a republican, my political views should not apply. Heck, I think most of us plug our noses when we vote!

Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of legislation that will have a profound impact on our lives. Much of it is being pushed surrounded by little fact and a lot of political rhetoric. What scares me is not the change but that so few people on either side of the aisle will base their opinion on facts and a rational thought process.

Recently it hit close to home. I read a horrific article about a man who went in for a routine gallbladder surgery and came out having lost both of his legs. To add insult to injury his family has no recourse, as this was done at a military hospital.

Why does this hit close to home? I was in the military and have experience both military and VA medicine. Neither was inspiring, and veterans care scares me. Why do I have such a negative view?

• During my 12 years of military service I was seen by a total of three doctors. This isn’t due to my incredible health. It’s because 90% of military health care is by corpsmen (essentially a registered nurse) and often isn’t under the supervision of any doctor.
• My wife can never again take Motrin or any NSAID because of an overdose. Yep, you guessed it, it was through a military doctor.
• I’ve had to go to VA hospitals a few times since I was honorably discharged. After these few experiences I know that I would rather die than be treated by the VA.

If you ever want to know what government health care is like visit a VA hospital. Look closely at the people. Look at the indifferent attitude of the employees. Ask about the credentials for the medical professionals. Watch the patients that are hanging around, hopeless and miserable. Look at the patients who – at 3:30 PM – are still waiting to be seen for their 8:00 AM appointment.

I’ve seen government healthcare and would rather be uninsured!

Health care reform facts

It took a lot of digging to find any actual facts. I found a ton of rhetoric. I found a lot of opinion. What is hard to find is anything concrete.

What we do know is that this is a 1000+ page bill. The expected cost over 10 years is $1.3B with a potential savings of $257B, resulting in a $1T cost to taxpayers. This data is from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and is non-partisan. Other groups are estimating the cost to be closer to $1.5T – 1.7T. After the 10 year period costs are expected to rise at 6.7% per year and there is nothing in the bill that will slow this growth.

The current thrust of the legislation is to increase coverage and reduce costs. How is that possible?

• Increase coverage: The plan will increase the eligibility for Medicaid income level to 133% of the poverty level. This will dramatically reduce the number of privately insured families shifting them to the public system.
• Decrease costs: The plan will cap payments to 5% higher than Medicare levels.
• Legislate acceptable coverage: Bureaucrats will determine what coverage you will receive.
• Individuals required to be covered by an acceptable plan: If you are not covered you will be taxed at 2% of your income up to the average cost.
• Medium and large corporations required to offer their employees an acceptable plan: Non-compliance will incur an 8% tax.

What does government healthcare mean to entrepreneurs?

Your insurance costs will go up dramatically. Even if you are not big enough to fall under the medium and large corporation status, the acceptable plan aspect and the reduced number of private participants will increase your insurance costs. Or you could chose to not offer health care. Since many of your employees won’t be eligible for public health care, it will make your company less attractive and you will lose employees.

What about entrepreneurs who don’t have employees? In these cases you will still be hit with additional costs:

1. You will be required to have insurance. If you don’t have insurance you will be taxed 2% of your income up to the cost of the average acceptable coverage. Either way you will pay.
2. The cost of insurance will go up. Since most entrepreneurs will be above the threshold for public insurance plans you will be forced into a private plan. Since the cost of private plans will go up…you get the idea.

What does government health care mean to individuals?

• Your health care costs will go up. You will see this either in reduced wages or in increased insurance costs.
• Your quality of health care will go down. By regulating the amount a doctor can charge (and to an extremely low level) we will drive the best doctors out of the system. What is left will be the average or substandard doctors. You also will see a reduction in available procedures. Bureaucrats will now decide what procedures are allowed.
• Your availability of health care will do down. When you reduce a doctor’s earnings you make the profession less desirable. Why should a doctor spend over a decade in training for average compensation? That question was rhetorical, and you will see few new doctors enter the system creating a massive shortage.

Visitors from GetEntrepreneurial

Welcome to Wealth and Wisdom! I’ve listed a few of my articles below that you might enjoy. Feel free to read them and any other articles that catch your interest.

• Recessionproof your sales
• How to Thrive in a Recession
• How to Thrive in a Recession – Ignore the News
• How to Thrive in a Recession – It’s All About the Customer
• How to Thrive in a Recession – Working for Someone Else

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  • “Thoughts Are Things by Prentice Mulford”

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Jeffrey Gitomer is one of my favorite sales experts. His books are fantastic and his weekly ezine is always full of great sales advice. If you are not a Gitomer subscriber I highly recomend signing up. I also recomend all of his books. They are the gold standard if you want to become a better salesman.

This week he wrote a timely article: The economy is falling. The economy is falling. In it he points out that while the economy stinks this is in contrast to the amazing boom we experienced over the last few years. It just means that the available business is reduced and that the low hanging fruit are a bit higher. He has 8.5 things you can do to thrive in this downturn.

Small Business Trends is hosting a Webinar on reducing business overhead. While I usually recommend entrepreneurs focus on making more money-you can’t cut your way to profits-expense control is still a vital part of any successful business. In most cases it should be part of your daily life, a habit you develop so you can focus on other vital parts of your business. Go to10 Strategies for Reducing Business Overhead Expenses – Webinar for more information.

Merlin Mann of 43 Folders had a great post on priorities. I always enjoy his writing as he makes me think differently and see things from a new point of view. While I don’t always agree with him I look forward to his posts.

Today Merlin talks about priorities. I like his view that something either is a priority…or it isn’t. There are no shades of grey. Our challenge in time management is that we try to prioritize our tasks. Task 1 is more important than task 3 which is less important than task 5…and then wonder why we have a high priority task on our list for weeks at a time. The answer is that it wasn’t a true priority.

Read his entire post Mud Rooms, Red Letters, and Real Priorities.

Corrected Links

Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill: This is the original self help book and is still just as valid today. If I had just one book on achieving your goals to recommend it would be this. It has made more people millionaires than any other book, course, or system.

Goals! by Brian Tracy: This is a full featured goal setting program. If you don’t already have a vision or you are new to effective goal setting this is the product for you.

In this time of crisis everyone keeps turning to Uncle Sam. Will congress bail out the automakers? Will Obama raise taxes? What is our government doing to save us?

They are missing the point

If you want to survive this economic storm you need to take matters into your own hands. It is in times of crisis that the greatest fortunes are made. In most cases it is by resourceful entrepreneurs who look up and see a need that isn’t being met.

Get your financial house in order

• You must have an emergency fund. This is not negotiable. If you can’t go several months without a paycheck you are putting your family at risk. Slash your spending now.
  • It makes you desparate: Why is this bad? When you are desparate you make stupid mistakes and have fewer options.
  • Loosing your job is stress enough. The last thing you need is to worry about losing your house!
  • It gives you power: It gives you the confidence to spend a few weeks finding the right job. It gives you confidence when you interview (again, desperation is never good). It gives you the time to get your own business up and running.

If you are an employee be indispensable

It doesn’t matter how much they like you or how good you are at your job. What matters is that you do one of three things:

1. Bring in business (sales or marketing).
2. Create new products.
3. Manage costs.

Wait a minute, my job is important. They couldn’t function without a ___________(fill in your job title). Friends, it may hurt to lose a good employee but they will survive. Remember, they are worried about going out of business. No matter how good you are unless you can offer them salvation (like a top notch salesman) you are expendable.

What if I’m already in sales? Then get better. Now is the time to become the best. Read books by the experts. Build a plan to develop your customer and gain market share. Companies will lay off salesmen, but the rainmaker is the last one to go.

If you are an employee sharpen your resume and strengthen your network

Even if you are a top notch employee you need a backup plan. Be prepared to move quickly if things go south. As for the network you need to build it before you need it. For more on networking read a guest post I did Network Your Way to Job Security.

Start a side business

Believe it or not recessions are one of the best times to start a business. Opportunities still exist but the competition is much more fierce. A small start up often has a lower overhead, is more nimble, and offers much more service and flexibility.

One great resource I’ve found is Brian Tracy’s CD program 21 Great Ways to Start and Build Your Own Successful Business.

Entrepreneurs…go back to basics

Ok, sales are down. What do you do? Most businesses panic and do stupid things. Managers often look for advanced sales techniques or new systems to save the day. This won’t help.

Look at what a coach does when his team is slumping. Does he teach new advanced skills? No, he goes back to basics! The same thing thing applies in business. For more on this read my post recessionproof your sales.

As Dan says “a Book That Makes Business Planning Easy, Fast and Fun!”

Are you tired of watching your investments sink into oblivion? I know I am. I firmly believe that owning your own thriving business is the ONLY way to be immune to the ups and downs of the economy and be 100% in control of your financial destiny…

You can start your own business right now, wherever you are, with whatever you have, and succeed!But, let me tell you…success in business will ONLY happen if you have a well thought out plan.

Order Business Plan or BUST! today, Tuesday, November 18th on amazon.com.

Wealth and Wisdom readers will get hundreds of dollars worth of FREE bonuses that will skyrocket your business to the next level!

For more information and to view the entire FREE bonus gift offer, please go to

http://businessplan.riskbuster.com

Visitors from the Dollar Stretcher.

Welcome to Wealth and Wisdom! I’ve listed a few of my articles below that you might enjoy. Feel free to read them and any other articles that catch your interest.

• How to respond when your family asks for money
• FDIC insurance-Is My Money Safe?
• 11 Steps to the Job of Your Dreams
• Three paths to financial abundance

If you like what you see please let me know by leaving a comment (I do respond to most). I would also like to invite you to join our blog for free. You’ll save time by having our articles delivered. We offer two ways:

Email Subscription

Sign up by email and we will deliver our blog to your inbox saving you time and ensuring you don’t miss anything. As a bonus we are including our special report “25 Keys to a Balanced and Wealthy Life.”

RSS Feed

We also publish via RSS. Simply click here to subscribe and we will deliver our blog right to your feed reader. If you are not sure what a feed reader (or RSS) is then check out our article 5 Ways RSS Can Save You Time.

Wow, the last few days have been an emotional rollercoaster ride. Friday night I went to bed with a catagory 2 hurricane on track to bulldozer right over our house. Saterday I woke up to a huge mess but minimal damage. I have friends who lived further inland than I do that were directly hit. The damage was significant.

It is the aftermath that will stick with me forever. It warmed my heart to see so many people pull together. I was dissapointed to see several neighbosr refuse to help but they were by far the minority. The funny thing is that I was not friends with them before the hurricane. I now think even less of them.

Today we got to my neighbors back yard. We leld up because I was hoping to have my chainsaw operational (the tree was big!). Unfortunately repairs are taking too long so we cut it up by hand. The part I’ll always remember is the tears running down my neighbor’s face. It is a profound feeling to touch someone so deeply.

Wile we are still without power life is coming back to normal. About half of the area retailers are back in business. It was nice to go out to dinner and eat something that wasn’t cooked on the grill! Perhaps the biggest shock was to see the mailman.

As things settle out and we have a more steady supply of gasoline our ration of electricity is improving. Right now three houses are sharing one generator. While it isn’t enough to run our air conditioners it will allow us some lights and fans. We even were able to watch tv for the first time tonight. It was surreal to see the aftermath. As the pictures of Houston and Galveston rolled in it hit us hard. These are all places we know.

Galveston is a perfect example. We go to the beach every few weeks since Galveston is so close. In fact, we were there last weekend. It is strange to think that it may never be the same.

We still have a long road ahead of us. There is a ton of cleanup and repairs. As you move closer to the clast the damage becomes more profound. Areas near Galveston are decimated.

Last night I was hit by a category 2 hurricane. Ok, it wasn’t quite a direct hit. The eye of the storm shifted about 25 miles to the east instead of right over my house. This dropped the top wind speed by about 15 MPH and that was just enough for us to escape serious damage. We personally were lucky. We lost part of our fence and a few shingles on our roof. A couple screens were ripped off, wadded up, and thrown at our house.

All in all this is not conducive to a good nights sleep!

The winds surged and at times roared. When it was at it’s peak I could hear my windows straining and I’m stunned none broke. Like I said we were lucky.

Not all of my neighbors were so lucky. One lost most of their shingles. A good friend just a few housed down the street had a tree resting on his roof. Several neighbors had leaking roofs. The number of branches on the ground was prodigious!

A further complication was the loss of power. 3.5M Houstonians (metro) were in the dark. As I write this only 100k have power back. Most will be in the dark for a week or two. The worse hit areas may be down for 3-4 weeks.

Yes, the damage is amazing.

But there is a positive

My mind has a need to find a purpose or a lesson in any situation and tends to go into overdrive as things get worse and worse. Several business ideas popped into my head and started fleshing themselves out. Solutions to problems magically appeared. These should start showing up in Wealth and Wisdom over the next few months.

W are also now closer to many of our neighbors. Our friends are now proven and closer than ever as we cleared branches and debris. For the neighbors we don’t know well we are now friends as we helped each other recover.

8 Lessons Natures Wrath Can Teach Us

1) Preparation is critical: We had a full supply of the necessities. We filled up our gas tanks. Our propane tank (and a spare) were full so we could grill for a week or two. We had several days of water, candles, and batteries.

As a result we are not desperate. The lines of people looking for food and water are mostly due to lack of preparation. This is what is flashed across your evening news!

2) The best laid plans: No matter how well you plan life still happens. In our case it was my chainsaw. It worked fine a couple of months ago. Today was a different story. Gas started pouring out when the fuel lines failed due to old age.

3) Have a backup plan: Once the chainsaw went down things got more physical. A good old bow saw is a godsend when your chainsaw stops working!

4) Who needs to workout when your chainsaw is broken? Clearing downed trees is a hell of a good workout.

5) Thank god for neighbors with generators: While I won’t be watching American Idol – not that I did when I had power – I was able to run my refrigerator and freezer. This will keep our food from spoiling for a week or two until we get power back.

6) Most people are good: It warmed my heart to see everyone pulling together. It also reminded me that friendships are formed and tested in times on need.

7) But some people are bums: Several neighbors strolled out after all the work was done.

Don’t think this wasn’t noticed by everyone else!

7.5) Karma: My bonus lesson is that karma is alive and kicking. We spent several hours working with a few neighbors clearing the storm damage. We did it to help our friends and neighbors while expecting nothing in return.

It turns out our neighbor has a generator. Guess who has extension cords stretched to his house? Suess who is not worrying about his freezer?

Karma.

I’ll let you know how we fared when the dust-or water-settles!