We’re at the dawn of 2023 and Co-Hosts Josh Bretl and Dave Schmidt are here to help us all fill our buckets – financially and otherwise!

Join us for a special New Year Edition of the Retirement Equals Freedom Podcast focused on figuring out how traditional and Roth IRAs as well as 401k plans can work for you!

#TaxNerds: You’ll come away understanding the benefits, limitations and rules of the road on contributions just in time for tax season – with a little historical context about retirement investing and pensions thrown in for good measure!

Don’t miss breaking news about everything from big plans for entertaining in the Bretl’s new kitchen to Dave’s secret passion for the harmonica to some fun reading recs. Let’s make the year ahead a great one!

Check out this cool new pod link resource with all the latest and greatest about Retirement Equals Freedom and one-click access to your favorite platform for listening!

And don’t forget to join the conversation at our private Facebook group, which you’ll find here.

Click here to explore the services that FSR Wealth Strategies offers and schedule a discovery call with one of the team’s CPAs. When it comes to living your best life, it’s never too early to get started! 

In the grand scheme of things, IRAs

are relatively new.

Your parents or grandparents never even knew what the

heck they were, and they were totally reliant upon

pension plans and company savings and things along those

lines, and those went away.

So they created these 401ks and these IRAs with the idea

that they can travel with you, and the savings get

built up time over time, and it can do a few things.

One is it gives the employee more control, and two is it

cuts cost for the employer.

But also, they're portable, so you can take them with you.

But we've never really talked about how we put

money into those accounts, how we put money into IRAs.

And should you, or should you not put money in?

We wanted to do an episode on what we call IRA

contributions and some of the nuances that go into it.

It's the dawn of 2023, and Josh and I are

hoping to fill your buckets both financially and otherwise.

Our special new year edition of the Retirement Equals

Freedom Podcast is focused on figuring out how traditional

and Roth IRAs, as well as your 401k plans, can work for you.

Hashtag tax nerd.

You'll come away from this episode,

understanding the benefits, limitations, and rules of

the road on contributions just in time for tax season.

This is The Retirement Equals Freedom Podcast.

Your host, Josh Bretl, is the owner of FSR Wealth Strategies.

And for the last two decades, it's Josh that's been

helping fine folks like you thrive in your retirement.

Well me?

Hey, I'm Dave.

Josh's longtime friend, co-host, and fan of beef barley stew.

So now, let me let you let me end this introduction

so you can learn all about IRA contributions.

FSR Wealth Management is a registered investment advisor

located in Elmhurst, Illinois.

Information and opinions contained in this audio

have been arrived at by FSR Wealth advisors.

All information herein is for informational purposes

and should not be construed as investment advice.

It does not constitute an offer, a solicitation or recommendation

to purchase any security.

FSR is not providing legal, tax, accounting, or financial

planning advice in this audio.

These views are as of the date of this publication

and are subject to change.

Oh, Canada.

David, happy new year.

Happy new year.

Oh.

That just ruined everything.

Way to start it off, Josh.

We came in with the goal of being just super

professional and not knocking things around in the new

year, and what do you do?

One of my favorite compliments that

I get is that I'm not your average accountant or CPA.

I'm not your average financial advisor.

I take that as a compliment.

And people used to say that to my dad.

I remember hearing as a kid, " You're not what I think of

when I think of an advisor or when I think of a CPA."

And I always thought that was kind of weird, but

now it makes me feel good.

And I also feel like this podcast is another

example of that.

We do weird okay here.

You remember the story I told you when

I was working at the bank and the sweet old lady

called me out for having a beard or a scruffy face?

Mm-hmm.

Bankers don't have scruffy faces.

"Well, ma'am, they do now."

Hey, look, you're human.

No one wants to work with someone that's

like, "I do taxes.

Ah, ah, ah."

I agree with you.

Look, Josh, 2023, my new goal is to be

a, I don't know, a sparkling conversationalist, if you will.

With who?

I don't know.

You, on a podcast.

like that idea.

Thank you.

We have all sorts of big dreams for the 2023 podcast.

I don't know what we're going to execute on, because we're

good dreamers, not always the best executors when it comes

towards the podcast stuff.

Maybe someday, we'll actually have a studio that...

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.

Did it ship?

I want to show you something.

I haven't gotten a notification of shipping yet.

Aw.

But you know how on Facebook, you can see things

like follow them on Facebook?

Dave.

Yeah.

I think that might be us.

Oh.

If that is, that's gorgeous.

Okay.

What he's referring to is there is a video on Facebook

from the company Josh ordered this table from that has them

showing the table and then going from table to the truck

that's going to ship it here to us, so it's got to be ours.

It's got to be ours.

Yeah.

Dave, I am really excited for 2023, and on many reasons.

I've got on a personal front, on a business front.

Hopefully by the time this podcast comes out,

we will have finished our construction on our house.

We'll have our house back to normal.

We've gotten through Christmas.

Josh, I'm excited for your house.

You went home and saw your new countertops the other

day, and what was the first thing I asked you?

You remember?

What was I concerned about?

So the first question you asked me probably

had to do with something I was going to make you.

Yeah.

I asked you, A) what's the first cocktail you're going to craft

for me on your new countertops?

And then, what are you going to cook me?

I don't know, but Missy and I have decided when

we're all done with this, 2023 is going to be the year

of parties at our house, so-

Yes.

it's going to be fun.

Cocktails and steaks at Josh's house.

I look forward to it.

But on a business front, we've set some really cool things

up, and we have some great listeners of the podcast.

Our clients are doing great.

Who knows what the economy's going to do this year?

Don't ask me for a crystal ball.

What I always say is be prepared for anything.

2023's going to be a good year.

2023 is shaping up to be a good year.

Yeah.

Now, here's my big question.

What is it?

Over Christmas, you and I talked about playing

a new sport, pickle ball.

Can you and I play pickle ball, learn how to play pickle ball?

Because it's all the rage.

And two, can we play basketball at least once this year?

Oh, I know.

The logistics of finding the spots to play

basketball, I think, are harder than pickle ball.

I feel like basketball, you can't just...

If you and I were to go to an open gym, we will

be dead within 30 seconds.

We have to find a place where you and I can just

kind of shoot around, get our legs out from underneath

us, and then start playing.

All right.

We'll talk about that.

We'll get that squared away.

Yeah.

But pickle ball, we've already talked about doing

a entire office pickle ball tournament, which I will record.

That would be fun to do a production around.

Yeah.

Well, so far, if anyone's listened this far in, you're

bored off of your gourd, because we've talked about

nothing for a few minutes, so-

Bored off of your gourd.

That might be a new hashtag.

I'm just sayin-

Hashtag bored off your gourd.

I'm just saying.

You know what, Josh?

I was up late last night thinking, "What is something

that we just haven't done a deep dive on in a long time?"

And financial wizard, so I know all these things.

I'm like-

Do not say Social Security.

No.

No.

We just finished a three part series, which we're actually

going to win some awards for.

Josh Bretl:

Especially part three.

Part three is amazing.

But what about IRAs and contributions and

things of that sort?

Oh, great.

I love talking about that stuff.

Okay.

No.

Actually, this idea came from Erin, as do a lot

of our ideas, apparently.

We've done a couple episodes on conversions and Roths

and the difference between traditionals and Roth IRAs.

But we've never really talked about how we put

money into those accounts, how we put money into IRAs.

And should you, or should you not put money in?

We wanted to do an episode on what we call IRA

contributions and some of the nuances that go into it.

Such as?

You're going to get into that, I hope?

Do you want me to?

I mean, yeah.

Nuance is your middle name.

In the grand scheme of things, IRAs

are relatively new.

Now, a lot of our clients who are in their late 50s, 60s,

and 70s, they've been around the for the majority of your

life, but in your working years, they probably just got started.

They really were relatively new.

Your parents or grandparents never even knew what the

heck they were, and they were totally reliant upon

pension plans and company savings and things along those

lines, and those went away.

They did.

Yeah.

Actually, Erin did some research

for us, and I didn't realize some of this stuff.

It was kind of neat.

didn't realize that the first pension in the United

States came into existence in 1875 for American Express.

I saw American Express, and I'm like,

"The credit card company?"

Well, first off, I didn't realize American

Express was around in 1875.

Yeah.

Right?

But also the fact that they had

the very first pension.

Good for them.

And then by 1960, half of the private sector

workforce had a pension.

That wasn't that long ago.

My father graduated high school in 1970, went to

college, graduated in '74.

And at that point in time, pensions were

still hot and heavy.

They were really going.

Due to some law changes in the '80s, the rules around pensions

became really difficult, and we saw a major decrease

in the companies wanting to administer pensions, especially

for smaller companies, things along those lines.

And the government knew that there was a

problem with savings.

And people were changing jobs more often, which Erin

threw out this one too.

I thought this was kind of interesting.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, that the modern

employee will hold over 11 jobs between the ages of 18 and 48.

And so what happens is with a pension, if you keep

changing jobs, those pensions don't usually go with you.

They don't accumulate the way they're supposed to.

And one of the benefits of a pension is working a long

period of time so you get the biggest payout and things.

That's how you maximize those.

So they created these 401ks and these IRAs with the idea

that they can travel with you, and the savings get

built up time over time, and it can do a few things.

One is it gives the employee more control, and two is it

cuts cost for the employer.

But also, they're portable, so you can take them with you.

Now, that sounds all great, but I think what we've realized

as a country is that people don't always want control.

They fear control sometimes.

They don't know how to do it.

The market's scary.

What if you're making the wrong decision?

So we've tried to simplify it and do things along those lines.

But one of the overarching comments or the overarching

themes was that you just had to save.

Pensions weren't going to be there.

You just had to save.

And they wanted to give you some advantages to savings.

401[k]s are company sponsored.

They're run by your employer.

And if your company has one, odds are you

can put money into it.

And your company can put money in.

They don't all do that.

But if you put money in, that there's very

rarely any income limits.

But your investment choices are limited to

what the company tells you you can put money into.

Some of them have wide choices.

Some of them have just a few choices.

But the choices that you have are limited to what the

company tells you you can have.

Are you saying...

because I don't remember.

Last time I had a 401[k] was 12 years ago.

An employee sometimes can go choose how aggressive

their portfolio is?

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

They might have 12 mutual funds

they get to pick from.

There's thousands and thousands of stocks out there, but they

might only have 12 mutual funds.

I see.

There's some limits as those come into play.

But the other thing, and you're a great example of that, is

you had a 401[k] when you worked for the large bank,

but when you went to become an independent contractor,

401[k]s don't really exist, or they're hard to exist for

small companies or individuals.

So the government created these IRAs.

IRA, it's a government acronym and actually easy to understand.

It's individual retirement account.

And what they said was, "Just like a 401[k], you put money in.

You'll get a tax deduction for putting money in."

Even to this day, sometimes they make that seem like

it's the best thing ever.

You're getting this tax deduction to put money in.

You're getting this tax deduction.

Well, what you're essentially doing is you're kicking the

tax calculation down the road.

It could be a good thing.

It may not be a good thing.

I will tell you, savings is always a good thing, but just a

matter of where are you saving?

What happens there?

IRAs and Roth IRAs are individual accounts.

We want to go through some of the rules that go through this.

So 401[k]s, if you're under age 50, you can put in a maximum

of $22,500 this year in 2023.

If you're over 50, they allow what they call

catch-up contributions, and you can put $30,000 in.

How much you should put in, that's a whole different

topic of conversation.

We always tell people, "Save as much as you can, but

don't go into debt to save."

401[k]s, Josh, most employers, do you know,

can you continuously adjust how much you're contributing?

Or is that an annual thing you have to choose?

It's become a lot more flexible recently.

It's really dependent upon the company.

The company can set limits as to how much you can put

in and how much you can put out, or how much you can put

in, when you can take it out.

Now, here's a couple rules on...

Once money goes into a 401[k], the company

doesn't have access to it.

They can't steal it or do anything like that.

But they can put handcuffs as to when you can get it out.

They may or may not allow you to borrow money

from it, called loans.

They may or may not let you take money out while you're working.

Now, the one rule is you can always get money out

when you leave the employer.

When you leave, you can always take the money out.

But you do have the right to leave it there too, if it's over

a certain dollar amount, so-

Oh, okay.

there's pros and cons.

You have to weigh those pros and cons as to where it sits.

But just getting the money in is what we're

going to focus on today.

Sure.

If you put that money in there, now,

there aren't generally income thresholds that's

out there for 401[k]s.

But there are some testing and some different rules

that go onto 401[k]s.

For smaller companies, if you have a 401[k], they may say,

"Hey, you've put too much in."

There are also Roth options on a lot of 401[k]s.

They don't all have them, but some do have Roth options.

Roth versus traditional, we've done whole episodes on that, The

big difference there is taxes.

The only difference between regular and

traditional is taxes.

Now, let's go to IRAs, because those are a little different.

If your company does not have a 401[k], or any retirement

plan, to be factual there, you have the ability to

put money into an IRA.

And there's some specific rules.

And you actually, if you're married, you have to know,

if neither of you have a 401[k], pretty much you can

put money in no matter what.

It's deductible.

If one of you has a 401[k], there's income thresholds.

You can't earn too much.

If both of you have 401[k]s, it's very restrictive.

Very rarely can you put money into an IRA and

have it be deductible.

Okay?

But there's a lot of times that putting money

in can be beneficial.

For You may be late in your career, maybe a retiree,

and you may have a side job, and you earn, I don't

know, 15,000, 20,000 bucks.

And you're normally in the 12% or 15% tax bracket, but this

side job just puts you up and above into the 22%, 24% bracket.

Well, in that case, let's put the money in.

Let's get a deduction, and then we'll take it out later at 15%.

That makes a ton of sense.

There also going to be some things for Medicare.

The cost of Medicare is dependent upon your

adjusted gross income.

It could be helpful for that.

There's just some things that putting 10,000 to

15,000 bucks away in your IRA if you're married

can be beneficial to you.

But you have to have earned income.

That's the key to this one, is earned income.

Earned income is money from a job.

Not Social Security.

Social Security is not earned income.

Investment is not earned income.

401[k] distributions are not earned income.

Pensions?

No?

No?

Pensions are not earned income.

It's income from working-

A job.

in some way.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

It could be self employment income.

It could be W2 income, which means an employer paid you.

It has to come from a job.

I read poetry on the street corner, and

people throw coins and dollars at me as tips.

Does that count as income?

Only if you're going to claim it on your

tax return, which legally you're supposed to, but I

don't know what you're doing.

I don't do your tax return, so-

I made $17 all of last year doing it.

Do I have to claim that?

Well, legally, yes.

Oh, man.

Do a lot of people do it?

No.

But legally, yeah, you're supposed to claim that.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Any and all income sources.

Roth contribution limits are a little different.

Now, if you put money into an IRA and you're above income

thresholds, you're still allowed to put money in, but

it becomes non-deductible.

And you have to file a form 8606 on your tax return, because

you have to track how much of your IRA is non-deductible

versus deductible.

Hashtag tax nerd.

Oh, yeah.

It's a fun thing, because that'll follow

into our backdoor Roth.

Really quick though, if I were to ask Al

what form is needed to file, would he be like, "8606?"

Would he know what forms are needed?

Is he not quite that-

You've just set my 2023 goal.

To teach him what form needs to be filed.

I am not a form guru.

I don't know which forms, what schedules, which this, all that.

But 8606 is a common form for people who have

non-deductible IRAs.

We see those a lot.

Get the 8606 out.

Let's see the 8606.

Yeah.

It's kind of fun.

It just rolls off the tongue, too.

It does.

It's fun.

Yeah.

It does.

Yeah.

There's probably people listening to this

podcast that know more about form 8606 as a client than

some of your advisors do.

But we'll get back to that one, but let's talk

about the Roth limits.

If you decide from a tax reason that you want to put

money into a Roth versus a traditional, there are very

strict income thresholds.

And again, it has to be earned income.

But for a single taxpayer, that starts at 138,000 and

phases out up to 153,000.

If you have less than $138,000 of earned income,

you can put money in a Roth.

It doesn't matter if you have a 401[k].

It doesn't matter any of those things.

You can put money into a Roth.

If you get above 153, you cannot.

And if you do, the penalties are actually very severe.

You have some time to take it out and do what

they call a reversal, but-

So if you make a mistake, you can fix it-

You can fix it.

before...

Yeah.

But if you leave it in there, and they catch

you, I want to say, don't quote me, but it's close to a

50% penalty on the earnings.

Oh, my gosh.

It's pretty substantial.

On the earnings.

Yeah.

Not-

But it's still pretty substantial.

Yeah.

It could be a substantial penalty.

For a married filing joint taxpayer, that phaseout starts

at 218,000 and goes up to 228.

If you're a high income earner, you probably can't put

money into a Roth directly.

Those numbers are pretty high for me.

Yeah.

I know.

That's a high income earner.

Now, that brings us to the backdoor Roth.

The way that works is people put money into

an IRA non-deductible.

They haven't deducted it.

And they do an instant conversion.

And that is essentially the third...

We always say there's three ways to get money into a Roth.

One is a contribution, which we just talked about.

Two is a conversion.

A conversion is going from a regular IRA to Roth IRA.

And the third's a backdoor Roth conversion.

Okay.

Now, what that means though, is

you're taking money out.

Still it's a conversion, but you have to be very careful,

and you really have to plan these out, because whenever

you take money out of an IRA that has a non-deductible

portion to it, so it has a form 8606, we have to follow what

they call the pro rata rule.

Okay?

Listen to me on this one.

Let's say your IRA is worth $20,000.

Okay?

20,000.

And your form 8606 says you've put in 10,000-

10,000.

as basis.

Basis.

Half as basis, half as earnings.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay?

Totally.

I'm on it.

Yeah.

Great.

And you do this backdoor Roth conversion for $10,000.

You think, "Hey, I've got this basis of 10,000.

I'm just going to convert it.

No big deal."

You do the conversion of $10,000, but because of the

pro rata rule, half of your IRA was non-deductible.

Half was earnings that you haven't paid taxes on yet.

Your tax return's going to show $5,000 of non-deductible and

$5,000 of actual taxable income.

Got it.

Just have to be aware of the pro rata rule.

At that level, it's not huge, but we've seen

people make mistakes in the $100,000 range there.

Oh.

You have to be careful with that.

With your Roth limits though, if someone

earns over that 228, let's say as a couple, 228,000, can

they still do a conversion?

There are no limits on conversions.

Could someone in theory just contribute to

an IRA, then the next day, convert it to a Roth, even

though they're over that limit?

That is a backdoor-

That is a-

conversion.

Okay.

Or in Illinois, this is a tip or trick, tip,

trick, this is something that people don't realize.

Hashtag Josh tips.

Oh, I like it.

That's new.

Thank you.

Illinois as a state is unique, where they

don't tax retirement income.

So IRA distributions, 401[k] distributions are not taxed

at the Illinois level.

But you still get a deduction for putting money in.

At the Illinois level, we tell everybody, "If you're choosing

between an IRA contribution and a Roth contribution and

you have the option for both, you are almost always better

putting money into the IRA.

You get a federal deduction and a state deduction.

And converting instantly, you'll pay a federal tax,

so those net to zero, but you won't pay the state tax.

You will get a state of Illinois tax benefit by doing that, so-"

I knew there was a reason we lived in Illinois.

It's for that Josh tip alone.

The Josh tip only applies to Illinois residents.

Other states, please check your local laws, but-

You sound like the little disclaimers on

pharmaceutical commercials.

I know.

Every state is so different.

It's crazy.

If you're going to put money in, you just need

to make sure you're making the right decisions there.

Okay.

You've been talking here about contributions a little bit

too long for my liking, so...

Yeah.

What?

What?

Okay.

Hey, Mr.

Josh.

Let's take a break.

You've been talking for so long, and my ears are sore.

Let's not make them snore.

Listening shouldn't be a chore.

Let's get to know Josh and Dave and watch our ratings soar.

Give me the cackaw.

Cackaw!

Cackaw!

Oh, yeah.

I was thinking about doing the Gritty here on camera and

making Landon super proud.

Eh, there's a better than average chance that I would

pull a hamstring doing it, so I opted out for episode 29.

There's a lot of pressure on you.

This is the first get to know Josh and Dave of 2023.

I actually struggle with it a little bit.

Did you?

Yeah.

Because, well, I read the cards, and I think it's

a good question, but I don't know how I'm going

to answer the question yet.

Oh.

Here's our question, and again, I think I have an

answer for what you're going to do here, but what would you

do with an extra hour in a day?

One extra hour?

One extra hour.

Every day, an extra hour.

What would you do?

I may be overanalyzing, but

when does that hour fit into our day, like-

it's your day.

You decide.

Oh.

An extra hour in my day.

First thing that comes to mind is napping, but I usually nap

during normal 24 hours, so I don't need extra time for that.

Napping is covered.

Do you really nap?

Almost daily.

Almost daily.

Between 20 minutes to 40 minutes a day.

That's actually one of my forms of meditation

that we talked about.

Yeah.

I don't always fall asleep, but I lay down.

With an extra hour a day, I do have a list of new

things I want to learn.

I want to learn a couple languages.

I want to learn how to play the harmonica,

potentially the guitar.

I think I would use that one extra hour and just

hardcore learn something new with that one hour.

I think learning something makes sense.

But the harmonica?

Oh, you know I have one, right?

No.

I wanted to surprise listeners

with a jingle.

I'm just not quite at that point yet.

I can only make certain sounds with it, but I bought it at

the heart of COVID thinking, "This is what I'm going to do."

And-

youTube videos?

You're learning the harmonica via YouTube videos?

That was the plan, but it's kind of just

sitting there on my desk at home collecting dust.

I think if I had an extra hour, I would read more.

Oh.

Yeah.

Kind of similar to mine.

Yeah.

business books, motivational books, life

books, fiction books.

I like all that stuff.

And I don't think I read enough.

Peppa the Pig books.

I read a lot of those.

Yeah, I like

- . Josh Bretl: Actually,

The kids are getting a little older.

We're reading Harry Potter right now as a family.

Oh.

We still read Pig the Pug.

Those are still timeless.

Oh, Zach loves Pig the Pug.

Yeah.

He's the best.

He also loves harmonicas, and so he got

one for Christmas as well.

We'll see.

Did he really?

Yeah.

We'll see.

Yes.

We'll see how it goes.

We're totally going to start a band, Zach.

I do learn things about you during these

get to know Josh and Dave.

Yeah.

This is back to back episodes.

I see mind blown.

The one with you meditating really blew my mind.

Did it?

In fact, I was listening to that episode again.

I went, "Man.

I knew him so well, and-"

I'm proud of you.

You've actually listened to the episode before I have.

Oh.

Look at this.

I'm really stuck on this true crime

called Bone Valley.

Man, I cannot recommend it enough.

It is the best true crime I've ever heard.

It's kind of like...

Dave relates to retirees.

Yeah.

I'm a little nervous.

Yeah.

Yeah.

By the way, I'm a little nervous about how you go

from a true crime podcast right into you relating to retirees.

Well, listen.

Whenever I do this with my paper stack, Josh

knows he's in for a treat.

There's notes.

There's notes, folks.

There's got to be notes.

I take notes pre-episode and mid-episode.

What I learned today, Josh, was that retirees will contribute

to an IRA for any number of reasons, assuming they

qualify, of course, right?

But generally, they'll contribute it for

tax savings, right?

Taxes are important.

Yeah.

Taxes are very important.

They contribute to something for a benefit.

Have you heard of the book How Full is your Bucket?

The kid version.

I've heard of the kid version.

Yes.

Yeah.

Okay.

That's the only version I know, too.

Okay.

To your point, I don't read enough either.

But we use the whole bucket philosophy in the Schmidt

house, and we love it.

And so I contribute to Carla's bucket.

And yes, I do it to make her happy, but I also do it because

I get a big benefit out of it.

Here's some examples.

Are you interested in hearing examples?

I love examples.

There may be one night where she makes

her gluten free vegan dinner for everybody, and I eat it.

Now, look, I like all food.

I eat everything.

I'll eat it, but it's not my favorite food.

I'll do that for a few nights.

And I'm contributing to her bucket so then I can say,

"Oh, Carla, looks good.

I'm going to get myself a calzone, if

that's okay with you."

And her bucket is so full from me eating her

meals, she's like, "Yeah.

Absolutely.

You contribute to my bucket.

You go get that reward."

It's not a tax savings.

It's a calzone.

But it's still the same thing.

Or if there's some social things going on where I have to go

talk to people and hang out with people, I'll fill her bucket.

I'll contribute to her bucket by doing a few of these.

But then one night I'll be like, "Oh, Carla, it's

a good game on tonight.

I'm kind of just not feeling social."

And she'll think back.

She'll be like, "Dave contributed to my bucket,

so he gets the reward of hanging out in the basement

by himself all night."

Retirees, I get you.

I get you.

And now it's time for Josh to wrap it all together.

Pen drop.

Carla, I love you, by the way.

He does love you, Carla.

What you said about that book, and we've read this book

since the kids were little, and for those listeners that

aren't aware of the bucket book, the bucket book has to

do with being kind to other people, and kindness is as

you fill up their bucket.

As you're being kind to them, it fills their bucket with love.

And the more full their bucket is, the better they feel,

and the better their life is.

And when you're mean to them or aren't kind to them,

it drops water out of the bucket, and they become

miserable human beings.

I think equally as important to

that is finding what fills people's buckets, because

it's different for everybody.

Yes.

Yeah.

And I was a little worried as to how you were going to try

and equate this to retirees.

It's on point.

It is a perfect one to one connection, Josh.

You're not too far off-

Oh.

Here's where I'm going with this.

Full House music.

I hope this resonates.

Oh, it's been playing.

Yeah.

You are putting stuff away for a future benefit.

And like a retiree who, putting money away right now is not fun.

I'd rather spend it on something else.

I'd rather go out and buy something cool, a

new toy, better food, whatever it might be.

But I'm going to save for the future.

I'm going to contribute to my IRA, my 401[k],

whatever that might be.

Now, you are contributing to Carla's bucket so that

in the future, you can reap the rewards of this.

Correct.

But here's the difference that

I'm struggling with.

When I contribute to the 401[k], it is truly out of

I'm going to get something in the future out of this.

Okay.

I think the theme of that story, the bucket story,

has everything to do with making the other person feel very

good, and has very little to do with expecting future benefits

that you'll receive from making that person feel good, so-

That's just one man's interpretation, Josh.

All right?

It's kind of like my daughter saying, "Well, if

I give her a gift, then she's going to give me a gift."

I haven't really matured past

the age of nine, or 8.

No.

I understand where you're going, and I think the

retirees will get it.

But I also think that they will hope that you're just

going to fill up Carla's bucket because you want to be a good

person and it makes you feel good to fill up her bucket.

And Dave, if you ever need something non-vegan, gluten

filled, come on over.

Oh, I know where to go, believe me.

This kind of ties back nicely to the whole Bretl

countertop situation, where you'll cook for everybody.

I'll just have Carla stop and get a salad for herself-

She does do that.

Dave, our first podcast of 2023 is in the books, and-

It's in the books.

I'm excited to see what the year

holds for us and for the podcast listeners as well.

Please, if you like the podcast, share it with a friend, a

family member, someone else who you think would find us

entertaining and insightful.

Yeah.

Well, I'm the insightful one.

Very insightful.

You're the entertaining one.

Hey, listeners, it's as simple

as telling a friend, "Hey, go to pod.link/ref.

R-E-F, Retirement Equals Freedom.

That is us.

Pod.link/ref.

We don't own that website, but it's a cool

website to just send somebody to, and it's like a really

quick recap of everything we do.

It can send them to all the different podcast apps.

Pod.link/ref.

Just give it a shot.

Well, with that, my friend, do you have

something you'd like to say-

Let's see.

to Debbie?

Deb, I will say this.

Next time you hear our compliance message, it

will be from our brand new podcast desk, so what I say

now is just a simple bye.

Bye.

Worst ending ever,

Which part?

I don't know.

The whole thing.