Dumping Debt!
Tonight was only one lesson, Dumping Debt, but that is the longest (time-wise) lesson in Financial Peace University and it is also Dave Ramsey’s true passion! I have to admit, even though I have seen the old Dumping Debt lesson on video…video cannot possible capture the full extent of this man’s zeal and intensity…you truly have to see it in person! Dave isn’t just about debt reduction; he is about total debt annihilation. THIS will be the first lesson I subject the Reluctant Spouse to when he gets home, simply on the strength of the debt myths that Dave Ramsey sets about debunking in a relatively calm and rational manner.
I use the term “relatively calm and rational” because once Dave began to explain the “gazelle intensity” concept, and the footage of the gazelles running from the cheetah started rolling, we didn’t have a seminar leader on stage…we had a wild man! Imagine a cross between a fundamentalist preacher leading an excited revival meeting, a sports fan whose team just won the biggest game, and a raving lunatic on the streets shouting the world is ending…and that comes close LOL Dave Ramsey was jumping up and down, waving his arms and screaming at the top of his lungs into the microphone…and I still couldn’t hear what he was saying since the entire audience was doing the same thing! Wow…I could just FEEL the energy in the air around me.
The meat of the Dumping Debt lesson is still the same, but the statistics are even more grim than they were six years ago when he last filmed it. In fact, the statistics are positively frightening:
- 25% of American families have a NEGATIVE net worth now
- more young adults file bankruptcy than graduate college now
- colleges lose more students due to massive debt loads than academic failures
- last year credit card companies collected $90 BILLION in penalty fees alone
- last year, credit card companies reported profits of over $150 BILLION
For those of y’all who have friends and family who think you have lost your mind or joined a cult when you got on the Dave Ramsey plan, these stats should convince you beyond all reasonable doubt that you are doing the RIGHT THING! Use these stats to convince them to get on the plan right NOW before they become one of these statistics!
Finally, at the end of the lessons, Dave Ramsey came back out and told us he wanted to h onor a friend of his who helped him move his first desk into his first office once they got the business out of his living room. He was talking about Russ Carroll, and the genuine gratitude and admiration in Dave’s voice rang true as he asked Russ out for us to applaud, and joined us in clapping for a man he said “was there the whole way.” Critics may quibble about Dave’s salesman ways, but they cannot deny his loyalty and appreciation of his staff, his friends, and his family for helping him every step of the way.
