➡ The text discusses the importance of financial responsibility, particularly in relation to car ownership. It highlights the issue of high monthly car payments and negative equity, with many people owing more on their car than it’s worth. The text also touches on the importance of being prepared for economic downturns, including having cash on hand and stocking up on necessary supplies. Finally, it mentions a new law in San Diego requiring businesses to offer paper coupons, not just digital ones, to ensure everyone has access to discounts.

➡ The article discusses three main points: a future change where everyone will be entitled to discounts on purchases, the impact of a $20 minimum wage for fast food workers in California and its potential spread to other industries like senior healthcare in Nevada, and the slow process of issuing building permits after fires, with advice to seek professional help when dealing with insurance companies.

Hey, it’s Dan. Welcome back. This is I, Allegedly, and I’ve got a good one for you today because it is time to get ready, guys. It really, really is. And please hit the like button. Please subscribe to the channel. Today, I am at the Flower Fields in Carlsbad, where all the flowers are blooming, but we came a few weeks early. And I had people say, oh, it would be nice to kind of see before and after what this place looks like. So I’m like, I was in the area, so I thought, okay, I’ll swing by and start filming there today.

And some of the flowers bloom on the other side, blooming on the other side, so I’ll show you that. But let’s get into this, guys. You know, recession talk and talk of trouble in the economy is something that this channel is not new to. And one thing that you got to pay attention to is trends that happen with spending, trends that happen in businesses. There are telltale signs of companies that should be doing well all of the time. And we’ve got some problems. John Dietrich is the CEO of FedEx, and they just released their numbers that were completed on February 28th.

And he said, wait a second. We made money. Sales were up. Revenue was up. But we have a problem. And we see a real strong possibility of an economic downturn over the course of this year through the middle of 2026. They do not see any increase in shipping. They do not see business improving at all during this time. Now, think about this. This is a logistics company that moves things from here to there. And they’re very good at it. You can’t argue with FedEx. You can like FedEx or hate FedEx. But they’re very good at what they do.

Telling us that there is going to be a huge downturn right now is something I think we should all look at. And, you know, the middle of next year to talk about this is realistic. Now, when you start to hear all these different, you know, numbers from the percentages of what, you know, what’s the percentage that we could have a recession? Well, you know, we’ve seen numbers 40 percent, 50 percent, now 60. Now, when you start talking to people, they say, listen, we’re not spending any money. We’re cutting back in every area that we can.

I went to the baseball game on Monday night of this week and saw Taylor Ward hit a walk off against the Dodgers, which was fantastic. And it was great. OK. But a friend of mine said, you know, my wife didn’t really watch you. But then she’s like, he’s kind of making sense. We should cut back. We should, you know, spend less and tell what’s wrong with that. But if you get a hold of this now and do it now, you’re going to be so ahead of the game. Again, if you live by yourself, if you have 12 kids, you need to look and do things differently right now because we’re headed not into the abyss.

You can sit there and say, oh, it will never get depressionary times. I think it’s going to personally, but you can think anything you want. Now, one thing they do here, and it’s going to come by and get a little noisy for a second, is they have this tractor that pulls you around the fields. And let’s face it, when this place is blooming, this is right off the five freeway in Carlsbad, California, they get this tractor and they pull everybody for a ride. And you can go around and get a good glimpse of everything and go up the hill without having a walk.

So, John Dietrich sits there and tells everybody to cut back, and that he does not see any path to where things are going to improve during this time. The best that you can do is hope for stability in the economy. Now, when you start to talk to people, which you’ve got started to get into, it was 90% of the people out there say, hey, listen, we’re going to do things a lot differently right now than we did in the past. Okay, well, that’s great, guys. I mean, that’s what you should do. You know, it was as low as 17% four or five months ago.

Now, you can blame the new administration, and I’m going to get all those emails and stuff like that. But I just think that we are in for a huge downturn. The Layoff Festival that has happened in every single industry is not going to slow down. The most expensive part of running a business right now is basically your employees. And if we could cut that back and save money on that, God, let’s do that. So, you know, I have a friend of mine who went to the, another guy that went to the baseball game with us, and they brought a consultant into his business, and he’s in, let’s just say he’s in middle management, okay? He’s not kind of vice-president-y, you know, where he’s at.

But the consultant is like, how can we make this place profitable, and what can we cut back? And it all points to people, cutting back people. How do we sell them? Well, we don’t have a quality product in our product. We don’t have production time. It’s just cutting back. So what do you do? You get rid of people. What job could one person do two jobs of? That’s the other thing right now. Bill Adams of Comerica Bank, he steps forward and says that, listen, we are headed for a downturn, and we are headed to watch business lending suffer.

You’re going to see people borrowing less money for expansion. So with that being said, what’s next, guys? What’s next? Now, here’s the thing that floored me, was Walmart released its numbers, and people are sitting there saying, you know, Walmart needs to, Walmart needs to be more competitive. How does Walmart need to be more competitive? I mean, you can buy shirts there for $10. You can do things like that. But they lost $22 billion as consumer confidence plummets. This story is below. This is the talk, guys, that people need to understand this, that when the lowest form of our economy, the lowest level of our economy is suffering, everybody suffers.

So, you know, Walmart cutting back, and what can they do to make things a better value, and, you know, the idea of apps inside of Walmart, Target, and all these other stores, and sometimes you say the names of these companies, and I will get people to go, I hate Walmart now. Why would you even do a story on Walmart? Because they’re in the news, guys. They’re in the news. They’re talking about a discount shopping place is having trouble selling things right now. That should concern you. You need to cut back on everything in your life right now, absolutely everything right now.

Target, same thing. Target is seeing a massive amount of people that cannot afford this, and these people, you know, if they could have a duel, Target and Walmart would do shoot each other, okay? Because they just hate each other so much, and they’re trying to be the better company, more competitive, and it’s ridiculous, okay? So, it’s not working, guys. You need to cut back on everything you can. You need to not borrow money that you don’t need to borrow. If you’re trying to put buyers out right now when it comes to business, try not to do that.

We’re going to walk over to the good stuff where everything’s blooming over there, but is there a bubble in the auto loan market? Yes, without a doubt. Now, Pamela Fuhy is a professor at the University of Georgia, and she’s talking about how it is crazy what is happening in the auto loan market. Now, think about this. For the first time ever, ever, ever, ever, auto loans have surpassed student loan debt in this country. Well, good. We got student loans are going down a little bit. Well, bad news is, auto loans are at $1.66 trillion in debt.

That’s how much people owe on their cars right now as they drive down the street. That is wild, guys. It’s just too much. It’s too big of a number. And with that, think about this. In 2019, compared to today, you’ve got $10,000 more in what people owe for their cars and what they’re financing. Average loan right now, think about this. If you owe less than this, you’re above average. $42,113 is the average car loan right now. That is crazy. I’ve never owed that much on an automobile, ever, ever, ever, but that’s what the average person owes right now.

20, almost 24.8%, almost 25% of the people that are driving down the street are two months behind. So when you see people pull up next to you and they’re financing that car, odds are they’re behind in their payment. Well, that’s comforting to know. The majority of the people that are behind in their payment are the subprime borrowers, people with the lowest credit scores out there. Now, we all need to get places. You need to get to the flower fields and go check it out, and you need to drive to get there. You can’t fly here.

There’s no way to do that. So you’ve got to hop into an automobile. The smartest thing you can do is go out and not finance that. Oh, you know, they did a woman who was like, why do you drive these old beat-up cars? Because I don’t know anything on them. I teach fiscal responsibility. Shouldn’t I live the part? Oh, I would think that you’d have a sports car or something like that. Okay. No, no, guys. Live it, guys. I don’t know anybody any money. The car is paid for, guys. Well, imagine that, okay? Imagine that.

Now, the staggering things about this is that when you hear these amounts, 20% of all the people out there, of all the cars you see, one in five have a payment of over $1,000 a month. What is wrong with you that you would do that? $1,000 of your monthly income goes towards the car payment. Now, here’s the thing. It doesn’t mean that they’re getting a good deal on this. It doesn’t mean that they’re financing lower terms. The last time I financed a car, I financed it for 36 months, which is the ideal time frame.

You want to buy a new car and you finance it for 36 months, you will have equity in the car when you go to turn it in, most likely. So, as long as you didn’t get clipped in the car, you didn’t get taken advantage of. This is stunning. Now, this place, you can see from the freeway when you drive by, and it is absolutely beautiful, but they’re annuals, and this is very early in the season, so they just start to bloom right now. And you can just see how absolutely stunning that is.

Man, this is just really, really nice of you. It’s kind of a cool day, but this will go for like two months, and then the season’s done. And this was owned by the nursery that’s down there, and then they sell the tickets here. Today’s a nice day because there’s nobody up here. So, I’ve been here with this place. You just can’t even walk around. People are playing music and doing crazy things. But, again, let’s get into it. You know, lower credit scores, they’ve got bigger problems. You know, the negative equity, how about this? When people turn cars in right now, I’ve got to get out of this car.

Car’s not working. The average negative equity is almost $6,700 right now. $6,700. So, what do you do? You just finance it in the next car? Ah, we’ll figure it out someday. We’ll make a bunch of money. We’re going to win the lottery and pay it off. Yeah, just like the other did. So, you know, so all these people, you know, 25% upside down. It’s just terrible, okay? Absolutely terrible. Now, think about this. Before the pandemic, it was only 14.9% of the people were upside down in their car loans. Average, you know, interest rates are at an all-time high for auto loans.

And my favorite part was the payments, man. The payments are just up there. But $1.66 trillion in auto loan debt. And you’re not getting out of that any time soon. So, look at this. Isn’t that beautiful? Absolutely stunning. Imagine you plant flowers on the side of a hill and people pay you $25 to walk up here. How about that? And they sell out, too. You only sell so many tickets in a day. When you go online and you check it out, you can sell out. You know, hell, there’s only 18 tickets left. Better hurry and buy them.

You have to buy them online. You have to paint advance. But stunning, guys. Absolutely stunning. But sign of the times, guys. Sign of the times is that everything points to a downturn. If you know that and you’re ready, you’re going to be fine. You really will. You just need to prepare. You need to save money every place you can. You need to stack cash and have cash in case there’s a problem with the banks. I am one of these people that believes now more than ever that we’re going to have a period of time when the banks are going to be shut down to us for an extended period of time.

You’re going to be able to pay for things with cash. Or if you’re like me and you got water and you got food and things like that in your house, you don’t worry about stuff like that. You just go about your day, which is what you should do. Everybody should be prepared right now for this. Your loved ones, your family members. If you take any prescription medicine, stock up on that. Now, every time I mention this, I get people that say, no, no, no. The insurance companies won’t allow it. Sure, they will. They’ll allow you to have a one-month supply.

They’ll allow you to do this. My, you know, cancer-stricken late girlfriend, we did this on a regular basis. My friends whose wife’s going through cancer treatment, stock up on everything. Get extra supply so that there is no issue with you in case you don’t feel good or you can’t get to the pharmacy or whatever. And guess what the doctor did? Allowed it. So did the insurance company. Ask. Ask for anything. Remember that. You’re going to see bills go up for things like energy. Will gas prices eventually go down even more? Yes, they will.

Will food prices go down? Let’s hope so. Eggs sure are dropping fast. I don’t hear people bitching about eggs anymore. But let me know. Let me know what you think about this so far with this. Yeah, let’s just look at that. Hello. Not just nice. Gosh. Talk about some bad news all day long. Oh, my gosh. It’s so pretty. I want to remind you that we have a private channel called iAllegedly Live. And it is uncensored. It is everything that we cannot cover here and other places. I love doing that content. We have almost 250 videos on there already.

Absolutely amazing. But check it out today. You sign up at iAllegedly.tv. Now, a couple things that I found fascinating. Number one was CNBC did a great article talking about how you have high-end earners, the richest 1% that are spending less money right now than ever. Now, think about this. There is tracking. We’re tracked throughout our entire lives, guys. Our spending, you know, shopping habits, how we drive, where we buy gas, I mean, where we eat, how much we spend when we go out to eat everything. Citibank did a report that they issued that spending has been off 5% for the highest income earners.

And let’s face it, how does the bank know that you have money? They know. The bank knows who has money and who doesn’t. So what you’re seeing is that CNBC has issued a warning that, you know, that the richest 1% are not spending money, but that we are entering an economic downturn in a very, very big way and that people need to prepare themselves for it. What does CNBC offer? Nothing. If you know, you know. You know what I mean? Well, okay, I guess that’s one way of looking at it.

I guess I’m ready for this. I am, okay? You should be, too. City of San Diego issued a law called grocery transparency and shopping transparency. I’m like, what’s that? Now, living here in Southern California, you get San Diego news, you get Ventura County news, you get Southern California news at the local news channels. As I watch this stuff till 2 o’clock in the morning, one thing that they did, San Diego City Council just issued a ruling that you have to allow paper coupons for businesses and for any shopping deal.

You cannot make people have to use the apps to get the bargains. Now, have you guys driven to any fast food place lately? McDonald’s, Wendy’s, I mean, everybody. Are you going to be using the app today? No, leave me alone. I don’t want to use the app. Well, what City of San Diego did, which is kind of cool, any offer that is on the app has to be offered in a printed paper coupon for the poorest of people and the oldest of people. And what this does is it makes it so that you can get the same discount, buy two, get one free, things like that have got to be in a printed circular so people can get it.

So the cool thing is if you go to San Diego, you’re going to be to walk in the store and get those coupons and thumb through it, where the rest of us have to go through an app and check it all out, which is a total headache. And they interviewed two people for this story that were great and they were both talking about how, wait a second, I couldn’t get my app open, I couldn’t get my phone open, and then I gave it to the cashiers. I’m holding up the line and we’ve all seen this.

I’ll have the old guy that, oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. But he says I felt real bad because the cashier couldn’t, you know, figure it out and she couldn’t get my app open and I didn’t get the discount, so I paid more for the product. That ends, guys. But what’s going to happen is with consumer and ombudsman across the country is they’re going to make it so that everybody’s going to be entitled to that. Now, I understand the simplicity of this. I understand the shopping. I understand all the stuff that they want to track.

We talked about the DNA and the 23andMe and how your date is just not yours and they’re going to sell it off. The idea with this is when it comes to the shop is they want to be able to take it so that regardless of what you can purchase, you can save money on that. So let me know what you think about that. Once again, I’m glad I could come out here for you guys. I love coming to this place. It’s just stunning. But it’s nice to give bad news with that background. One thing that happened here in California two years ago when Governor Newsom made the bold move to pay fast food workers $20 an hour and couldn’t figure out if it would have a negative effect on the economy.

Well, I told you every single other industry is going to start saying that they want to get paid the $20 an hour minimum. And where does this money come from? You got to make money to pay the wages. That’s one thing that we definitely know. There’s always little cutouts here where you can go get your pictures right and the flowers and stuff. But the latest industry is senior health care workers in Nevada. Nevada, they say, is going to be experiencing a silver tsunami. And I’m not talking about the price of silver going up.

I’m talking about old people coming of age and needing care. And as we get older, the workers want to get paid more money and they want a minimum of $20 an hour, which is crazy. It really is. I mean, it’s good, but it’s going to increase insurance premiums. We’re going to have to pay for this. So what do you think about this? And again, you can sit there and say $20 an hour is not that much. But 40 hours a week, guys, $800 a week to work fast food and to do this. So it’s kind of crazy.

Final, final story is the fires were in January. And two months ago, Adam Corolla did a great expose on how it’s going to take forever to get building permits. There have been four building permits issued during this entire time. Four. Not 40, not 400, four. And a bunch of great stories. There’s a great video below from our local CBS News talking about how people are getting the runaround. Think about this. The contents of our home had $700,000 worth of stuff in it. Well, that’s nice. To rebuild the house is going to be about $656,000. What did the insurance company offer them? $68,000 total for everything.

And the problem is people get freaked out and worried and they take ridiculous offers. Get yourself a private adjuster. Go out and get some advice. Get an attorney. And get yourself help. Because they’re going to take advantage of you. And I would use profanity right there is where I would have done it. So please hit the like button. Subscribe to this channel. Let me know what you want to see. Hello at ialegily.com. And onward and upward, guys. And look at this. Hello. This goes on forever, guys. I’ll see you real soon. [tr:trw].

See more of I Allegedly on their Public Channel and the MPN I Allegedly channel.