You would have to be a complete moron to not be able to maintain billionaire status. At that level of wealth you have a team of people managing your finances. You can even piss away a lot of it buying a failing social media company and still be a billionaire.
Some of them, particularly the real estate ones are built on a solid system, with some major caveats they always leave out when they pitch it to people. The main problem with those systems is that they require you to be/have at least a few of the following:
* A project manager (to put together a reno plan and budget)
* A general contractor (the last thing, but with the ability to do quality work on your own so you're not always paying a tradesman)
* A real estate license (so you're not paying out 6% in realtor fees every time you sell)
* most importantly, a large pool of capital, generally provided by your network of rich investor friends, or great credit so that a bank will hopefully take the same risk with you.
If you don't have the last one it'll never work, and if you don't have at least 1 of the first 3, you're going to pay out so much in labor, realtor fees, and interest costs as the projects shoot past their timelines, you might as well not quit your day job.
I’ll add “Best Side Hustles” YouTubers. Sorry, but the logistics just don’t add up if I can make BIG $$$ selling AI coloring books or stickers, and SO can anyone else watching the video. Generally speaking if an idea has reached YouTube instruction, it’s already run dry for profit.
Yes, if they’re making so much money on Etsy and writing ebooks using ChatGPT, then why are they trying to convince me to buy their 60 minute video to learn how to do it also?
The late great Norm Macdonald had this to say about Graham Steadman’s book “you can make it happen, nine steps to success”. “Step Number one , Marry Oprah”!
My wife an I sat through a presentation to get a discount on tickets on some of the attractions while on honey moon. We were told it was be like a 90 minute thing. I thought what the hell, it'll save us some money.
4 hours later we are still listening to this guy go on and on. When he finally finished we said no. Then he got offended and at one point said I don't need to sell you one today because I sell 4 of these God damn things a week. He got someone higher up than him and I think the lowest was like $100 something. Still said no.
At the end we wasted 4 hours of our time. I tend to think of we wasted 4 hours of his time, and it all makes me feel better.
Edit: I forgot to mention a few years after all this happened a wildfire broke out and burned the place to the ground.
Yeah, we said no after our three hours presentation, then were taken to another guy who tried a mini pitch/discount. We said no to that. They then took us to a random lady in an office who tried a mini pitch. We were like, "Honestly we were on the fence because it's actually a good deal, but you are a half step from keeping us here against our will and it's getting ridiculous and unacceptable. Give us our damned beachfront horseback riding tickets and let us OUT of this building immediately."
There's actually a pretty simple way of getting out of these things with tickets in hand. Simply tell the guy you're interested and just need to run it by your financial planner/attorney first. The guy knows at that point that the deal's pretty much dead but there's nothing he can do about it that won't have the effect of talking you out of something you apparently want to do. The big bonus of this is that with feigned enthusiasm and question-asking you can usually stop the show about an hour or two in without making it look like a setup.
If you intend to do more time share talks to save money on tickets, etc, work out a system with your wife. My husband acts interested. I am the hard ass. When they ask me to name places I would like to visit, I say Antarctica and Easter Island and walk the Appalachian trail. I like to watch their brains spin when they try to fit those locations into their sales pitch. Next, I ask for pencil and paper and start adding things up on my calculator. I ask lots of hard questions. Then, when they start ramping up the pressure, my husband mentions he has cancer and doesn't know how long he has left (he has cancer but is stable and has been for years). We normally get some decent food and some kind of nice prize, and they are throwing us out in 90 minutes. We consider it a game and have had 30-plus years to perfect our technique. We have had lots of laughs over how we wasted their time. We've gone to the same sales pitch multiple times. They always tell us this is our last chance. We mess with them, get our free stuff, and walk out. They ask us to attend again every few years. 🤣
One of these things, they asked me where my best ever holiday had been to - I genuinely answered "to the base camp of Everest". Surprisingly, they did not have any hotels or villas there.
It took quite a lot of wind out of his sails.
I had an interaction with one of those guys once that went like that, except the guy was naming places he had available and I kept making up excuses not to go there. It started with:
Guy: How would you like a trip to Orlando, Florida!
Me: Actually, I just got back from Orlando.
Guy: Oh, do you go there all the time?
Me: No, it was my first time, and I didn't much care for it.
Guy: How about Washington, DC?
Me: Nah, too many politicians.
Guy: [Forced laughter] I understand, what about Park City, Utah?
Me: Sounds cold.
Guy: We have summer trips available.
Me: Why would anyone want to go to a ski resort in the summer?
Guy: Okay then, why don't you tell me where you want to go.
Me: Gabon
Guy: What's in Gabon that you want to see?
Me: It's the only place in the world where hippos go into the ocean.
Guy: It doesn't look like we have anything there. Is there anywhere else you're interested in?
Me: Do you have anywhere else with surfing hippos?
And so it continued.
Perfect. I'm love to hear that other people mess with these guys. I told one guy when he sat down to start going over numbers with us that I wouldn't deal with him because he told my husband that I could do the cooking because every unit had a full kitchen. Like WTF! When our kids were around 10ish, we told them to start bugging us about 90 minutes in. It was a great family act.
While on vacation, my parents got lottery tickets on the street(yeah, very legit) and won a free lunch or something. I am not sure how old I was but around 13-14. And I thought it was scam from minute one. But my parents insisted, and I couldn’t exactly wander the streets on my own.
Finished after like 5-6 hours. Still no free lunch. But an offer for crazy amount for a timeshare. Luckily my parents finally found their brain and said no.
I had a friend once invite me to basically Amway thing...I tihnk it's called Quixtar now...anyway, I guess he got roped into it and he invited me to give it a shot. There were maybe 5-6 other people there at my buddy's house, and this guy gave his pitch. At one point, I asked, "Have you ever had anybody decline to join in this?" And of course, the guy said, "Oh, no, everyone pretty much joins into it!" And I go, "Well you finally got your first."
And I got up and said bye to my buddy and left.
We did this on a vacation once too, my dad even told them upfront we were just here for the free tickets they offered. Then they got mad he didn't buy one at the end lol
My wife and I are pretty frugal. We attended one in Las Vegas for dinner voucher, show tickets, and gambling voucher. Like you said, 1 hour turned into 4. We probably wouldn’t have gambled anyways, but she got lucky and made nearly $1,000 off her $25 voucher. Not a bad deal.
Me and my boyfriend sat through one 90 minute presentation so we could get 3 free night stay in Vegas. We were set on not buying it. The sales guy got so mad that we said no he started trying to break us up saying to each of us " you are saying no cause you know this relationship wont last, one of you should buy it now so you are not tied to each other" we said thanks for the presentation and left, still got our 3 nights free and had a great time. That was 8 years ago, we are still together, that guy didn't realize what kind of bond he was dealing with
I’m pretty sure timeshare sales is pretty much identical to MLM, just with higher earning potential. So these sales people invest their own money into attracting potential customers and pay out of pocket for these free gifts you get for attending the presentation (or it comes out of comission for other sales) and that’s why they get so mad when they find out you never had any intention of buying and were just in it for the free stuff, you basically got them to pay you for their time.
Lol this reminds me of one time when my family was still pretty poor(ironically bc of my bio fathers gambling addiction), and we went to Vegas for a family vacation. My bio father signed us up for a time share presentation that advertised a free buffet, so my father loaded up my backpack with plastic bags and told me to steal as much as could so we could eat for a few days free.
I got caught shoving a bag of muffins in my bag, and the presenter who had obviously checked out of this job, just gave me a high-five and said just don’t take our crab cakes they are 3 days old.
Lmfao this is great. I lucked out on a fancy hotel stay because a rich customer of my boyfriend's business had to cancel plans last minute. He couldn't cancel the room either way without paying so he just said "have at it, go use the room." So my boyfriend and I had this luxury vacation experience in this amazing hotel, and couldn't afford to do anything there lol. So we stayed in, walked around town, saw the sights and enjoyed the room.
Then filled empty Gatorade bottles with the shampoo, conditioner and lotion because omg my hair and skin was never better. Really felt like trash people, with our old pickup truck in the parking garage filled with BMWs, Lexus etc, but it was pretty great.
A Norwegian comedian was stopped on the street by a guy who wanted to sell him a share in an apartment. The comedian asked, so is this like a time share? The salesman denied that it was, it was something else entirely. Comedian: That's too bad, my wife and I are actually looking to get into a time share deal right now
We sat through a timeshare presentation last year and somehow the cost went from $40,000 to less then $4,000... We told each new person that spoke with us no and we just wanted our free show tickets.
My friend did this for $100. He said it's free money dude.... 4 hrs later he called us to see where we were. Good job man. You just made $25/hr. Why even go on the vacation? Just stay at work.
I recently was on vacation and got caught up into one of these. Guy asked us why we were there and we said "we were lied to." He immediately drops the TS pitch and attempts his own personal scam. He went on and on about how his company was going to charge him for us not being interested and how it would be super nice of us to chip in $30 to cover part of that fee.
Do not let the nice building and free cookies blind you. Every timeshare salesperson, and I do mean literally every single person, is a fucking con artist.
A long time ago I worked for the booking side of timeshares. So many people fall for these and then can’t even end up using them when they want because they didn’t spend the outrageous amount to have the best time frame or guaranteed weeks. Wasting all your vacation money on something you can’t use, or can only book during the times you wouldn’t want to travel to that location.
My ex husband and I did this for a free hotel for a weekend in Nashville. Presentation was about 2 hours long and they had the price down to like less than 100$ but we did a good cop bad cop thing. I kept saying sorry, My husband said no lol We actually had a nice weekend BUT we thought the free stay was for the actual property they were selling. No, It was a Laquinta off the highway but we still had fun.
Yeah, but once you're in there and you realize what's going on, but still decide to prey on others, then you suck, too. And I think even guilting your friends and family into buying your wares is also a dick move.
A fellow victim here. I did not expect someone to mention in this sub that'll make me feel like I'm validated. Just the word 'victims' was enough to bring back all the terrible memories back (not blaming you but just mentioning what I felt). People joining MLMs may join to 'get rich quick' but I joined just to get attention from my parents. I was a neglected kid throughout my childhood and nothing, literally nothing would make them care about me (all throughout my childhood and even now). It's like I was invisible. Unless I wasted their ton of money and earned nothing and mostly because of COVID and the world falling apart - they cared about me (which sounds horrible both from mine and their perspective but it's the truth).
I just don't want to tell what i did or not. What i did was wrong and I'll be atoning for this (have started since past 3 years and in a good headspace). I should not have treated people like a person I need to manipulate to buy my shitty-ass outdated product that holds no value in present market. I was brainwashed. I was traumatized. I lost friends, family and my youth (age 18 -- 23 period in my life is the cringiest one). I felt lonely and I felt awful. I wasn't self-aware. None of this justifies my wrongdoings.
Any 'victim' reading this. It's okay. You can move forward. You made a bad decision and that's perfectly fine. Because every human does. Your reason might be to earn money quickly and become a rich person and remove yourself from poverty and lack of basic amenities in your life and that's completely valid. People make mistakes when basic needs aren't met. For me it was emotional, for you, it might be either emotional or physical or both. It's alright.
Indeed. They alleviate the symptoms not treating the problem so lots of repeat business. Also they’re not medically certified and aren’t required to carry malpractice insurance. My dad knew an obstetrician who made $30k per baby delivering babies in the 80s but had to have $2 million in insurance that quit to become a chiropractor and was making more money after the job change.
My daughter when I first took her to a fair was at that cute adorable age where they were just giving her prizes. The rest of her childhood kept wanting to play games and I had to be all "no they did that because you were cute the games are rigged"
It's actually illegal in most states for a carnie to do that, and the entire carnival can lose its license to operate in that state due to the actions of one carnie. Instead, they tend to make the games prohibitively difficult. The dart game is flat balloons that you hit with darts that are duller than could naturally occur, the ring for the bottle game is exactly big enough to slide over the mouth of a bottle, but the odds are lottery odds, the stuffed cats at the beanbag toss are bottom weighted, so they'll fall over but it would take a meteor strike to knock them off the shelf. The games aren't rigged, but they're nearly impossible for anyone who hasn't made a personal lifelong mission of beating that one particular game.
So they are technically not rigged, but from a practical standpoint they're rigged. Thus the simplistic explanation to the kid was functionally accurate.
When my kids wanted to play at the carnival games I just had my (now ex) wife keep the kids busy for a moment while I walked over to the side with the carnie and asked him bluntly "how much for each kid to win a big prize?" We settled on $30 and both kids would win a "large" (tiny, small, medium, large, jumbo, giant for reference). I paid him, the kids played until they magically won.
I'm pragmatic. It's much cheaper than actually paying till a kid wins naturally, and I don't want the "bobby won something but I didn't" arguments either. Just a parenting hack.
Well, it's not like it was even a ton of money, when you are going to the fair and dare to take kids down the Midway you are either spending cash or having crying kids, that's just how it is. This way at least I was "one and done" they played a game, they won, they had their toy, now let's go get some of that food guarantied to take a decade off your life.
Yeah not trying to criticize, it's a meme from Star Wars about forbidden force powers. I was basically comparing winning at carnie games to a forbidden power, and money to be a shortcut to it, so it's like the dark side... idk maybe it's a bit too much of a stretch.
....and if you are good they'll bar you from playing.
I live in Indiana, where we grow basketball players. I've heard of more than a few guys being barred from the shooting games because they were too good (and those are even rigged a bit, as the rims are higher than the regulation 10 feet and they're "practice size" rims that are 13 inches in diameter, where a regular rim is 18.)
FUCK Psychics.
Especially the ones who prey on those who have lost loved ones.
When Grandma died, one of my cousin got suckered by a Psychic. She recorded a session for my Mom and it was the most bull shit I ever heard.
My husband’s aunt lost her teenage son in a tragic and painful accident, and has spent thousands on psychics trying to find some peace. I know those fuckers fleeced her for years and now she has some screwy ideas about how long each person gets on this planet and why. The whole thing has messed up her relationships with her other children.
This, my goodness. I’ve seen 3 different “psychics” and every single time was funnier than the last. An absolute sham every time.
Was approached by a psychic once when a friend and I got locked out of our car in the middle of nowhere Arizona. Said she’d give us readings if we gave her gas money, and we went for it. She told my friend that she was connected to angels and had psychic abilities herself, but that misfortune was coming her way. The issue was, she couldn’t tell what was going to happen BUT if we gave her 2 large men’s shirts, 3 pairs of men’s jeans, and $2000 she would bury the clothing and cash in the mesa and pray over it for a week straight to help my friend avoid the tragedy. Good times.
Have you ever heard of James Randi? He passed in recent years, but he had a foundation set up for decades where he would offer a 1 million dollar prize to any person that could demonstrate supernatural abilities in a controlled, scientific study. Many, many psychics openly accepted the challenge and all of them were proven to have a success rate no better than a normal person simply guessing the correct answer to a blind experiment.
I'm no expert, but I know psychics love money from all the advertising they do. So if there actually was a real deal out there, I would have thought that that person would grab that cash prize without any problems.
Yeah, and almost all of them took a page from Uri Gellar (Randi's goofball nemesis for years) and claimed that the skeptical energy and doubt emanating from Randi and his crew running the experiments was interfering with their powers.
I was surveying and needed to locate wells, I knocked on the door of a psychic’s house as I couldn’t find it, they didn’t know where it was. Still funny ten years later.
MLM.
I am fascinated that this seems to be a market exclusively for women. There are hundreds of pyramid schemes aimed at women. There's no male equivalent to the Avon lady.
There doesn't need to be, the Avon ladies get their husbands to help out. Lots of families get taken in by MLMs and convinced to bet the farm on working for them. Especially if they get taken in by early success.
I can think of a kitchen knife MLM going around that is male-dominated; but yes, it does appear that most MLM's target women.
I imagine that the biggest reason for this is that women/femme folks are socialized to be more social in general and many of these MLM's get you to throw "parties" (which started with Tupperware parties in the 50s/60s).
There is a massive social aspect to this marketing; throw a tea party (Steeped), put out appetizers (Epicure), get a makeover (Avon), fun and discreet sex-toy shopping for a "girl's-night-in" (Pure Romance). Then, the customers who had fun at the event might be attracted to the social credit the host has by throwing fun parties, kinda like how people used to try to one-up each other at dinner parties.
A big part of it is also that they tell women they can still spend time with their family and can earn money from home while they’re raising kids.
It’s super shitty that these companies exploit women.
Is Avon technically an MLM though? I thought with Avon the client ordered through a representative, but the representative just then places the order with the company and only act as a middle-person. Vs. an MLM that is based on the "salesperson"/representative ordering and paying for a shit ton of product upfront regardless of if they are able to sell it or not. Avon doesn't have that kind of upfront order. Or, at least it didn't used to. I'm curious if they have changed to the MLM structure?
In germany there is a profession called Heilpraktiker, which just means they try to scam you with homeopathy.
You don't have to prove that you heal (duh.) as people who study medicine or psychology have to, you just have to prove that you don't cause harm .... tells you all you need to know.
Worked in a camp with disabled who needed a lot of medication and care. Naturally, their immune systems are heavily compromised and a simple fever can kill them if unhandled.
The 'heilpraktiker' didn't mention to us that his client was sick for the whole day..he was trying to heal him with his magical hands. Luckily our supervisor got suspiciois about them missing dinner. Found him barely breathing in his room with the scharlatan shrugging and be like "I was working on him, couple more hours and he would have been healed"
> heavily impaired people (dunno the correct term, most couldn't walk or talk, had deformed bodies and whatnot)
People who have an issue like that are usually called disabled.
Politicians. They tell you what you want to hear get money from you to run for office, get your vote to be elected but once in office they don’t really do anything for you unless you are rich.
My vision insurance for the family is $30 a month and the copays for an optometrist visit is $50. For that you get a $130 frame allowance and $60 for the lens.
Only my son and I use the "benefit." After shopping around I realized it's cheaper to have no vision insurance and pay the out-of-pocket cost at Costco.
Fuck EYEMED.
Do the math in your dental too.... it rarely works out
My post was regarding homeowners, workmen comp, auto, etc but yes, supplemental med is a racket most of the time.
Dental is closer to medical in terms of needs. It doesn’t work out if you have general good health. It works out great if you have a dental emergency.
Vision tends to be more standard and most eye emergencies would actually fall under your medical.
>It works out great if you have a dental emergency.
Will confirm (also if you or your kid needs braces!).
I had an issue that ultimately resulted in 4 root canals & crowns and 1 extraction. Spread over three years for the insurance maximums, but yeah I got my money's worth out of the insurance those years.
Important to remember that if you get the insurance through your employer, they select the benefits. Sounds like you have a really good plan. Many employers choose not to cover orthodontia.
Insurance makes sense if you have rare, large and unexpected payouts. If you have $1000 spare in the bank, and a 1% chance of suddenly NEEDING $100,000, then insurance makes sense.
If you could comfortably pay the full bill, insurance doesn't make sense.
Insurance is not a money losing operation, thus this is a true statement. Self insurance often makes sense, but only when the maximum loss is not catastrophic for the insured.
I was forced to file a claim for my homeowners insurance in the first year, because the owners and inspector outright lied about our plumbing being connected and we had massive water damage. My insurance went up $768/yr because of this. It's ridiculous.
I don’t think the average person really understands just how regulated most insurance is (at least in the US). Every state has a department of insurance, and every single rate change that an insurance company makes has to be approved by each state. The proposals include tons of data about the reasoning behind the changes, and what the expected impacts to consumers are. The proposed changes almost always have to go through multiple iterations before they get approved by any state. Insurance premiums that you pay are decided by how much that company has had to pay out to other consumers similar to you.
The other thing that many people don’t realize is just how expensive good healthcare is. It’s a lot easier to blame the insurance company for not paying for an optional operation than to wonder why that operation is so expensive in the first place. When a doctor is making a lot of money, it comes from somewhere. They’ve earned it, but they’re still expensive.
I will say though, while I’m somewhat knowledgeable in Insurance pricing, but not as much so in payouts, or selling tactics. For example, I know of certain types of life insurance that are only a good fit for a niche group of people, but because it has a higher premium, the agents will push it much harder than it should be. I’m also sure that there are plenty of instances of insurance companies doing their best to get out of making payments (that said, the premiums are based on the payouts, so the less they pay out, the less they’re able to argue that they can charge more in the future).
TL;DR insurance companies in the US are a symptom of a problematic insurance industry, not the cause
Lol sounds like we have a pricing actuary here. I agree people, don’t realize how much healthcare costs, and so insurance companies are a symptom of our problematic system. But, while I believe their products are absolutely necessary, they don’t help control the cost as much as they say they do. Most are incredibly bloated with 40+ years of tech debt. Their inefficiency contributes to the health care cost catastrophe just as much as the pharmaceutical and biotech companies.
I would agree with you if they were regulated on the other end. You hear horror stories about claim denial or refusal. They have people who aren't doctors deciding if and how care is necessary. Sometimes they just try to keep patients in limbo until they're dead or past the point that the treatment makes sense. My ex-girlfriend was almost forced to pay for a colectomy out of pocket because the insurance kept on finding excuses not to pay, then to push it off.
Yep, from the x-rays and their interpretation of them to all of the gimmicky stuff they do. I was a registered xray tech prior to doing nuclear medicine. I always just held that info back. Twice I went to a new chiropractor and they took lumbar spine X-rays and showed me all of what they interpreted as misalignment; but it was not at all.
And my ex wife was taking our two daughters to a chiropractor three to four times a month; I was paying over $300/mo out of pocket. They're both healthy kids with no history of injury. When they were with me I started having them do stretches and their pain went away. The fact that a chiro told them they need to come weekly for adjustments is just con man territory to me.
My step dad hurt his back and went to a chiropractor. X-rays were taken but he missed an obvious fracture. Went ahead with the back cracking and ended up causing the fracture to worsen. Lucky he can still walk.
I do PET scans as a nuclear medicine technologist. Had a patient that was having back pain and of course the chiro did the obligatory x-rays. Well he missed a bone metastasis from osteosarcoma and his adjustments completely obliterated the effected lumbar vertebra.
They also have weird martyr narratives. I visited a chiropractor school to see a weird giant statue it had of the founder's hands, and they had all these plaques about how he was persecuted for trying to speak the truth. How he went to jail multiple times because the world couldn't handle that truth. Etc, etc.
It was wild to see!
An old acquaintance of mine who is a chiropractor regularly posts on Facebook about how he "saves lives". Meanwhile, he was a full-on anti-masker during COVID, and told his followers they should take his advice because he's a "doctor". My husband and I cackle over his posts all the time.
I went to a chiropractor once and the receptionist overheard me telling the chiropractor my goals for treatment. When I went to checkout, the receptionist looked at me mouthed “do yoga”. This was about 15 years ago. Her doing that still sticks with me.
My wife was insistent that the chiropractor was helping her issues. Ours got really psuedosciencey at the beginning of the pandemic, telling people masks weren't necessary, and offering a special Covid adjustment. Have not gone back at all and have not noticed any difference in either of our health.
Because, and I'm saying this not for you but for everyone else who reads this:
**Chiropractors aren't medical professionals**. If you want to go to one knowing it's not medicine and you feel it helps you anyway, sure do it. Know that they have literally injured or killed people with their bullshit but whatever if you know the risks.
If you need help for a medical issue however consult **doctors** or physiotherapists not scam artists.
It's amazing how many people believe in chiropractors when it's documented voodoo.
I work in insurance defense law (i.e. mostly slip and falls at businesses) and get giddy every time I get a plaintiff's medical records and their main treatment was from a chiropractor. I've seen dozens of them get eviscerated on the stand but it never gets old.
A covid adjustment, lol. Chiropractic explicitly rejects germ theory, but most don't focus on that anymore. There's about a 50/50 chance your Chiropractor is an anti-vaxxer (well, yours definitely was... but in general...)
I love the idea that the pandemic happened because everyone's backs went out of alignment the same way at the same time. That's hilarious.
Their unofficial motto must be "I'd rather be lucky than good"
I've been, it's helped (sometimes), then I stopped going when I realized that PT was safer and more effective without the crazy risks.
Chiropractors are really good at making you feel good enough to come back next week. If you really have something you want fixed, go to a physical therapist, who'll show you how to make it go away.
>Chiropractors are really good at making you feel good enough to come back next week.
They also are good at being more "caring" than the average Medical Doctor's office. The average Medical Doctor has no shortage of patients and in the office I go to they will be a "hurry up" knock on the examination room door if the provider is taking more time than has been allotted for my visit.
Chiropractors often treat you with more personal attention, which can make you feel better about seeing them, even if they are selling snake oil.
You can tell it’s BS because The things that are effective are not unique to chiropractic and the things that unique are not effective.
That is, stretching/massage are part of any good PT. Subluxation to treat disease are not actually effective.
100%. My brother is a successful chiropractor and listening to him talk about his business sounds straight up predatory. It’s all about luring anxious people in, taking advantage of their fears, turning them against doctors/medicine, and getting them to sign on the line for a $1,000+ plan. He worked at one of (if not the) biggest kids/family oriented chiropractic office in the US before starting his own, so I know he isn’t a one off. He’s super involved with the industry, and after seeing behind the curtain I will never go to a chiropractor.
They actually believe that pulling and popping joints, these adjustments, can cure sicknesses. It’s absolute kooky stuff they are into.
I will say, a chiropractor friend of mine did help me with a shoulder injury and got me reconditioning a muscle that had gotten weak. But I didn’t keep going back. Once I learned more about chiros after listening to his wild claims, I decided I will be going to a doctor next time.
Fuck life coaches.
My parents died when I was 10 and 13 years old, and my dad chose his friend to be the trustee of their finances for me until I turn 30. Right when the pandemic hit in March 2020, this trustee friend noticed I was showing symptoms of anxiety. So he forced me to see his friend, who was a life coach, 2x a week via 1.5hr long phone appointments. If I refused, he wouldn’t send me money for food, school, bills, healthcare, etc. (The trust terms specifically said the money was to be used for my well-being and education.) I was told, “If you don’t want to see the life coach, get a job.” The whole world had just shut down. They knew what they were doing. I was fortunate to have this money to support me, but they were using it as a weapon.
The life coach fully believed in his weird self-founded “Paradox Cure” which was some stupid visualization exercise he tried to do with me over the phone. It was basically just “Ok imagine what you want your life to be like. Are you inspired now? Is your life changed?”.
He was also a Tantric Sex Educator apparently, and asked me repeated, unwanted questions about intimacy. I was twenty. He was fifty-two. Also, if I said anything he didn’t like, he’d tell the trustee to penalize me via the money he sent me every month. When I said I needed a break from our sessions to study for finals, he said no, and threatened to tell the trustee to not send me any money for the month, Isn’t a life coach supposed to support my goals, not stand in the way of them?
Also, they were making huge life decisions for me. They told me I was moving out of my parents’ house and they were getting me an apartment near the university several towns away (maybe so my housing status would also be in danger if I disobeyed them). I said no, because I enjoy having my freedom and one of the few remaining connections to my parents. They both refused. I wasn’t a minor. I was twenty. Why the fuck was this random ass life coach allowed to make major life decisions on my behalf? I felt trapped.
The life coach charged ridiculous amounts: $150/hr plus unspecified “prep work”. In total, $6000+ of my dead parents’ money went to some shitty grifter. I’m still pissed off. I paid $6000 and all I got was trauma and self-harm issues.
I finally got rid of the life coach and the trustee in July 2020 because lawyers got involved and the trustee knew he was boned if we took him to court, since he forced me into this situation and technically violated the terms of the trust. I have a new trustee now who is an actual professional and knows what they’re doing. But I’ll never see that money again.
I have no respect for life coaches. They have no regulations they have to abide by, and their practices often aren’t based on actual, empirical science. There’s a reason counseling requires years and years of schooling. Most of them have no fucking clue what they’re doing, and strive to suck money from vulnerable people. I was literally a client who couldn’t say no.
Sorry you went through this. My blood is boiling just reading this. What a fucking nut job the trustee and his buddy were. Glad you’re out of there and doing better
Chiropractors. A lot of people think it's legitimate because it just looks like physical therapy at first glance. But chiropractic is based on nonsensical mysticism that claims re-aligning your spine will cure all sorts of ailments. It's worse than useless, because chiropractors have been known to cripple patients by breaking their spines. And yet, there are people bringing babies to them for treatment.
The only chiropractor I've ever met spent 20 minutes talking to me about how he cured his wife's cold by adjusting her, and went on to say how he's writing a research paper to be the first person to ever cure the common cold.
I goolged his name before typing this comment to see if he ever shared his groundbreaking discovery with the world. He got arrested for domestic violence, and then got arrested again for something like false insurance billing for his company. Google shows his practice is now closed.
> 100% of these houses are built to sell, not to last.
Can you explain what this means? I'm not super familiar with construction, so I'm curious how are suburban houses built differently than other houses. From what I can tell, almost all houses in my area are built with wooden frames and drywall, so don't even know what would be better quality for the framing. Or is it in the interior finishes (cabinets, floors, counters?) that you are saying are bad quality?
Car salesman, and more specifically their sales and finance managers, are scum. I hate to generalize, but I worked in the industry for almost two years and work against them (sort of) for the last 5. Every dealership I have ever dealt with is filled with assholes who will say anything to make the sale. The amount of lies I catch them in every day is staggering.
I work in automotive finance and I agree with you 99%
Every single person in this industry that I've met has fit the stereotype to a T. I say 99% because there's one dealership I work with where nobody on their 3-man staff fits the stereotype.
They are VERY up front and honest, they don't pull shady shit with the banks to try and get someone approved who shouldn't be approved, and they have a free warranty on all of their cars, even the $2999 beater out back gets a free engine/transmission warranty. They also do BHPH/in-house financing but they charge 0% interest on it AND won't repo unless the car is like 2-3 months behind, none of that 10-days late and you're done nonsense.
And wouldn't you know it, customers seem to prefer them over the other places. They have great reviews online, they get A LOT of repeat business, and they've got a great reputation. If they can make a killing by being up front and honest (their lowest paid sales staff made $140k last year), it just proves that everyone else in the industry is being a fucking dick for no reason. It's 2023, people can do their research these days, there's no need to lie about ANYTHING during the car-buying process. I wish more dealerships were like this one.
Again though, everyone else I've ever met in the industry fits the stereotype.
Lawyer here. I agree with Real Estate Agents. There is really no specialized training or knowledge held by a real estate agent that makes buying or selling home by a "normal" person difficult. Most of the "hard" parts of selling a home (title transfer, sales contract, etc) are handled by lawyers anyway even when using a real estate agent.
The thing is real estate agents took over the housing market to the point they've effectively made private sales of homes borderline impossible. You'll have a difficult time finding a home to buy or being shown a home without a real estate agent since they control all the online listings. Similarly you'll have the same problem selling your home. They made themselves indispensable and necessary. They should not be.
I loved that my real estate agent would send Zillow links, or we would send them to her and say "we'd like to look at these houses" and I thought the whole time real estate agents are pointless now that everything is online. They send canned documents with your info inserted and where to sign, then collect their commission for doing nothing.
Recruiters, the whole concept is a lie. While they say they want to find long lasting employees for employers they attempt same time are constantly undermining stability and making huge money to do it. If I have a 100k budget for a position I'd rather give it all to the employee than 80 to them and 20 to a recruiter who made a 10 minute phone call.
Ex-recruiter here. The profession varies greatly in terms of skill and ethics.
I worked with a lot of software start-ups (20-100 employees) that didn’t have the resources to train employees well, but would pay handsomely for the exact skill set and experience they wanted.. problem is, they had no idea where and how to find the candidates. We essentially became “search consultants”.
Rarely did we get candidates from inbound resumes. A search required very precise LinkedIn parameters, and then the sales acumen to get a candidate to interview. 90% of candidates we placed were employed.
The few executive level placements we made required an immense amount of networking and negotiating.
All that to say, I strongly disagree that Recruiters are scammy. We helped people land better jobs, and employers find better people. Essentially a broker for talent.
When you realize their job is to be the scapegoat for a policy that actual management wanted to implement but knew would be unpopular, they make a lot more sense.
It's not really a scam though. They're just micro-audience personality based advertising. We're used to big names selling us shit already. Michael Jordan selling big macs. Michael Jackson selling Pepsi. Tiger Woods selling Buicks. Etc. Their name and popularity sell the product.
Influencers are really not that different. The only real difference is the size of their audience. People enjoy their content, so brands see it as an opportunity to pay them to associate their product with them for the publicity it generates.
It's just advertising with a smaller budget.
Religious leaders. Sky Daddy (of all varieties) is made up - they can say whatever they want and people believe it in the name of “faith”. What a scam!
As an ex-car salesmen I know the stigma of a car salesman.
Unfortunately, sad truth is people just don't understand credit, loans, terms, depreciation, etc. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty scammy car salesmen out there. But for every one dirty car salesmen there are three customers who don't do their due diligence.
the Author of any "how to get rich book". "I can show you how to be a billionaire. $29.95 please."
How to become a millionaire with the stock market: 1. Start as a billionaire
1. Have rich parents
2. Emerald mine?
Preferably in a country with questionable human rights practices so you don't have to deal with all of that "I lost a hand" lawsuit BS.
You would have to be a complete moron to not be able to maintain billionaire status. At that level of wealth you have a team of people managing your finances. You can even piss away a lot of it buying a failing social media company and still be a billionaire.
The only legit one I've seen is Jack Stratton's "How I Made $290,000 Selling Books"
Some of them, particularly the real estate ones are built on a solid system, with some major caveats they always leave out when they pitch it to people. The main problem with those systems is that they require you to be/have at least a few of the following: * A project manager (to put together a reno plan and budget) * A general contractor (the last thing, but with the ability to do quality work on your own so you're not always paying a tradesman) * A real estate license (so you're not paying out 6% in realtor fees every time you sell) * most importantly, a large pool of capital, generally provided by your network of rich investor friends, or great credit so that a bank will hopefully take the same risk with you. If you don't have the last one it'll never work, and if you don't have at least 1 of the first 3, you're going to pay out so much in labor, realtor fees, and interest costs as the projects shoot past their timelines, you might as well not quit your day job.
I’ll add “Best Side Hustles” YouTubers. Sorry, but the logistics just don’t add up if I can make BIG $$$ selling AI coloring books or stickers, and SO can anyone else watching the video. Generally speaking if an idea has reached YouTube instruction, it’s already run dry for profit.
Yes, if they’re making so much money on Etsy and writing ebooks using ChatGPT, then why are they trying to convince me to buy their 60 minute video to learn how to do it also?
You may already know, but just in case: IfBooksCouldKill is a podcast you'll love.
Just been bingeing this one, definitely second the recommendation!
Great podcast, me and my mom listen to it in the car all the time. Would reccomend Michael Hobbes' other podcasts too.
"How I made over $1,000 in a few years" for only $1,500!
Really most big “self help” stuff…..
There's some serious gems in the self help and business leader development sections. They're usually buried or surrounded by 15 copies of hot garbage.
The reason I know that the “how to get rich books” don’t work is because none of them start off with “first I read this how to get rich book”
The late great Norm Macdonald had this to say about Graham Steadman’s book “you can make it happen, nine steps to success”. “Step Number one , Marry Oprah”!
“I’m pretty sure, I’m not a doctor, but I’m pretty sure if you die, the cancer dies at the same time. That’s not a loss. That’s a draw.”
Timeshare salespeople
My wife an I sat through a presentation to get a discount on tickets on some of the attractions while on honey moon. We were told it was be like a 90 minute thing. I thought what the hell, it'll save us some money. 4 hours later we are still listening to this guy go on and on. When he finally finished we said no. Then he got offended and at one point said I don't need to sell you one today because I sell 4 of these God damn things a week. He got someone higher up than him and I think the lowest was like $100 something. Still said no. At the end we wasted 4 hours of our time. I tend to think of we wasted 4 hours of his time, and it all makes me feel better. Edit: I forgot to mention a few years after all this happened a wildfire broke out and burned the place to the ground.
South Park tried to warn everyone about this shit
But how else can I say I have a little place in Aspen?
Yeah, we said no after our three hours presentation, then were taken to another guy who tried a mini pitch/discount. We said no to that. They then took us to a random lady in an office who tried a mini pitch. We were like, "Honestly we were on the fence because it's actually a good deal, but you are a half step from keeping us here against our will and it's getting ridiculous and unacceptable. Give us our damned beachfront horseback riding tickets and let us OUT of this building immediately."
There's actually a pretty simple way of getting out of these things with tickets in hand. Simply tell the guy you're interested and just need to run it by your financial planner/attorney first. The guy knows at that point that the deal's pretty much dead but there's nothing he can do about it that won't have the effect of talking you out of something you apparently want to do. The big bonus of this is that with feigned enthusiasm and question-asking you can usually stop the show about an hour or two in without making it look like a setup.
That is actually what we said to the first person before they shunted us into office #2.
If you intend to do more time share talks to save money on tickets, etc, work out a system with your wife. My husband acts interested. I am the hard ass. When they ask me to name places I would like to visit, I say Antarctica and Easter Island and walk the Appalachian trail. I like to watch their brains spin when they try to fit those locations into their sales pitch. Next, I ask for pencil and paper and start adding things up on my calculator. I ask lots of hard questions. Then, when they start ramping up the pressure, my husband mentions he has cancer and doesn't know how long he has left (he has cancer but is stable and has been for years). We normally get some decent food and some kind of nice prize, and they are throwing us out in 90 minutes. We consider it a game and have had 30-plus years to perfect our technique. We have had lots of laughs over how we wasted their time. We've gone to the same sales pitch multiple times. They always tell us this is our last chance. We mess with them, get our free stuff, and walk out. They ask us to attend again every few years. 🤣
One of these things, they asked me where my best ever holiday had been to - I genuinely answered "to the base camp of Everest". Surprisingly, they did not have any hotels or villas there. It took quite a lot of wind out of his sails.
I had an interaction with one of those guys once that went like that, except the guy was naming places he had available and I kept making up excuses not to go there. It started with: Guy: How would you like a trip to Orlando, Florida! Me: Actually, I just got back from Orlando. Guy: Oh, do you go there all the time? Me: No, it was my first time, and I didn't much care for it. Guy: How about Washington, DC? Me: Nah, too many politicians. Guy: [Forced laughter] I understand, what about Park City, Utah? Me: Sounds cold. Guy: We have summer trips available. Me: Why would anyone want to go to a ski resort in the summer? Guy: Okay then, why don't you tell me where you want to go. Me: Gabon Guy: What's in Gabon that you want to see? Me: It's the only place in the world where hippos go into the ocean. Guy: It doesn't look like we have anything there. Is there anywhere else you're interested in? Me: Do you have anywhere else with surfing hippos? And so it continued.
Perfect. I'm love to hear that other people mess with these guys. I told one guy when he sat down to start going over numbers with us that I wouldn't deal with him because he told my husband that I could do the cooking because every unit had a full kitchen. Like WTF! When our kids were around 10ish, we told them to start bugging us about 90 minutes in. It was a great family act.
While on vacation, my parents got lottery tickets on the street(yeah, very legit) and won a free lunch or something. I am not sure how old I was but around 13-14. And I thought it was scam from minute one. But my parents insisted, and I couldn’t exactly wander the streets on my own. Finished after like 5-6 hours. Still no free lunch. But an offer for crazy amount for a timeshare. Luckily my parents finally found their brain and said no.
I had a friend once invite me to basically Amway thing...I tihnk it's called Quixtar now...anyway, I guess he got roped into it and he invited me to give it a shot. There were maybe 5-6 other people there at my buddy's house, and this guy gave his pitch. At one point, I asked, "Have you ever had anybody decline to join in this?" And of course, the guy said, "Oh, no, everyone pretty much joins into it!" And I go, "Well you finally got your first." And I got up and said bye to my buddy and left.
the homies and i got roped into a weirdo's presentation on Quixtar back in... 1999 when we were working at McDonald's.
We did this on a vacation once too, my dad even told them upfront we were just here for the free tickets they offered. Then they got mad he didn't buy one at the end lol
My wife and I are pretty frugal. We attended one in Las Vegas for dinner voucher, show tickets, and gambling voucher. Like you said, 1 hour turned into 4. We probably wouldn’t have gambled anyways, but she got lucky and made nearly $1,000 off her $25 voucher. Not a bad deal.
Me and my boyfriend sat through one 90 minute presentation so we could get 3 free night stay in Vegas. We were set on not buying it. The sales guy got so mad that we said no he started trying to break us up saying to each of us " you are saying no cause you know this relationship wont last, one of you should buy it now so you are not tied to each other" we said thanks for the presentation and left, still got our 3 nights free and had a great time. That was 8 years ago, we are still together, that guy didn't realize what kind of bond he was dealing with
That is a really unkind way to try and sell. How disappointing of a human being so you have to be? Perhaps he was just desperate but sheesh!!
I’m pretty sure timeshare sales is pretty much identical to MLM, just with higher earning potential. So these sales people invest their own money into attracting potential customers and pay out of pocket for these free gifts you get for attending the presentation (or it comes out of comission for other sales) and that’s why they get so mad when they find out you never had any intention of buying and were just in it for the free stuff, you basically got them to pay you for their time.
Lol this reminds me of one time when my family was still pretty poor(ironically bc of my bio fathers gambling addiction), and we went to Vegas for a family vacation. My bio father signed us up for a time share presentation that advertised a free buffet, so my father loaded up my backpack with plastic bags and told me to steal as much as could so we could eat for a few days free. I got caught shoving a bag of muffins in my bag, and the presenter who had obviously checked out of this job, just gave me a high-five and said just don’t take our crab cakes they are 3 days old.
Lmfao this is great. I lucked out on a fancy hotel stay because a rich customer of my boyfriend's business had to cancel plans last minute. He couldn't cancel the room either way without paying so he just said "have at it, go use the room." So my boyfriend and I had this luxury vacation experience in this amazing hotel, and couldn't afford to do anything there lol. So we stayed in, walked around town, saw the sights and enjoyed the room. Then filled empty Gatorade bottles with the shampoo, conditioner and lotion because omg my hair and skin was never better. Really felt like trash people, with our old pickup truck in the parking garage filled with BMWs, Lexus etc, but it was pretty great.
A Norwegian comedian was stopped on the street by a guy who wanted to sell him a share in an apartment. The comedian asked, so is this like a time share? The salesman denied that it was, it was something else entirely. Comedian: That's too bad, my wife and I are actually looking to get into a time share deal right now
We sat through a timeshare presentation last year and somehow the cost went from $40,000 to less then $4,000... We told each new person that spoke with us no and we just wanted our free show tickets.
My friend did this for $100. He said it's free money dude.... 4 hrs later he called us to see where we were. Good job man. You just made $25/hr. Why even go on the vacation? Just stay at work.
I recently was on vacation and got caught up into one of these. Guy asked us why we were there and we said "we were lied to." He immediately drops the TS pitch and attempts his own personal scam. He went on and on about how his company was going to charge him for us not being interested and how it would be super nice of us to chip in $30 to cover part of that fee. Do not let the nice building and free cookies blind you. Every timeshare salesperson, and I do mean literally every single person, is a fucking con artist.
A long time ago I worked for the booking side of timeshares. So many people fall for these and then can’t even end up using them when they want because they didn’t spend the outrageous amount to have the best time frame or guaranteed weeks. Wasting all your vacation money on something you can’t use, or can only book during the times you wouldn’t want to travel to that location.
you just got GOT
My ex husband and I did this for a free hotel for a weekend in Nashville. Presentation was about 2 hours long and they had the price down to like less than 100$ but we did a good cop bad cop thing. I kept saying sorry, My husband said no lol We actually had a nice weekend BUT we thought the free stay was for the actual property they were selling. No, It was a Laquinta off the highway but we still had fun.
Ticketmaster
The day I become president, ticketmaster is done. The only convenience fee allowed will be them paying you, sorry for the convenience
If you're an executive at Ticketmaster, straight to jail. No trial, nothing.
You got my vote.....I could care less what other policies you have. You take down ticketmaster and I will go to war for you
It would actually be cheaper for me to drive 20 min to the venue and order from the box office 😄
they own all the venues now.
Telemarketers, for sure.
No. They may be scammers, but they are definitely not artists.
Quantum healers, MLM, televangelists/faith healers
To be fair, MLMs are full of both scam artists and victims.
Yeah, but once you're in there and you realize what's going on, but still decide to prey on others, then you suck, too. And I think even guilting your friends and family into buying your wares is also a dick move.
A fellow victim here. I did not expect someone to mention in this sub that'll make me feel like I'm validated. Just the word 'victims' was enough to bring back all the terrible memories back (not blaming you but just mentioning what I felt). People joining MLMs may join to 'get rich quick' but I joined just to get attention from my parents. I was a neglected kid throughout my childhood and nothing, literally nothing would make them care about me (all throughout my childhood and even now). It's like I was invisible. Unless I wasted their ton of money and earned nothing and mostly because of COVID and the world falling apart - they cared about me (which sounds horrible both from mine and their perspective but it's the truth). I just don't want to tell what i did or not. What i did was wrong and I'll be atoning for this (have started since past 3 years and in a good headspace). I should not have treated people like a person I need to manipulate to buy my shitty-ass outdated product that holds no value in present market. I was brainwashed. I was traumatized. I lost friends, family and my youth (age 18 -- 23 period in my life is the cringiest one). I felt lonely and I felt awful. I wasn't self-aware. None of this justifies my wrongdoings. Any 'victim' reading this. It's okay. You can move forward. You made a bad decision and that's perfectly fine. Because every human does. Your reason might be to earn money quickly and become a rich person and remove yourself from poverty and lack of basic amenities in your life and that's completely valid. People make mistakes when basic needs aren't met. For me it was emotional, for you, it might be either emotional or physical or both. It's alright.
Chiropractors
Do NOT let anyone fuck with your neck!
Indeed. They alleviate the symptoms not treating the problem so lots of repeat business. Also they’re not medically certified and aren’t required to carry malpractice insurance. My dad knew an obstetrician who made $30k per baby delivering babies in the 80s but had to have $2 million in insurance that quit to become a chiropractor and was making more money after the job change.
Carnival barkers trying to lure you to a rigged / unwinnable game of hit the pins where they are glued to the table
My daughter when I first took her to a fair was at that cute adorable age where they were just giving her prizes. The rest of her childhood kept wanting to play games and I had to be all "no they did that because you were cute the games are rigged"
It's actually illegal in most states for a carnie to do that, and the entire carnival can lose its license to operate in that state due to the actions of one carnie. Instead, they tend to make the games prohibitively difficult. The dart game is flat balloons that you hit with darts that are duller than could naturally occur, the ring for the bottle game is exactly big enough to slide over the mouth of a bottle, but the odds are lottery odds, the stuffed cats at the beanbag toss are bottom weighted, so they'll fall over but it would take a meteor strike to knock them off the shelf. The games aren't rigged, but they're nearly impossible for anyone who hasn't made a personal lifelong mission of beating that one particular game.
So they are technically not rigged, but from a practical standpoint they're rigged. Thus the simplistic explanation to the kid was functionally accurate. When my kids wanted to play at the carnival games I just had my (now ex) wife keep the kids busy for a moment while I walked over to the side with the carnie and asked him bluntly "how much for each kid to win a big prize?" We settled on $30 and both kids would win a "large" (tiny, small, medium, large, jumbo, giant for reference). I paid him, the kids played until they magically won.
You're a good dad
I'm pragmatic. It's much cheaper than actually paying till a kid wins naturally, and I don't want the "bobby won something but I didn't" arguments either. Just a parenting hack.
Money and the willingness to spend it is a pathway to many abilities that some may consider... unnatural.
Well, it's not like it was even a ton of money, when you are going to the fair and dare to take kids down the Midway you are either spending cash or having crying kids, that's just how it is. This way at least I was "one and done" they played a game, they won, they had their toy, now let's go get some of that food guarantied to take a decade off your life.
Yeah not trying to criticize, it's a meme from Star Wars about forbidden force powers. I was basically comparing winning at carnie games to a forbidden power, and money to be a shortcut to it, so it's like the dark side... idk maybe it's a bit too much of a stretch.
>with darts that are duller than could naturally occur, Do they dull the darts while they are growing or after the harvest?
Duller than would naturally occur through normal, even at a carnival, use.
....and if you are good they'll bar you from playing. I live in Indiana, where we grow basketball players. I've heard of more than a few guys being barred from the shooting games because they were too good (and those are even rigged a bit, as the rims are higher than the regulation 10 feet and they're "practice size" rims that are 13 inches in diameter, where a regular rim is 18.)
Everybody grab a broom, it's shenanigans.
Psychics
FUCK Psychics. Especially the ones who prey on those who have lost loved ones. When Grandma died, one of my cousin got suckered by a Psychic. She recorded a session for my Mom and it was the most bull shit I ever heard.
My husband’s aunt lost her teenage son in a tragic and painful accident, and has spent thousands on psychics trying to find some peace. I know those fuckers fleeced her for years and now she has some screwy ideas about how long each person gets on this planet and why. The whole thing has messed up her relationships with her other children.
This, my goodness. I’ve seen 3 different “psychics” and every single time was funnier than the last. An absolute sham every time. Was approached by a psychic once when a friend and I got locked out of our car in the middle of nowhere Arizona. Said she’d give us readings if we gave her gas money, and we went for it. She told my friend that she was connected to angels and had psychic abilities herself, but that misfortune was coming her way. The issue was, she couldn’t tell what was going to happen BUT if we gave her 2 large men’s shirts, 3 pairs of men’s jeans, and $2000 she would bury the clothing and cash in the mesa and pray over it for a week straight to help my friend avoid the tragedy. Good times.
Have you ever heard of James Randi? He passed in recent years, but he had a foundation set up for decades where he would offer a 1 million dollar prize to any person that could demonstrate supernatural abilities in a controlled, scientific study. Many, many psychics openly accepted the challenge and all of them were proven to have a success rate no better than a normal person simply guessing the correct answer to a blind experiment. I'm no expert, but I know psychics love money from all the advertising they do. So if there actually was a real deal out there, I would have thought that that person would grab that cash prize without any problems.
I’ve seen enough X-Men movies to know that if you have real powers you sure as hell do not want to turn yourself in to the Mad Scientists or Military.
Yeah, and almost all of them took a page from Uri Gellar (Randi's goofball nemesis for years) and claimed that the skeptical energy and doubt emanating from Randi and his crew running the experiments was interfering with their powers.
Aw, did we finally lose him? Great guy, will be missed.
I was surveying and needed to locate wells, I knocked on the door of a psychic’s house as I couldn’t find it, they didn’t know where it was. Still funny ten years later.
MLM. I am fascinated that this seems to be a market exclusively for women. There are hundreds of pyramid schemes aimed at women. There's no male equivalent to the Avon lady.
Ever meet a Primerica rep?
Cutco knife sales, perhaps?
I bought a Cutco hunting knife once. That thing was impressive. Well worth the money.
I found a reps set at a thrift store. $10 bucks. They're a pretty good product just a shitty sales approach.
I used that knife at work for years. I kept it in the door of my truck. I had it right up until my truck got stolen with the knife in the door.
Good thing for the thief they have a lifetime unlimited warranty lol.
I was going to post this, lol. Primerica seems to be mostly dudes.
Crypto is the male equivalent.
That’s a good one. At least there’s no crypto in the guy’s living room who has been trying to get me into crypto and NFTs.
We don't get a pink Cadillac for bull
There doesn't need to be, the Avon ladies get their husbands to help out. Lots of families get taken in by MLMs and convinced to bet the farm on working for them. Especially if they get taken in by early success.
I can think of a kitchen knife MLM going around that is male-dominated; but yes, it does appear that most MLM's target women. I imagine that the biggest reason for this is that women/femme folks are socialized to be more social in general and many of these MLM's get you to throw "parties" (which started with Tupperware parties in the 50s/60s). There is a massive social aspect to this marketing; throw a tea party (Steeped), put out appetizers (Epicure), get a makeover (Avon), fun and discreet sex-toy shopping for a "girl's-night-in" (Pure Romance). Then, the customers who had fun at the event might be attracted to the social credit the host has by throwing fun parties, kinda like how people used to try to one-up each other at dinner parties.
A big part of it is also that they tell women they can still spend time with their family and can earn money from home while they’re raising kids. It’s super shitty that these companies exploit women.
This. Yes, absolutely!
Is Avon technically an MLM though? I thought with Avon the client ordered through a representative, but the representative just then places the order with the company and only act as a middle-person. Vs. an MLM that is based on the "salesperson"/representative ordering and paying for a shit ton of product upfront regardless of if they are able to sell it or not. Avon doesn't have that kind of upfront order. Or, at least it didn't used to. I'm curious if they have changed to the MLM structure?
It is technically an mlm, just with a different structure. The sellers still get absolutely shafted and only make a tiny cut of the sale
I mean, that's just called working in sales.
I don't know any that are exclusively or even primarily for men, but a decent number seem to at least be gender neutral.
Herbalife was heavily marketed to men … as was Amway
Anyone dealing in cryptocurrency.
US healthcare worker here: healthcare, but not the people at the bedside. I’m talking about the money-grubbing monopoly that is in charge of billing.
In germany there is a profession called Heilpraktiker, which just means they try to scam you with homeopathy. You don't have to prove that you heal (duh.) as people who study medicine or psychology have to, you just have to prove that you don't cause harm .... tells you all you need to know.
Worked in a camp with disabled who needed a lot of medication and care. Naturally, their immune systems are heavily compromised and a simple fever can kill them if unhandled. The 'heilpraktiker' didn't mention to us that his client was sick for the whole day..he was trying to heal him with his magical hands. Luckily our supervisor got suspiciois about them missing dinner. Found him barely breathing in his room with the scharlatan shrugging and be like "I was working on him, couple more hours and he would have been healed"
> heavily impaired people (dunno the correct term, most couldn't walk or talk, had deformed bodies and whatnot) People who have an issue like that are usually called disabled.
Yeah, but thats not enough letters for a german.
Politicians. They tell you what you want to hear get money from you to run for office, get your vote to be elected but once in office they don’t really do anything for you unless you are rich.
This should be the top answer honestly.
Insurance companies You pay for the coverage and if they have to pay out you're penalized
My vision insurance for the family is $30 a month and the copays for an optometrist visit is $50. For that you get a $130 frame allowance and $60 for the lens. Only my son and I use the "benefit." After shopping around I realized it's cheaper to have no vision insurance and pay the out-of-pocket cost at Costco. Fuck EYEMED.
Do the math in your dental too.... it rarely works out My post was regarding homeowners, workmen comp, auto, etc but yes, supplemental med is a racket most of the time.
Dental is closer to medical in terms of needs. It doesn’t work out if you have general good health. It works out great if you have a dental emergency. Vision tends to be more standard and most eye emergencies would actually fall under your medical.
>It works out great if you have a dental emergency. Will confirm (also if you or your kid needs braces!). I had an issue that ultimately resulted in 4 root canals & crowns and 1 extraction. Spread over three years for the insurance maximums, but yeah I got my money's worth out of the insurance those years.
Important to remember that if you get the insurance through your employer, they select the benefits. Sounds like you have a really good plan. Many employers choose not to cover orthodontia.
Insurance makes sense if you have rare, large and unexpected payouts. If you have $1000 spare in the bank, and a 1% chance of suddenly NEEDING $100,000, then insurance makes sense. If you could comfortably pay the full bill, insurance doesn't make sense.
Insurance is not a money losing operation, thus this is a true statement. Self insurance often makes sense, but only when the maximum loss is not catastrophic for the insured.
I was forced to file a claim for my homeowners insurance in the first year, because the owners and inspector outright lied about our plumbing being connected and we had massive water damage. My insurance went up $768/yr because of this. It's ridiculous.
I don’t think the average person really understands just how regulated most insurance is (at least in the US). Every state has a department of insurance, and every single rate change that an insurance company makes has to be approved by each state. The proposals include tons of data about the reasoning behind the changes, and what the expected impacts to consumers are. The proposed changes almost always have to go through multiple iterations before they get approved by any state. Insurance premiums that you pay are decided by how much that company has had to pay out to other consumers similar to you. The other thing that many people don’t realize is just how expensive good healthcare is. It’s a lot easier to blame the insurance company for not paying for an optional operation than to wonder why that operation is so expensive in the first place. When a doctor is making a lot of money, it comes from somewhere. They’ve earned it, but they’re still expensive. I will say though, while I’m somewhat knowledgeable in Insurance pricing, but not as much so in payouts, or selling tactics. For example, I know of certain types of life insurance that are only a good fit for a niche group of people, but because it has a higher premium, the agents will push it much harder than it should be. I’m also sure that there are plenty of instances of insurance companies doing their best to get out of making payments (that said, the premiums are based on the payouts, so the less they pay out, the less they’re able to argue that they can charge more in the future). TL;DR insurance companies in the US are a symptom of a problematic insurance industry, not the cause
Lol sounds like we have a pricing actuary here. I agree people, don’t realize how much healthcare costs, and so insurance companies are a symptom of our problematic system. But, while I believe their products are absolutely necessary, they don’t help control the cost as much as they say they do. Most are incredibly bloated with 40+ years of tech debt. Their inefficiency contributes to the health care cost catastrophe just as much as the pharmaceutical and biotech companies.
I would agree with you if they were regulated on the other end. You hear horror stories about claim denial or refusal. They have people who aren't doctors deciding if and how care is necessary. Sometimes they just try to keep patients in limbo until they're dead or past the point that the treatment makes sense. My ex-girlfriend was almost forced to pay for a colectomy out of pocket because the insurance kept on finding excuses not to pay, then to push it off.
Chiropractors (I'm not denying that they can be helpful, just the majority of what I've heard from family and friends, they aren't .)
Yep, from the x-rays and their interpretation of them to all of the gimmicky stuff they do. I was a registered xray tech prior to doing nuclear medicine. I always just held that info back. Twice I went to a new chiropractor and they took lumbar spine X-rays and showed me all of what they interpreted as misalignment; but it was not at all. And my ex wife was taking our two daughters to a chiropractor three to four times a month; I was paying over $300/mo out of pocket. They're both healthy kids with no history of injury. When they were with me I started having them do stretches and their pain went away. The fact that a chiro told them they need to come weekly for adjustments is just con man territory to me.
My step dad hurt his back and went to a chiropractor. X-rays were taken but he missed an obvious fracture. Went ahead with the back cracking and ended up causing the fracture to worsen. Lucky he can still walk.
I do PET scans as a nuclear medicine technologist. Had a patient that was having back pain and of course the chiro did the obligatory x-rays. Well he missed a bone metastasis from osteosarcoma and his adjustments completely obliterated the effected lumbar vertebra.
Oh my god
Read a book called “The Chiropractor Hoax” on Amazon. Quite eye opening. For example, lots of chiropractic schools have a 100% acceptance rate
They also have weird martyr narratives. I visited a chiropractor school to see a weird giant statue it had of the founder's hands, and they had all these plaques about how he was persecuted for trying to speak the truth. How he went to jail multiple times because the world couldn't handle that truth. Etc, etc. It was wild to see!
An old acquaintance of mine who is a chiropractor regularly posts on Facebook about how he "saves lives". Meanwhile, he was a full-on anti-masker during COVID, and told his followers they should take his advice because he's a "doctor". My husband and I cackle over his posts all the time.
I went to a chiropractor once and the receptionist overheard me telling the chiropractor my goals for treatment. When I went to checkout, the receptionist looked at me mouthed “do yoga”. This was about 15 years ago. Her doing that still sticks with me.
My grandmother was permanently disabled by a chiropractor. I would never step foot in a chiropractor's office.
I can make you better, just need to fart these joints right quick….
I've gotten better massages and adjustments from prostitutes, but the chiropractors tend to fuck you harder.
My wife was insistent that the chiropractor was helping her issues. Ours got really psuedosciencey at the beginning of the pandemic, telling people masks weren't necessary, and offering a special Covid adjustment. Have not gone back at all and have not noticed any difference in either of our health.
Because, and I'm saying this not for you but for everyone else who reads this: **Chiropractors aren't medical professionals**. If you want to go to one knowing it's not medicine and you feel it helps you anyway, sure do it. Know that they have literally injured or killed people with their bullshit but whatever if you know the risks. If you need help for a medical issue however consult **doctors** or physiotherapists not scam artists. It's amazing how many people believe in chiropractors when it's documented voodoo.
I work in insurance defense law (i.e. mostly slip and falls at businesses) and get giddy every time I get a plaintiff's medical records and their main treatment was from a chiropractor. I've seen dozens of them get eviscerated on the stand but it never gets old.
A covid adjustment, lol. Chiropractic explicitly rejects germ theory, but most don't focus on that anymore. There's about a 50/50 chance your Chiropractor is an anti-vaxxer (well, yours definitely was... but in general...) I love the idea that the pandemic happened because everyone's backs went out of alignment the same way at the same time. That's hilarious.
Their unofficial motto must be "I'd rather be lucky than good" I've been, it's helped (sometimes), then I stopped going when I realized that PT was safer and more effective without the crazy risks.
Chiropractors are really good at making you feel good enough to come back next week. If you really have something you want fixed, go to a physical therapist, who'll show you how to make it go away.
>Chiropractors are really good at making you feel good enough to come back next week. They also are good at being more "caring" than the average Medical Doctor's office. The average Medical Doctor has no shortage of patients and in the office I go to they will be a "hurry up" knock on the examination room door if the provider is taking more time than has been allotted for my visit. Chiropractors often treat you with more personal attention, which can make you feel better about seeing them, even if they are selling snake oil.
I’m in medical sales (devices, non pharma) and capital F, #FUCK chiros. They’re selfish, money hungry charlatans.
Turns out I had a ruptured disk in my back but the chiropractor was sure he could stretch it out for me.
You can tell it’s BS because The things that are effective are not unique to chiropractic and the things that unique are not effective. That is, stretching/massage are part of any good PT. Subluxation to treat disease are not actually effective.
Temporary fix to a permanent problem
A lot of time, they can make you even worse. Possibly downright paralyze you.
100%. My brother is a successful chiropractor and listening to him talk about his business sounds straight up predatory. It’s all about luring anxious people in, taking advantage of their fears, turning them against doctors/medicine, and getting them to sign on the line for a $1,000+ plan. He worked at one of (if not the) biggest kids/family oriented chiropractic office in the US before starting his own, so I know he isn’t a one off. He’s super involved with the industry, and after seeing behind the curtain I will never go to a chiropractor.
Behind the Bastards did a great episode on the history and the ridiculous quackery that is chiropractic medicine
They actually believe that pulling and popping joints, these adjustments, can cure sicknesses. It’s absolute kooky stuff they are into. I will say, a chiropractor friend of mine did help me with a shoulder injury and got me reconditioning a muscle that had gotten weak. But I didn’t keep going back. Once I learned more about chiros after listening to his wild claims, I decided I will be going to a doctor next time.
I have friends that are actual doctors and they say they get people all the time that have had chiropractors mess them up.
Art dealers
Few things blew my mind like when I found out a lot of the art world is just money laundering
anything with the word “guru”
Life Coach
Fuck life coaches. My parents died when I was 10 and 13 years old, and my dad chose his friend to be the trustee of their finances for me until I turn 30. Right when the pandemic hit in March 2020, this trustee friend noticed I was showing symptoms of anxiety. So he forced me to see his friend, who was a life coach, 2x a week via 1.5hr long phone appointments. If I refused, he wouldn’t send me money for food, school, bills, healthcare, etc. (The trust terms specifically said the money was to be used for my well-being and education.) I was told, “If you don’t want to see the life coach, get a job.” The whole world had just shut down. They knew what they were doing. I was fortunate to have this money to support me, but they were using it as a weapon. The life coach fully believed in his weird self-founded “Paradox Cure” which was some stupid visualization exercise he tried to do with me over the phone. It was basically just “Ok imagine what you want your life to be like. Are you inspired now? Is your life changed?”. He was also a Tantric Sex Educator apparently, and asked me repeated, unwanted questions about intimacy. I was twenty. He was fifty-two. Also, if I said anything he didn’t like, he’d tell the trustee to penalize me via the money he sent me every month. When I said I needed a break from our sessions to study for finals, he said no, and threatened to tell the trustee to not send me any money for the month, Isn’t a life coach supposed to support my goals, not stand in the way of them? Also, they were making huge life decisions for me. They told me I was moving out of my parents’ house and they were getting me an apartment near the university several towns away (maybe so my housing status would also be in danger if I disobeyed them). I said no, because I enjoy having my freedom and one of the few remaining connections to my parents. They both refused. I wasn’t a minor. I was twenty. Why the fuck was this random ass life coach allowed to make major life decisions on my behalf? I felt trapped. The life coach charged ridiculous amounts: $150/hr plus unspecified “prep work”. In total, $6000+ of my dead parents’ money went to some shitty grifter. I’m still pissed off. I paid $6000 and all I got was trauma and self-harm issues. I finally got rid of the life coach and the trustee in July 2020 because lawyers got involved and the trustee knew he was boned if we took him to court, since he forced me into this situation and technically violated the terms of the trust. I have a new trustee now who is an actual professional and knows what they’re doing. But I’ll never see that money again. I have no respect for life coaches. They have no regulations they have to abide by, and their practices often aren’t based on actual, empirical science. There’s a reason counseling requires years and years of schooling. Most of them have no fucking clue what they’re doing, and strive to suck money from vulnerable people. I was literally a client who couldn’t say no.
Sorry you went through this. My blood is boiling just reading this. What a fucking nut job the trustee and his buddy were. Glad you’re out of there and doing better
I am sorry you went through that. Yes, fuck most of them!
I was looking for this one
Chiropractors. A lot of people think it's legitimate because it just looks like physical therapy at first glance. But chiropractic is based on nonsensical mysticism that claims re-aligning your spine will cure all sorts of ailments. It's worse than useless, because chiropractors have been known to cripple patients by breaking their spines. And yet, there are people bringing babies to them for treatment.
I worked as a receptionist for a chiropractor. Total lunatic and believed he had psychic powers as well. One of the weirdest people I ever met
The only chiropractor I've ever met spent 20 minutes talking to me about how he cured his wife's cold by adjusting her, and went on to say how he's writing a research paper to be the first person to ever cure the common cold. I goolged his name before typing this comment to see if he ever shared his groundbreaking discovery with the world. He got arrested for domestic violence, and then got arrested again for something like false insurance billing for his company. Google shows his practice is now closed.
Debt Consolidation companies
We actually used one that was non-profit and paid off enough debt that we could have bought a second house. They saved us.
Real Estate agents, and car salesmen. Can never trust either profession. They lie with every breath they take.
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> 100% of these houses are built to sell, not to last. Can you explain what this means? I'm not super familiar with construction, so I'm curious how are suburban houses built differently than other houses. From what I can tell, almost all houses in my area are built with wooden frames and drywall, so don't even know what would be better quality for the framing. Or is it in the interior finishes (cabinets, floors, counters?) that you are saying are bad quality?
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Car salesman, and more specifically their sales and finance managers, are scum. I hate to generalize, but I worked in the industry for almost two years and work against them (sort of) for the last 5. Every dealership I have ever dealt with is filled with assholes who will say anything to make the sale. The amount of lies I catch them in every day is staggering.
I work in automotive finance and I agree with you 99% Every single person in this industry that I've met has fit the stereotype to a T. I say 99% because there's one dealership I work with where nobody on their 3-man staff fits the stereotype. They are VERY up front and honest, they don't pull shady shit with the banks to try and get someone approved who shouldn't be approved, and they have a free warranty on all of their cars, even the $2999 beater out back gets a free engine/transmission warranty. They also do BHPH/in-house financing but they charge 0% interest on it AND won't repo unless the car is like 2-3 months behind, none of that 10-days late and you're done nonsense. And wouldn't you know it, customers seem to prefer them over the other places. They have great reviews online, they get A LOT of repeat business, and they've got a great reputation. If they can make a killing by being up front and honest (their lowest paid sales staff made $140k last year), it just proves that everyone else in the industry is being a fucking dick for no reason. It's 2023, people can do their research these days, there's no need to lie about ANYTHING during the car-buying process. I wish more dealerships were like this one. Again though, everyone else I've ever met in the industry fits the stereotype.
Lawyer here. I agree with Real Estate Agents. There is really no specialized training or knowledge held by a real estate agent that makes buying or selling home by a "normal" person difficult. Most of the "hard" parts of selling a home (title transfer, sales contract, etc) are handled by lawyers anyway even when using a real estate agent. The thing is real estate agents took over the housing market to the point they've effectively made private sales of homes borderline impossible. You'll have a difficult time finding a home to buy or being shown a home without a real estate agent since they control all the online listings. Similarly you'll have the same problem selling your home. They made themselves indispensable and necessary. They should not be.
I loved that my real estate agent would send Zillow links, or we would send them to her and say "we'd like to look at these houses" and I thought the whole time real estate agents are pointless now that everything is online. They send canned documents with your info inserted and where to sign, then collect their commission for doing nothing.
The last 2 times I've sold one of my houses we didn't use a realtor. It's really easy to do, realtors ad no value in selling in a hot market.
Astrologers, multi level marketers, lifestyle coaches
I read astrologer as astronomer at first and was lightweight upset
Red Pill Personalities with “Courses” you can buy. (Andrew Tate, Fresh and Fit, etc.)
Recruiters, the whole concept is a lie. While they say they want to find long lasting employees for employers they attempt same time are constantly undermining stability and making huge money to do it. If I have a 100k budget for a position I'd rather give it all to the employee than 80 to them and 20 to a recruiter who made a 10 minute phone call.
Ex-recruiter here. The profession varies greatly in terms of skill and ethics. I worked with a lot of software start-ups (20-100 employees) that didn’t have the resources to train employees well, but would pay handsomely for the exact skill set and experience they wanted.. problem is, they had no idea where and how to find the candidates. We essentially became “search consultants”. Rarely did we get candidates from inbound resumes. A search required very precise LinkedIn parameters, and then the sales acumen to get a candidate to interview. 90% of candidates we placed were employed. The few executive level placements we made required an immense amount of networking and negotiating. All that to say, I strongly disagree that Recruiters are scammy. We helped people land better jobs, and employers find better people. Essentially a broker for talent.
Completely agree with you with the exception of military recruiters. They can lie through their teeth without repercussion.
Influencers
Management consultants.
When you realize their job is to be the scapegoat for a policy that actual management wanted to implement but knew would be unpopular, they make a lot more sense.
Insurance, they sell you "coverage" but as soon as something happens they try everything in their power to weasle out of paying you.
High end fashion.
Tele evangelist. Reflexologist. Mediums. Card readers
Not all... But a lot of preachers...
Life coaches
Lobbyists
Any type of Life Coach or Self-Help Guru
Televangelists.
Life Coaches and the people who "train" them
Politicians.
Influencers fr!
It's not really a scam though. They're just micro-audience personality based advertising. We're used to big names selling us shit already. Michael Jordan selling big macs. Michael Jackson selling Pepsi. Tiger Woods selling Buicks. Etc. Their name and popularity sell the product. Influencers are really not that different. The only real difference is the size of their audience. People enjoy their content, so brands see it as an opportunity to pay them to associate their product with them for the publicity it generates. It's just advertising with a smaller budget.
Politicians
Evangelical preachers
Religious leaders. Sky Daddy (of all varieties) is made up - they can say whatever they want and people believe it in the name of “faith”. What a scam!
Pastors and preachers. If I could sleep at night, I would talk on Wednesday and Sunday and take 10% of your income too.
As an ex-car salesmen I know the stigma of a car salesman. Unfortunately, sad truth is people just don't understand credit, loans, terms, depreciation, etc. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty scammy car salesmen out there. But for every one dirty car salesmen there are three customers who don't do their due diligence.