February 13, 2018 • Page 2 shop online at www.missourivalleyshopper.com Gender Differences Dave Says By Daris Howard Quit Job for School? Dave RAMSEY Dear Dave, My wife and I have $72,000 in debt from student loans and a car loan. We’re trying to pay off our debt using the debt snowball system, and we each make about $45,000 a year. She’s a teacher, and she’s planning on going back to school for her master’s degree, but she’s thinking about quitting her job to do this. She’ll be able to make more money with the additional education, and she would only be unemployed for two years. The degree program will cost us $2,000 out of pocket per semester for two years. Does this sound like a good idea? Chris Dear Chris, There’s no reason for your wife to quit her job to make this happen. Lots of people — especially teachers — hold down their jobs and go back to school to further their education. I’m not sure trying to make it on one income when you’re that deep in debt is a good idea. Whatever you do, don’t borrow more money to make this happen. Cash flow it, or don’t do it. We’re talking about $8,000 total, and you’ve got $72,000 in debt hanging over your heads already. My advice would be to wait until you’ve got the other debt knocked out, then save up and pay cash for school. You could slow down your debt snowball, and use some of that to pay for school, but I’d hate to see you lose the momentum you have when it comes to getting out of debt. The choice is yours, but don’t tack on anymore student loan debt. I know her income will go up with a master’s degree, so from that standpoint it’s a good thing to do. But if you do a good thing a dumb way, it ends up being dumb! — Dave Pre-planning Explained Dear Dave, My grandmother passed away a week ago. She was 98, and I know both she and my grandfather had pre-paid for their funerals in 2004. However, there were outstanding costs of $1,500 with the funeral services we had to pay out of pocket, because she had outlived the insurance policy attached to the pre-payment plan. I know you say it’s always better to pre-plan, not pre-pay, for a funeral. Can you refresh my understanding of this? Rebecca Dear Rebecca, Let’s use a round figure, and say the cost of a funeral is $10,000. What would $10,000 grow to 25 years from now if it were invested in a good mutual fund? Now, juxtapose that number with the increase in the cost of a funeral over that time. The average inflation rate of consumer-purchased items is around four percent. So, the cost of funerals, on average, has risen about four percent a year. By comparison, you could’ve invested that money, and it would’ve grown at 10 or 12 percent in a good mutual fund. Now understand, I’m not knocking folks who are in the funeral business. But lots of businesses that provide these services realize more margin in selling pre-paid policies than they do in caskets. In other words, they don’t make as much money selling the casket as they do selling a pre-paid policy on the casket. Do you understand my reasoning? If we knew the exact date she pre-paid, and how much she pre-paid, that figure invested in a good mutual fund would be a whole lot more than the cost of a reasonable funeral. It’s the same principle behind the reason I advise folks to not pre-pay college, or just about anything else, that’s likely far into the future. The money you could’ve made on the investment is a lot more than the value of pre-paying. Pre-planning, on the other hand, is a great idea for many things — including funerals. I’m truly sorry for your loss, Rebecca. God bless you all. — Dave * Dave Ramsey is America’s trusted voice on money and business, and CEO of Ramsey Solutions. He has authored seven bestselling books, including The Total Money Makeover. The Dave Ramsey Show is heard by more than 12 million listeners each week on 575 radio stations and multiple digital platforms. Follow Dave on Twitter at @DaveRamsey and on the web at daveramsey.com. MV Shopper 665-5884 MV The Krak es Shopperen B ic M I S S O U R I VA L L E Y st Pr Be Town! In In Print and Online! M I S S O U R I VA L L E Y We’ll Match All Local Advertisin g Prices! la 18.99 1.75 ML ck Spiced Rum 19.99 750 ML Find What You’re Looking For! in the Classifieds. In Print and Online! Call 665-5884 Whiskey $ Jack Daniels Ho ney $ www.missourivalleyshopper.com Jack Daniels Fir 19.99 750 ML e Cinnamon Whiskey Smirnoff Vodka $ 1 Busch & Busch 7.9$9 1.75 ML Light 14.99 30 Warm or Cold Pack $ Cork N Bottle 1500 Broadway, 665-3881 With Valentine’s Day approaching, I have thought quite a bit about the differences in the genders. Watching boys and girls in my classes at the university, I see those differences quite often, and they make me smile. Of course, I had already seen them between my wife, Donna, and me. But often it’s more pronounced among young people. As an example, one day a girl came into class. She apparently had a haircut, though to me it looked the same as it did in our previous class. But the other girls in her group noticed the difference immediately. “Wow!” one girl said. “You got a haircut.” “Yes,” the first girl replied. “And now I can’t do anything with it. It doesn’t lay right on the left side, and the flair is wrong in the back.” She then went on for about five minutes, describing in minute detail how bad it was. When she finally finished, one of the girls in her group said, “Well, I think it’s cute.” All of the other girls in the group voiced their agreement. A few minutes later, just about the time class was to start, a boy came in. He obviously had a haircut because, compared to the previous class day, his hair was almost nonexistent. He sat down, and the boy closest to him noticed his hair. “Hey, Dude, you got a haircut,” the boy said. “Yeah,” the boy with the haircut replied. “Man, it’s ugly,” the first boy said. “Yeah,” the boy with the haircut replied. There was no long, detailed explanation of it, no concern on how it laid, nothing. It was just ugly. Another big difference is how boys and girls ask each other out. When I was younger, girls almost never asked a boy out, but now it’s apparently quite acceptable. And watching the differences is interesting. A boy will try to ask a girl out quietly. But when a girl offers an invitation to a boy, it’s pretty much a community event. The girl will often have a whole entourage of her friends accompany her, surround the boy, and do whatever it takes to make it the social activity of the year. I have analyzed these differences and have come to a few conclusions. A boy is afraid the girl will turn him down, so he does it quietly just in case, so that it will reduce the humiliation. At first, I thought the girl did it in a big group so the boy would be too embarrassed to turn her down. But I’ve since come to the conclusion that I’m thinking like a man. From watching these episodes, I now feel the girl tends to have a great desire to have the boy be proud of her, so she wants everyone to see it when he says yes. Of course, I seldom see a boy turn a girl down in that situation. There is nothing like enduring the wrath of a whole group of girls, and the boy knows it, or quickly will. So, I suppose if her purpose is to guarantee that he will say yes, that tends to work as well. As for myself and Donna, I realized those differences are still there. She was a thousand miles away visiting our new granddaughter. She called and told me she found a beautiful coat that she wanted to buy for me. “I want to send you a picture to see if you like it,” she said. “How much does it cost?” I asked. “I want to have you see a picture first to decide if you like it before I tell you,” she replied. “If you tell me how much it costs, I can tell you if I like it even without a picture,” I said. I could tell by her sigh that she thought I was thinking too much like a man. But when she told me the price, I knew I didn’t like it. Seriously, I saved her lots of time sending the picture. St. John’s Parish Annual Friday, Febuary 16 Snow Date: Feb. 23 Serving 5-9 p.m. at St. John’s Parish Center, Fordyce, NE Menu: Fried Pollock, Potato Salad, Coleslaw, Baked Beans, Bun and Refreshments 2018 Beautiful Baby Contest We will be featuring our annual “Beautiful Baby Contest” in print and online on Wednesday, February 28th If you or someone you know has a child or pet we would love to include them in our feature! To enter, simply submit your photo and entry form with a $10 submission fee by Adults: $10 Kids 6-12 yr: $5 Kids 5 and under: Free 1) 2) 3) 4) “Fur o! 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