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The Coming Economic Earthquake (Burkett)


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I recently heard an interview on Focus on the Family w/ Larry Burkett and Dobson discussing this very book (the interview was from 1991 or 92). It was amazingly prophetic! You may want to check out Focus on the Family's archives to hear that discussion. From what I heard, the basic premesis is to stay within your means and get debt free ASAP. Blessings.

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get and stay out of debt, own your own home, 6mos living expenses in the bank, investing in the stock market--would have the resources to take advantage of whatever happened in the event of an economic disaster.

 

He didn't advocate anything different than he did for sound economies. Stay out of debt. Save. Tithe. These work no matter what kind of economy you're living in. So, I don't remember exactly, but I'm pretty sure he said to invest in your 401Ks, preferably in the stock market, especially when it's down. Take advantage of automatic investment plans if possible, so that you're buying more when it's down, less when it's up.

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get and stay out of debt, own your own home, 6mos living expenses in the bank, investing in the stock market--would have the resources to take advantage of whatever happened in the event of an economic disaster.

 

He didn't advocate anything different than he did for sound economies. Stay out of debt. Save. Tithe. These work no matter what kind of economy you're living in. So, I don't remember exactly, but I'm pretty sure he said to invest in your 401Ks, preferably in the stock market, especially when it's down. Take advantage of automatic investment plans if possible, so that you're buying more when it's down, less when it's up.

 

 

That's my recollection about the book, too. It's been a long, long time since I read it. Other than that I think the book is dated. Doesn't it predict a financial catastrophe before the turn of the century? I might be remembering wrong...

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I just read this this past summer! It could have been written today. I read the 1991 edition, it was in the church library. PariSarah outlined it pretty well. Some of the recommendations he made were based on different interest rates than we have today but overall it was just as she pointed out. It led to a discussion with dh about using our 401K to pay off the house at one point but we did not end up doing that. However we are using more to pay off the house instead of the 529 plan for awhile.

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I haven't read the book (although I'd like to), but here it is at half.com for cheap:

 

Original edition - 1991

 

Revised edition - 1994

 

Now if you do read it, you must come back and give us a report! ;)

 

Thanks, Denise, for this! My standard book search at http://www.bestbookdeal.com let me down this time! (Though, even when I Googled the title I came up empty handed). I appreciate your help.

 

As for reading it, Parisarah did just a beautiful job of sharing the info I was looking for I may not bother! :tongue_smilie:

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get and stay out of debt, own your own home, 6mos living expenses in the bank, investing in the stock market--would have the resources to take advantage of whatever happened in the event of an economic disaster.

 

He didn't advocate anything different than he did for sound economies. Stay out of debt. Save. Tithe. These work no matter what kind of economy you're living in. So, I don't remember exactly, but I'm pretty sure he said to invest in your 401Ks, preferably in the stock market, especially when it's down. Take advantage of automatic investment plans if possible, so that you're buying more when it's down, less when it's up.

 

Thanks! This was exactly what I was looking for!!

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but I remember that one of the concerns that he had was that he thought that the government would take retirement accounts. I can't remember if it was just pensions or also 401Ks, but I do think that he suggested having some investments outside of retirement accounts as well.

 

And in answer to the question about it being 'dated', yes, I think it is a really dated book, but one of the main issues that he talked about was government debt, and that had actually decreased for a while but now is far worse than ever before.

 

I don't totally believe the book, but it is interesting to consider some of the ideas.

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What the government giveth, the government can taketh away!

 

I think that was one of the things I thought he was over-the-top on. I just can't imagine the gov't saying, "Okay, we're taking over everybody's IRAs now." But it's certainly foreseeable that the gov't could decide, for example, to tax Roth IRA distributions, or to take away the tax deduction for retirement contributions.

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Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but I understood that they had been friends and held very similar beliefs. DR gives lots of credit to LB in all of his material.

 

As for charging a lot, I just don't see where that would be. His books cost money to buy, but so did LB's. His FPU costs $90, but it contains a LOT of stuff, including a leather envelope system. I think the money for this investment is more for the sake of the group of students participating,though there is $90 worth of stuff included, imo. Charging $90 practically guarantees participation. When you sign on to something like this, it is difficult to commit to being at every class. It is easy to slack off and not do the assignments. The classes are small-ish and work with encouraging each other. That isn't easy to do when half of the students don't show up or don't know what the assignment is when they do show. It benefits the co-students and the student himself - if he is more committed he'll get more out of it.

 

But, for those not wanting to do it in a group, the FPU book is available used and in church libraries. If you take the class code from the front of his book and enter it on the site, they still give you access to all of the material you could need. The site even asks if this is where you received the book. It doesn't discourage it at all. I think that's pretty generous.

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