# Classic Suze School The Dollar of the Decades

An episode of [Suze Orman's Women & Money (And Everyone Smart Enough To Listen)](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1439621652), 5 Nov 2026, 13 min.

Audio: https://traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/2df1102a-5761-4c99-b489-aabd0161f8fe/44e0936e-923c-43c7-9e2a-aade00edf4d3/9e7a84c5-cf76-4171-830e-b4f8017cffa7/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=4e05fb00-5a5b-4ed9-b353-aade00edf4dd

For this Classic Suze School, Suze talked about how our financial needs change as we age and explained why every dollar counts and why we need to count every dollar in each of our decades. Learn more about the Ultimate Scam Protection here: SuzeOrman.com Watch Suze’s YouTube Channel Jumpstart financial wellness for your employees: https://bit.ly/SecureSave Protect your financial future with the Must Have Docs: https://bit.ly/3Vq1V3G Help with the Must Have Docs: • Email:support@musthavedocuments.zendesk.com • Phone: 888-510-0510 Get your savings going with Alliant Credit Union: https://bit.ly/3rg0Yio Get Suze’s special offers for podcast listeners at suzeorman.com/offer Join Suze’s Women & Money Community for FREE and ASK SUZE your questions which may just end up on the podcast. Download the app by following one of these links: CLICK HERE FOR APPLE: https://apple.co/2KcAHbH CLICK HERE FOR GOOGLE PLAY: https://bit.ly/3curfMI See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:08] Robert: November 5th, 2026. Welcome to the Women and Money podcast
[0:12] Robert: as well as everyone smart enough to listen. Hi there, Robert,
[0:16] Robert: the producer here. For today's classic Suze School, we're gonna
[0:19] Robert: go back to an episode where Suze talked about how
[0:22] Robert: our financial needs change the older we get. This Sunday,
[0:27] Robert: we're gonna have a brand new episode for you, so
[0:29] Robert: make sure that you come back to this feed. But
[0:31] Robert: for now... Here's Suze.
[0:39] Suze: Decades mean a lot, not just emotionally speaking, but it
[0:45] Suze: also has a true repercussion on your financial state of being.
[0:52] Suze: I personally call it the dollar of the decades, because
[0:55] Suze: there's always something that goes on financially.
[0:59] Suze: Where there's a difference when you turn 20 to 30.
[1:03] Suze: Now we have a decade there where you're going from
[1:05] Suze: being out of college or whatever you're doing, and you're
[1:08] Suze: trying to get a little bit more serious. Maybe you've
[1:11] Suze: gotten married and you're going to have kids or you're
[1:13] Suze: by yourself, but now you think, all right, the dollars
[1:16] Suze: of the decade when you're 30 is, I want to
[1:18] Suze: buy a home.
[1:20] Suze: I want to start saving for my future. That's when
[1:22] Suze: retirement accounts usually start to come into your life, even
[1:25] Suze: though they should have come in when you were in
[1:27] Suze: your 20s, and then you turn into your 40s, and
[1:31] Suze: now the dollar of the decades there is, am I
[1:34] Suze: saving enough? Oh my God, have I saved enough for
[1:37] Suze: my kids' college education? Why aren't I saving enough in
[1:42] Suze: my retirement accounts? Look how much debt I've accumulated. Oh
[1:45] Suze: my God.
[1:46] Suze: Maybe I need a bigger house now because my kids
[1:49] Suze: are growing up or whatever it is, but now you're
[1:52] Suze: tending to spend more money in your 40s. Then comes
[1:56] Suze: the 50s, and the 50s start to become intense because
[2:00] Suze: you know you are just 10 years away from turning 60,
[2:04] Suze: and 60's a big number. So in the 50s you're like,
[2:08] Suze: oh God.
[2:09] Suze: Now you're afraid because you realize you haven't saved enough,
[2:13] Suze: you don't have enough money, you've refinanced your house, you're
[2:17] Suze: not going to have that house paid for by the
[2:19] Suze: time you retire. Oh, your parents are in trouble. Your
[2:22] Suze: parents start to need money. You're going to start to
[2:25] Suze: have to help them possibly your kids now have graduated
[2:28] Suze: college and they don't have enough money. So now you're
[2:31] Suze: in this situation when you're in your 50s that your
[2:33] Suze: money is going for your parents, for your kids, for
[2:37] Suze: everybody but you. Maybe you're a business owner and your employees,
[2:40] Suze: especially this year, they need money or your business is
[2:43] Suze: shut down, but now you are really starting to panic
[2:46] Suze: and then you turn 60.
[2:49] Suze: And the dollar of the decades at 60 can be
[2:52] Suze: really intense if you have not prepared for it, because
[2:56] Suze: now you are thinking, oh my God, I am just
[2:59] Suze: five years away from qualifying for Medicare.
[3:02] Suze: I'm just seven years away from qualifying for Social Security,
[3:07] Suze: and when you start hearing about Medicare and Social Security,
[3:10] Suze: and you're watching all of these ads on TV and
[3:13] Suze: you're thinking, oh my God, they're talking to me. I
[3:15] Suze: remember when I was young and I used to watch
[3:18] Suze: these ads, and they didn't have anything to do with me,
[3:21] Suze: and now they're all about me.
[3:24] Suze: And then the 70s come.
[3:28] Suze: And then things do start to happen.
[3:31] Suze: Unless you're really one of the unusual ones, your body
[3:35] Suze: starts to really fail in certain ways. Your aches and
[3:39] Suze: pains are really noticeable unless you were one of the
[3:42] Suze: smart ones who all the decades before did yoga, stayed athletic,
[3:47] Suze: always stretched, ate great, thought about that, yeah, it matters
[3:52] Suze: if you're gonna eat that pizza every single day. It matters.
[3:57] Suze: You should be eating fruits and vegetables and all these things.
[4:00] Suze: Those things matter, but you don't know that they matter
[4:04] Suze: until you get to be about 70.
[4:08] Suze: When things really start to change in your body cause
[4:13] Suze: you are getting older.
[4:15] Suze: And then where did the dollars come in there? Oh,
[4:19] Suze: do I have the right kind of insurance?
[4:22] Suze: Oh, do I have enough money to last me through
[4:25] Suze: my retirement? Oh, maybe now I really need to think
[4:30] Suze: about telling my kids I can't afford to pay for
[4:35] Suze: them any more because I'm all out of money. I
[4:38] Suze: still have credit card debt, and now you are riddled
[4:41] Suze: with fear.
[4:43] Suze: Now, you don't know what to do. If you've been
[4:46] Suze: in a relationship, now you're getting afraid that maybe your
[4:50] Suze: spouse is getting ill, or you're getting older, and if
[4:53] Suze: something happened to one of you, and it's not if
[4:56] Suze: something's going to happen, it's when something's going to happen.
[4:59] Suze: Do you know what you need to know about
[5:02] Suze: The money. Do you have a will? Do you have
[5:04] Suze: a trust? Do, oh, you're starting to think about all
[5:06] Suze: those things seriously, even though you should have been thinking
[5:09] Suze: about those things years and years ago. Now you're starting
[5:14] Suze: to pay attention, and then something happens and you find out, oh,
[5:17] Suze: your spouse really didn't know what they were doing with
[5:19] Suze: the money anyway.
[5:21] Suze: And you don't have what you think, and it goes
[5:24] Suze: on and on, and then the 80s come.
[5:28] Suze: And more fear sets in, and either you feel secure
[5:33] Suze: at that point in time, or you don't.
[5:38] Suze: And when you don't, there's not a lot at that
[5:41] Suze: point that you can really do about it if you
[5:44] Suze: hadn't paid attention to your money earlier on.
[5:49] Suze: So, this is about the dollar of the decades and
[5:54] Suze: how you have got to count every dollar and you
[5:58] Suze: have got to make every dollar count. You know, when
[6:03] Suze: I was seeing clients and they would work so hard
[6:08] Suze: to get out of debt, to save money, they would
[6:12] Suze: spend all year to get out of $700 of debt
[6:15] Suze: or to save just $1,000. Do you know?
[6:19] Suze: That it used to be that only 50% of the
[6:21] Suze: people in the United States had more than $1,000 in savings.
[6:26] Suze: I doubt highly right now, highly, that more than 10%
[6:32] Suze: have more than $200 or $300 in savings right now.
[6:37] Suze: So it's gotten really bad.
[6:39] Suze: But anyway, back to my story, and they would work
[6:42] Suze: so hard to save money and get out of debt,
[6:46] Suze: and then December would come.
[6:49] Suze: And the holidays would come and before you know it,
[6:53] Suze: the temptation was so, so strong that people would spend
[6:59] Suze: that money all over again just to please their relatives,
[7:04] Suze: their children, everybody.
[7:08] Suze: This is not to happen to you this year. This
[7:11] Suze: is the year that whatever you have.
[7:14] Suze: You have got to resist that temptation.
[7:19] Suze: You know, what's interesting is that right now, all of
[7:24] Suze: us are in serious danger of spending more money than normal,
[7:29] Suze: and the reason that is, is because many of us
[7:32] Suze: have gotten used to not going to a store to
[7:36] Suze: buy something. It's easier to buy something online.
[7:43] Suze: than ever before. You go on Amazon and you can
[7:46] Suze: go shopping, and I'm telling you, you just have to
[7:49] Suze: be careful. So I'm asking all of you.
[7:53] Suze: For this decade, whatever decade you're in.
[7:58] Suze: To make the most out of your dollars.
[8:01] Suze: A friend of mine had texted me and said to me, Suze,
[8:07] Suze: it's so hard, it's so hard. I don't have enough money.
[8:09] Suze: I can't save money. And we went through all of
[8:12] Suze: her bills and she found out that she was paying
[8:15] Suze: money in fees to the bank because she didn't have
[8:18] Suze: enough money for their minimum, and she was paying a
[8:21] Suze: significant amount of money in fees. All right.
[8:23] Suze: So today I get a text from her. She says,
[8:26] Suze: You're going to be so proud of me. I closed
[8:29] Suze: that account. I found another bank that has no fees,
[8:34] Suze: no minimum to open up, and she was so excited.
[8:38] Suze: And I said, Oh, I'm so proud of you. I said,
[8:41] Suze: you know, you only have $20 to your name. You
[8:44] Suze: got to make sure that you make every dollar count
[8:47] Suze: and count every dollar.
[8:49] Suze: And then she sent me pictures of her daughters and her,
[8:55] Suze: and I noticed that her daughter had a nose ring.
[8:59] Suze: And I wrote her back and I said, So how
[9:02] Suze: much did that cost to get the nose pierced? Like,
[9:05] Suze: what is that about? And she said to me, Oh, Suze,
[9:09] Suze: that's a plastic little ring that we get at the
[9:12] Suze: dollar store, which is where we have to shop. We
[9:14] Suze: buy our food and everything there, and it was just $1.
[9:19] Suze: And I said, Oh, just $1. She said, Yes, Suze.
[9:24] Suze: And that's when she said to me, You'll never understand.
[9:29] Suze: And I wrote her back and I said it's not
[9:33] Suze: about if I understand or I don't understand because my
[9:38] Suze: understanding is never going to change your situation. It's about
[9:43] Suze: you don't understand. You don't understand how every dollar counts
[9:50] Suze: and you have to count every single dollar.
[9:54] Suze: And then she said to me, yep, that's true.
[9:59] Suze: And then she says, but we're going to go to
[10:02] Suze: the store today, the dollar store, with my girls, and
[10:07] Suze: we're going to just look around. And I said, If
[10:09] Suze: you come back with one thing other than food, cause
[10:16] Suze: your refrigerator is empty, you have $20 to your name,
[10:20] Suze: and if you spend $1.
[10:23] Suze: Because that's like 5% of everything that she has if
[10:26] Suze: you think about it. $1 of $20 is 5%. If
[10:32] Suze: you spend $1 on one thing that you don't need.
[10:38] Suze: Then you're going to understand why, when you come to
[10:42] Suze: me and ask me for help, that I say no
[10:45] Suze: to you, because you don't understand.
[10:50] Suze: So this is the time in our lives right here
[10:54] Suze: and right now where all of us have to understand.
[10:58] Suze: We have to understand what everybody's going through. We have
[11:01] Suze: to understand what we're going through. We have to understand
[11:04] Suze: and we have to do something about it.
[11:08] Suze: And what you do about it.
[11:11] Suze: Is you make every penny count, every dollar count, and
[11:17] Suze: you count every penny, and you count every dollar, and
[11:21] Suze: you make sure that you make moves that absolutely make sense,
[11:27] Suze: not out of guilt, not out of shame, not out
[11:30] Suze: of wanting to please somebody, no.
[11:33] Suze: This is the decade now where we really have to
[11:38] Suze: stand in our truth and we really have to do
[11:42] Suze: that which is best for every single one of us.
[11:48] Suze: The real question also comes down to, are you paying
[11:52] Suze: attention to what you're doing with your money as well?
[11:58] Suze: Are you feeding your money McDonald's and chicken and things
[12:02] Suze: like that from Kentucky Fried? Or are you feeding your
[12:06] Suze: money Roth IRAs and investing accounts and paying down debt
[12:11] Suze: and things like that?
[12:14] Suze: Did that even make sense what I just said? Maybe yes,
[12:17] Suze: maybe no, but I think you understand what I am
[12:20] Suze: talking about.
[12:22] Suze: So, that's the podcast for today, and I hope that
[12:27] Suze: you enjoyed it.

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