Snow Days, Sunlight, and Tea

Join the engaging conversation on '50 Cups Hot Takes,' hosted by Jim Baker. In this episode, Jim and Bill discuss hot topics including the impact of snow days on schools and society, the benefits and misconceptions of sunlight and dermatology, and their personal takes on the frustrating health insurance experiences. Tune in for an insightful dialogue paired with a taste of Jim's delicious Earl Grey tea, all while navigating through the intriguing narratives around hot contemporary issues. Don't miss Jim's expert tips on choosing the best loose-leaf tea and more!

00:00 Introduction to 50 Cups Hot Takes

01:45 Jim Baker's Background and Career

02:36 The Decline of Local Radio

03:28 Snow Days and Remote Learning

15:17 The Importance of Sunlight and Dermatology

22:21 The Importance of Sunlight for Animals and Humans

23:25 Rethinking Sun Protection and Skin Cancer

23:54 Personal Experiences with Sun Exposure

27:58 The Daily Struggle to Get Enough Sunlight

28:53 Challenges with Health Insurance

29:55 The Complexity of Insurance Plans

33:14 Fighting Insurance Companies

35:36 The High Cost of Healthcare

38:45 The Outrage of Hospital Parking Fees

41:20 Promoting Loose Leaf Tea

Creators and Guests

Host

Bill LuMaye

Talk Host WPTF and Voice Over Talent

Host

Jim Baker

Author of "The Adventure Begins When The Plan Falls Apart" Converting a Crisis into Company Success, Jim is a husband and father of 4, Baker has spent the last 30 years in the business world as an entrepreneur, investor, and advisor. He had a successful exit in 2014 after owning and managing a CRO and functional services company, Ockham, specializing in Oncology. During that time prior to exit, Baker grew ASG and then Ockham both organically and through M&A. Over time Baker has experience in acquiring and selling companies, working with investment bankers, private equity, and mezzanine debt funding. In addition, has vast experience in business branding and managing and leading people. After the sale to Chiltern International, Baker started Sumus Development Group, an advisory business focused on operational excellence, exit strategy and marketing. In addition, Baker is an active investor in the business community.

What is Hot Takes: 50Cups?

United We Sip – Dive into the fascinating world of American culture with "Hot Takes: 50Cups." Join founder Jim Baker as he shares his hot takes on everything from day to day life, business trends and societal shifts, uncovering how we are all more united than we think.

At 50Cups, we believe in the power of community and the shared goal of living a healthy, fulfilled life. Our mission is to inspire you through organic, great-tasting teas, education, and awareness, uniting us all in our quest for better living.

Each episode of "Hot Takes: 50Cups" features Jim's candid and insightful commentary on the challenges, triumphs, and everyday experiences that shape our collective journey. From entrepreneurial wisdom, cultural observations, to health topics and nutrition this podcast offers a fresh perspective that will leave you inspired and enlightened.

Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a business leader, or simply curious about the threads that bind us, this podcast is your gateway to understanding and connection.

Subscribe now and join the conversation!

[00:00:00]

Bill LuMaye: Hello everybody and welcome to 50 Cups Hot Takes and with the one and only Jim Bakker, who is a brilliant man.

He's a successful entrepreneur and happens to also own 50 Cups Tea company. And I do the show merely for the opportunity to taste one of his delicious teas. But Jim, it's good to see you. Hey, you as well. Hey, before we begin, I'm

Jim Baker: gonna pour some tea, please. Today it's chili outside. It is, um. And 40 some odd degrees, I think.

Mm-hmm . And we got a little oral gray tea.

Bill LuMaye: Ooh.

Jim Baker: Um, which is always good in the afternoon. If you need a little [00:01:00] pick me up. And also at the same time, um, wanna warm up that body a little bit. Unfortunately, I had a little glassware incident and that's why we have the, you know, old fashioned, cups today, um, take away cups, but hopefully the, the taste won't be compromised.

I'll just kill the rest of this. Oh, it's absolutely delicious. Also, before we begin, yes, four or five people that actually watch this, um, have complimented me on you. Really, you have a phenomenal voice. They really love the way you host. So I said, well, if you love them so much tell all your friends and family so we can get more viewers.

That would be great. Great. But yeah, and I told 'em all about your background. Um, so for the audience, maybe you should just give them a little five minute background about yourself. Well,

Bill LuMaye: yeah, I, I don't wanna bore you, but I've been doing radios certainly in the Raleigh area for about 15 years. We were doing the talk radio.

We do TV currently. Not doing radio right now, but we're doing the podcast and of course we hook up [00:02:00] mm-hmm . You know, two times a month and we talk about all the hot takes. And I love this show. I really do, because it's all the things we wanna say and all the little things that bug us. But yeah, and I've been involved in the political scene and movies and recordings, sound and all of that.

So I've had kind of a . An interesting road, but, um, nothing better than this. Free T man. What was the

Jim Baker: radio station that you were on in

Bill LuMaye: the old days? Well here in Raleigh was WPTF. Okay. Which at the time was a very big 50,000 watt AM station. And and of course like everything else, the AM stations went, went by the wayside.

And radio in general right now is in bit of a tough stake. So

Jim Baker: yeah. iHeart XM and Spotify pretty much. . Killed off most of the local radio. Right.

Bill LuMaye: Pretty much. And then of course you have all the media, I mean the social media. And I was just talking to Joey, he said, boy, his business is booming from all these just jockeys that were let go from all these big companies.

So they're all doing their own podcasts. But yeah, that's kinda my, [00:03:00] my thing. And and I've always enjoyed it. Had a lot of fun doing it. So thanks for the opportunity. Yeah. Well, enjoy your tea today. Yeah. Cheers. Thank you. Does this help colds? It does. . Man, it's that time of the year. I just spent Jim, three days.

I work from home, by the way, with my my wife who's a teacher, and my daughter who's a student. Wow. You a little vacation. A little stay vacation, huh? Well, they did. Yes, they did. Jim, um, I'm a, I'm, I know on the list of things to talk about today, you wanted to talk about snow days or so do I, because I'm a little pent up, but I, I'm interested in hearing your take on it.

Yeah. Is it a good take or a not so good take? It's

Jim Baker: an interesting take. Oh, beautiful. It used to be a bad take. Mm-hmm . Um, I had kids that obviously went through the school systems and you know, as a kid myself, I still remember and when we snowed, I grew up in the northeast for the most part, um, in my formative years.[00:04:00]

And did spend some time down south. But you know, when there was a snow storm down south, or even if it was a half an inch ice storm, you know the place shut down. Yep. In for a week. And, as a kid, you're excited for the first day. Then after that it kind of gets old. Um, 'cause there's not really much to do outside 'cause it starts to melt and slushy and dirty and other than playing football, um, in the slush, it's you can't really slay ride or do anything else.

Right. So. Right. Um, and so I could kind of get it a little bit in the old days, at least with the South, and of course we are here. The Raleigh Durham area and up north you had a snow day. If you got 20 inches of snow, you usually were off for a day and the next day you probably had a delayed opening. And then after that you were ready to rock, you know, for the rest of the week.

And what I've noticed, even in the northeast now, but really more so down here still, is that even if it's forecasted mm-hmm . And it hasn't even hit yet. And as we all know, um, the weather forecast. [00:05:00] Professionals love to capture our attention with, in this case, Snowmageddon. And I remember in this past snowstorm in which we received on Wednesday and Thursday, so less than 48 hours ago, um, we were told last Sunday that it was gonna be a 13 inch snowstorm.

Yes. And then it's, you know, every single day it seemed to like go down in impact to the point where they were predicting, you know, three or four inches. But there's, Wednesday morning we woke up and there was no, the, the roads were dry, the sky was cloudy, but dry. Mm-hmm . And by 10 or 11 in the morning, you know, we saw some snowflakes.

And then probably by two, two o'clock or so in the afternoon, it was snowing. But I wouldn't call it a, a snow getting storm. I would agree with that. Right. The good news is around here, um, they've, I think finally perfected the prep of the roads. A few years ago, they'd prep 'em 10 days in advance and then [00:06:00] you'd drive around 50 degrees sunshine for the next 10 days and you see clouds of salt and sand just, you know, blowing up in the air.

Um, so by the time the actual precipitation did occur, it was gone. It was gone at that point in time. So they are timing it a little bit better now, which is great. But I'm thinking to myself from a snow day perspective. I'll give you that. They, they should have, they could have closed school on Wednesday.

There was zero reason to close school yesterday, past 10 o'clock in the morning, and today the roads have been dry for 24 hours. Mm-hmm . The weather is above freezing. There's no snow anywhere on any hard surface. Um, and there hasn't been since probably noon yesterday. Right. And lo and behold, schools are closed again.

Right. So I started thinking to myself, are we simply as a country and a municipality, just always taking the easy way out?

Bill LuMaye: I would answer that by saying yes, I think they are, but that's a very good point. [00:07:00] And is that good for our

Jim Baker: kids? No, it

Bill LuMaye: is not in this

Jim Baker: case. And is it good for ? Quite frankly, everybody else, and you know, the easy decision is to just kill off school, right?

We don't have to worry about car accidents, we don't have to worry about buses, we don't have to worry about people slipping, whatever it is. Um, but the, but is that good for society? You know, is it good for us to automatically when every, when things go, you know different or un or we have unpredictability, I.

IE weather in this case. Um, does it make sense just to punt and let everybody just kind of hang out

Bill LuMaye: at home? You know what I find interesting, and I think it goes back to remember it was snow Gaden it was on the air actually, and it snowed. People were abandoning their cars and walking away, and I think there was a con, remember the iconic picture of one of them on fire?

And someone put a meme with the Michelin snowman, you know, in it. We were a laughing stock and, [00:08:00] and, then of course you had everybody trying to get home at the same time. So I think they got a little gun shy going, well, listen, we gotta, we can't get into that again where we let everybody out at the same time.

But your point about the weather forecasters polar vortex, everything's in red. I mean, it is the worst possible case scenario that they're bringing to you. Well, it scares the heck out of everybody. And so it's not surprising that they would do this, but you're right. I thought my good. Today's a beautiful day.

Why are the kids not in school? I don't know why. Jim.

Jim Baker: And in your situation, do you, um, I guess your school system encourages the parents to teach the kids when there's a snow day. Do you want to

Bill LuMaye: explain that? I would be happy to. This is relatively new and I haven't researched it. But the re remote learning days, so you have so many days.

The schools plan for a snow day. This is Wake County in general, I think. And so now [00:09:00] they have remote learning packets that go home with the kids from every one of their teachers. They must complete 'em with a parent who have to sign off on it is basically you're teaching your kids throughout the day what should have been taught in school, which I find irritating and.

So they must get credit for it, but it makes it so much easier to say, well, let's just give them three days of remote learning and sit back and relax for those three days. Maybe I'm a little more, cynical than I should be on this, but I, I, I, I, I parents, most parents can't stay home and teach their kids.

Right. And if that's a way to get out of going to school for whatever reason, I, I think it's wrong.

Jim Baker: Yeah, I do too. And I think also in the old days I think up north especially, you allocated five snow days. Yes. So if it never snowed for the entire year, there were no snow days off. Then you got outta school in June.

Five days earlier. Right, right. But they had the snow days built in and then the end of school was the end of school, you know, and then if there were more snow days, [00:10:00] um, which happened one time, um, yeah. Had to go a longer, we had to school on Saturday or they extended the, the year by a couple of extra days to make up for those snow days.

'cause you had to have this 181 days of learning. Right, right, right. And it seems like that to your point of homeschooling, it seems like they figure out a way, you know, to get around that where. You know, they can count the remote days as real school days. Right? Right. And we know it's just kind of like the work from home crowd.

Not everybody, but in most cases or some cases, forget I even said most, I don't wanna get attacked. In some cases we're not as productive at home as we might be at work.

Bill LuMaye: That is so true. Plus. I feel really stupid. Jim, have you seen the math the way they do basic math nowadays? I'm sure it's not Two plus two equals four anymore.

Not anymore. I can fill a whole page with equations to get to the same answers. So it, it, and I'm, and I'm meaning that in all sincerity and it's . In one respect, it's good to know that that's [00:11:00] what's going on, but at the same time, um, I think the school system ought to step up and teach the kids. Remember we had remote learning during Covid?

Didn't that work out real well? Yeah, it worked out great. Yeah, so, so thank you for hitting that hot button for me. But you're right, and I grew up in Green Bay. Listen, you know, the snow banks were higher than I was as a kid, and we still went to school and, it's a matter of perspective. I get it. They had the machinery to clear the roads, but it was kind of crazy to watch everybody at home yesterday and, and certainly today.

Jim Baker: Yeah. I'm just wondering too, with the, the remote learning being counted as a school day, there's, there's less incentive to open the schools back up. Right. Because in the old days if you didn't have that, you know, I'm sure teachers didn't want to extend their teaching year because of snow days, so there's probably pressure to try to open up.

Sooner than later. So you wouldn't have to make those days up. Right. If you exceeded your snow day total. And I don't know if they do that in Wake County or not, where they build in X amount of days. [00:12:00] They probably do, but even this year, I mean, we've had . We had three days now, I think three or four weeks ago we had a dusting.

We had about two or three days. Yes. You know, so they've already blown through the five days. Right. You know, at this point in time. And what's noon too? And it's not snow, but every time there's a major rain event, not a hurricane, I. Just a what we call a tropical storm, right? Um, where we're getting, you know, 20 mile an hour winds and we're getting some heavy rain.

They shut school down for that. So what's going on? What do you think? I mean, honestly,

Bill LuMaye: I feel like we're worsening up. That's what I'm saying. You know, I mean, what, what happened to the men and women out there that. Throw their kids in the car and get to school. Right? Are we that fearful? Is that what you think?

Are we afraid?

Jim Baker: Think also, we all, and we obviously admire, you know, the, the frontline workers, so to speak, that have to go brave those storms and everything else. Well, if they're gonna be raised in a society in the future where anything, weather related, you know is is a green light to stay home, then [00:13:00] how are they gonna have the.

Perseverance to wherewithal to want to go out and and, and work when they need to, to keep the power on, to do other things, to plow the roads, um, if they've been taught from the time they started school, that it's okay to relax.

Bill LuMaye: Well, I agree with you on this and, um. It's scary enough driving at certain hours in North Carolina when the, when the sun is out and the pavement's dry and when it starts to rain.

We all know that for whatever reason, North Carolina and Carolina drivers are tough. They just can't do it. So when you add in snow, and again, you know, if people were honest, the media were honest and gave you the forecast like they used to give it and not shade the colors in and try to blow it out of proportion, I think you'd have less of it.

But I think the politicians, school officials, Ryan. They get parents all over 'em on online and they're, why aren't you closing schools? They have pressure because they're frightened. I get it. Yeah. I get it. There's,

Jim Baker: and I'm not, like I [00:14:00] said, I, I think it's, um, it's just a genuine though, I think to if you're a tax paying citizen of the state to ask parents who aren't professional teachers to teach the kids and at the same time pay somebody that's teaching and administrating a full-time salary.

If somebody else is doing the work. Amen brother. Amen. I agree with that. We're not gonna solve it today, but that's one of my hot takes and it's obviously in my mind since the weather's beautiful outside right now. No, we probably had some

Bill LuMaye: time to sit back and relax a little bit. The quit the No, my getting that we had the kids were at home.

Um, but it was a sunny day today. It was beautiful. And actually yesterday the sun came out and the snow was melting. It was . Really a nice day. It was, and it was nice to get out because we've been kind of stuck inside. And I remember during Covid, again, going back to those years, we had to stay inside. Even though going out in the sun was kind of the thing we we needed to do, we're transitioning.

I I could see it coming. You could. [00:15:00] Well, I'm a professional food broadcasting. See, this is how you do it in radio school. Yes. And but you do have sunlight. On your list of hot topics today, but I never really know how to read you. Are we going? It's good. Is it bad? Is a little of both. What do you, what are your thoughts?

Well, let's do dermatology. Okay.

Jim Baker: And sunlight. All right. Together. And as we know over the last 30 or so years, the dermatologic profession mm-hmm . Has skyrocketed. Right? I did not know that. True. Yes. Dermatology is is a nice field to get into. It's usually a nine to five job as a, a doctor. Um, no on call during the weekend, no surgeries, no unexpected things that needed to to happen, like if you were an OB GYN, for example, or if you are a surgeon or I.

If you're an oncologist, I mean, all those other fields orthopedists, you know, you're kind of, could be a 24 7 type of job. You're on call [00:16:00] during the weekends and everything else. So dermatology itself, not gonna get that emergency call, huh? No, not really. No. Probably not, no. Um, and then on top of that you know, there has been, obviously skin cancer is, is increased significantly.

Mm-hmm . In the last 30, 40 years. And I think we've been . Most things in healthcare, we've been given the wrong information, and I think the information that all of us have been given for the last 40 years, is, Hey, stay out of the sun. Because if you get a sunburn, you'll get skin cancer, and therefore, we're gonna tell you not to get in the sun anymore.

We're gonna tell you to lather a bunch of chemicals onto your skin to protect you from a sunburn. We have no idea what a lot of these ingredients are. And I think a long time ago we did it might have done a hot take on, um, on sunscreen. Mm-hmm . Um, but it's wildly toxic. Um, as you know, the skin absorbs, um [00:17:00] as an absorption organ, and you're getting those chemicals, um, going into your bloodstream and who knows what type of long-term effect, um, they will have on the body.

I also think looking at this thing logically and also listening to a number of podcasts, you know, in the last couple years, in order for life to exist, we have to have sun. Mm-hmm . So if that's the case, how can sun be bad for you? It's a great question. Hopefully you've researched this and have it answered.

So when I go to a dermatologist Yeah. For my annual checkup mm-hmm . Because I had a little bit of a squamous cell, lesion on my left hand. Mm-hmm . Five years ago. Once you have that and they take it out, no big deal. And by the way, you can't die from it. And once you take it out, um, now you're on the, you're in [00:18:00] the system, so to speak.

Bill LuMaye: Okay.

Jim Baker: So you go once a year. I love my dermatologist. I think she's great. However, you know, she's, I. Got as much color as this cup . She's, you know, she practices what she preaches I mean, she's, she's you know, um, she's young.

She's probably in her early forties, and, but she just looks like she lacks the, that extra boost of mm-hmm . You know effervescence energy, you know, sure. That you see in other people. And I started noticing. All the other dermatologists in the practice and or you know, their, their assistants and like everybody's the same.

Nobody has a tan, you know, nobody looks like they go hiking in the outdoors. And if they do, maybe they're dressed like a mummy because they've been taught, you know, that sun is the enemy and what . Brought everything home to me, was a simple statement. This one doctor made in a podcast I was [00:19:00] listening to and he said, um, and he's talking about the body with melon.

Um, our tongue, by the way, has the most concentrated amount of light. Um, in the body, um, for obvious reasons, right? It's, it can taste food, um, it helps you talk, um, like it's a very vital organ. Yes. And the body needs light in order for it to exist. And so some of these . He claims at least some of these ailments that we're getting, um, are not, they're derived potentially from other situations like bad food environment, et cetera, et cetera.

But it's a, it's basically at the end of the day, we're a bunch of electrons and protons mm-hmm . And we need light. And if the food that we're eating is. Taking out the light. If we are not in the sunlight, if we are not taking vitamin D three, we are losing our ability to maintain our mitochondria. As a result, we get sick.

So your point about covid staying [00:20:00] inside was the exact opposite of what should have happened. Right? Right, right. And I think we talked about this too in the past, back in the old days, in the 19 hundreds, um, people that had long-term illnesses back then, like tuberculosis or whatever. Oh sure. Well, what do they do with them every single day if they were in a healthcare facility, they basically rolled them out outside.

Mm-hmm . And put 'em in sunlight all day long. That's how they healed. Yes. Right. Absolutely. So we don't do that today, right? If you're go to a hospital, um, you never see light. You see fluorescent lights, you see incandescent lights, you see other lights in the, in the, in the room that you're in. But the place is hermetically sealed.

You have no light whatsoever. And if you look at all the doctors that work 24 7 as docs, especially surgeons, they're in a dark room all day long. They have, they don't have, out of all the doctors, they have the, their longevity is less [00:21:00] than other professions. And you have to look back and say, well, why is that?

You know, I mean, they're on their feet. If their doctors, hopefully they're eating a balanced diet, hopefully they're doing some exercise, so not sitting at a desk all day long looking at a computer. Right. But . There's gotta be a reason why they're not living as long as other people, and it's probably because they're indoors all day long.

Bill LuMaye: Well, how did that shift? I mean, there was a time, sunlight was considered a good thing. Mm-hmm . Um, and I've noticed that over the years. And, and it bounces around. Some things become bad and then they become good again and then bad again. So is this today's science that for whatever reason they. I mean, how, how do we get to a point where intelligent people, doctors are pretty smart?

Um, you would think they would know that that sunlight is helpful, you would think. Um,

Jim Baker: but it's not. But it's not. And as somebody said in a podcast I listened to and I was, I forgot to mention [00:22:00] this point, when a lion is out in the wild, gets enough sun, the lion goes underneath the tree. And he then said, if a lion is in captivity in a zoo, he basically has alopecia.

He's splotchiness, he's losing his coat. Um, he's becoming sicker and sicker because in a zoo you're not really seeing a lot of light in some of these zoos. Now, some of the newer zoos where they have a giant. Range, you know, where the lions can go out and run around all day long and stuff like that.

Probably a little bit of a different story. Sure. My guess is because of these newer zoos and these, you know, um, the ability to get them out, you know, outside more, um, even the zoologists know that these animals need sun. So if an animal needs sun, doesn't, a human needs sun and 'cause we are animals at the end of the day.

And I found his comment about. When they get hot [00:23:00] enough, they go underneath a tree. Wouldn't the same rule apply for us? So when we're out in the sun and then when we start to burn, maybe that's a signal that says, okay, we've had enough. So let's go underneath the shade for a while. Let's put a shirt on, right?

Because maybe the body has gotten enough light and it's a warning sign saying you're, it's okay. You can. Go put some clothes on now and get in the shade, right? Instead of mm-hmm . The alternative, which is, well, let's lather up, protect ourselves from not getting any sun whatsoever and, and absorb all those chemicals in the meantime.

And that's, that's keep reapplying and reapplying all day long and 7, 8, 9, 10, 11-year-old kids. And we haven't. And skin cancer keeps skyrocketing and our population's getting sicker and sicker.

Bill LuMaye: That is something deep. I mean, that really is, I hadn't thought about that. I, I see little kids, I mean toddlers, where they lather 'em up and set 'em outside.

When I grew [00:24:00] up, that's exactly what I did. I'd get a sunburn and I'd go, wow, I don't want one of those again. And the next time I learned, well, I'm getting hot. I'm gonna, I'm gonna pick up and get into some shade. Some used to call that common sense . I mean, honestly have people lost that ability to go, well, this is bad.

I'm starting to burn. I should just get up and move. Are we so conditioned? No, I don't even think

Jim Baker: it's that. I think it's, I think some people might want not to, might wanna protect themselves from a burn, but I think most people will put it on because you've been told sunlight faster. Yeah, so conditioned, right?

So don't

Bill LuMaye: get any sunlight, hadn't even thought about the chemicals you're putting on, much less, you know, protecting yourself from whatever UV rays they feel is, is causing the damage to your skin. But if that were true, that the lotion helped and everybody's doing it. Then you would think you would see a decrease, right?

We're not, but we're not seeing that. Right.

Jim Baker: No, and it's not the sun's hotter than it was, you know, a hundred years ago. It's not the sun's closer to the earth now than it was. It's [00:25:00] not the greenhouse gases. It's nothing like that. It's just simply what we've been told and what we've been taught and. I'm just as guilty of it.

Our kids were really young, you know, we lather 'em up so we can go swim in the pool, you know, down the street and, um, but you know, now. I'm going out and getting

Bill LuMaye: sun. Good for you, . Yeah. Well, you know, we do that because we love our kids. Right. And we do, or I did anyway, rely on expert opinions when it comes to this sort of thing.

I don't any longer though, because it seems that more often than not they, they seem to be off pace and wrong. That's [00:26:00] why I'm kind of excited about what may happen with the Health and Human Service, department here in the next four years. Sure. Because he seems to be kind of cut from that same ilk, right.

Where he is questioning things and I think that's good. Right.

Jim Baker: Yeah. And according to what I've read too, watching a sunrise and looking at the sun mm-hmm . For 10 minutes, you're gonna get a little bit of spot in your eye after you turn away. Mm-hmm . But looking at it for 10 minutes, it's not gonna harm your eyes.

Um, 'cause the pupil obviously is a receptor of light. As well as your skin. Um, but it's supposed to be [00:27:00] the best light is between sunrise and nine or 10 in the morning if you're on the East Coast, for example. Um, so if you went out in the sun, let's say at five o'clock at night, you're getting, probably a third of the amount of light that you would get at nine o'clock in the morning.

Alright?

Bill LuMaye: So if you wanna, and

Jim Baker: you can't really get burned at nine o'clock in the morning. That's true. So, you know, if you really want to really look at this whole sun thing, do your research, um, and understand that it's not bad for you and understand when are the best times to go out and get light. And I think if you look at, the average human that works outdoors compared to one that works indoors.

That outdoor person tends to live or tends to be healthier than the indoor person.

Bill LuMaye: I agree. And if you look at the old days, back when I was growing up, people worked outdoors a lot. Sure. Much more than today. So yeah. Just, yeah. If you start to feel a little warm, just move then. How's that

Jim Baker: to your point, yesterday, I mean, I thought about it, I'm like, did I go [00:28:00] outside at all yesterday?

Well, I, worked out indoors. I got in my car. I then walked from the parking lot into the building. So yeah, I was outdoors for about 30 seconds. Mm-hmm . And, and then I was indoors the rest of the day. Then I left at night and went back home. So I never saw the sunlight. Yesterday

Bill LuMaye: I was just talk, talking to my daughter.

She's 90 years old and she's in school, so everybody's sick. You know, this is that six season. I wonder why. Yeah. And I'm going, I can't, I can't wait for it to get warm so we can get outside again. Right. And isn't it interesting when you do that. The sickness disappears. I'm sure it's not as simple as that, but I know when I'm sick, it's really nice to have insurance.

Jim , there's that segue again, but again, I don't know where you wanna go with this boy. I don't, I've never heard anybody really talk about insurance and had positive good things to say about it. Usually there's, there's something that they've experienced or is in the news. What are your thoughts on insurance today?

Well,

Jim Baker: I talked to you a couple months ago about you having an aggregator. [00:29:00] Yes, get you a better deal in insurance than if you did it yourself, you know, through the exchange or directly with the insurance company. Right. All right, so this is a little bit of a different take. So my, because I went and got my a aggregator because the insurance company that I'm was with before, which is the same one I'm with now, I.

Wasn't individually offering me a, a similar plan to what I had the year before they changed all the plans. Okay. So I had a choice. I would either go to their new plan, which was $400 more a month, or I had to go shop for a new plan. Wow. Now, the one that I got from the aggregator, as a reminder, was a better plan.

Than what I had before was different, so I didn't really like it as much, but from a pure coverage perspective, it was a little bit better and it was $400 less than what I was paying last year. How is that possible? Well, that's, that's one of the issues that I still haven't solved yet. Yeah. Um, but for some reason the insurance companies like the aggregators, the brokers, [00:30:00] and, um, they're able to just through the insurance laws.

Cut that individual person a better deal than what you could get if you went off on your own. Which me, to me, makes zero sense. I mean, it's counterintuitive. If I think if, if I'm the insurance company and you're my client, yes, um, you get the best deal. You know, the new P person that's looking to come in, maybe he gets a good deal through the aggregator, but after that I'm gonna make sure I retain you and I don't have to pay commission to somebody else.

Right? But it's the same mentality that the cable companies, cable TV companies have and everybody else, the new people get the great deals. The people that have been loyal, you know, for 5, 10, 15 years are the ones that are paying the freight for everybody else. So I don't understand it, but my issue is this.

Mm-hmm . So my plan switched. I went to get a checkup, physical on the 20th of December. I had labs run like everybody does, and then I went home, celebrated Christmas. Most of my labs came [00:31:00] in, you know, over the next couple of days after our, before Christmas mm-hmm . And then they all got paid for, you know, based on my plan and everything else.

Um, and then I get a charge in 2025. Saying that I owe X amount of dollars for this one lab. It's not a lot of money, but I'm like, what is this? You know, I was covered in 24. I knew my deductible, everything was good. So I just simply had to, it was basically a, the lab charge was nothing. Right. You know, you know how they, the insurance companies do it anyhow.

The practitioner says labs were a billion dollars. And then the um, insurance company says, no, they're actually . $70. Right. And then you got the next column, which is how much you owe compared to what was paid to the provider. Right, right, right. So I'm thinking I'm gonna owe, you know, let's say 20 bucks.

Yeah. And Bill comes back and it's 70. Yeah. So again, it's principle more than it's anything else. Absolutely. What's going on here? [00:32:00] So I popped the practitioner and nice note in my chart, um, and. They say, yeah, it's your responsibility. I said, yeah, but it, it took place in 2024, not 25. Well, they didn't read it till 2025.

I said, well, that's not my problem. That's, it's not my problem. No, I was there. Correct. I followed the healthcare rules. I showed up and they said The date of service is when I should be getting charged. Absolutely. So now, um, because of the way the system is, the practitioner tells me to go pound salt. Go talk to your insurance company.

So now you go through the. 75 prompts on calling the insurance company and giving my birthday 400 times. Yes. And everything else stand in my head and spit nickels and then go through the automated attendant and everything else. Finally get somebody whose English might be the second language. I don't know.

Yeah. And um, I'm explaining what's going on. And then he basically regurgitates well this is 2025 and this is your plan. I said, I [00:33:00] understand. I said, but this happened in 2024. It's not my fault. The provider didn't read the lab until 2025. They read everything else. Mm-hmm . Except for one lab. And so I said, I'm not paying it.

And so now we have to go through this wonderful appeal process. Um, so I filled out this paperwork. I'm waiting for a call from one of their compliance officers, and it's, you gotta, it's almost, they almost make it so hard for you to protect them by the way. They shouldn't be paying the claim.

Bill LuMaye: Correct.

Jim Baker: Right, right. Um, and they don't care. No, they don't. And they make would rather make it difficult as much as difficult as possible for you. So then you just say that the heck with it, you'll pay the freaking $50 and I'll be done with it. That's right. Or 70 or

Bill LuMaye: whatever the number is. God bless you for doing this, for all the little people out there, Jim , because I would be the guy who'd cave and go, I, I just don't have time for this.

And I've done this many, many times. You brought the cable company and all [00:34:00] that. I mean, . They make it almost impossible to leave them. Um, so how far are you gonna go with this? I'm not, they're not packing down at all. Good for you. It always

Jim Baker: doesn't take tremendous amounts of time. In the next month or so.

I'm sticking with it, right? If it's a phone call here and there and I just keep saying no, then. Who knows what's gonna happen. Maybe you'll do to them what they were trying to do. Deal. That's a minor case though. There's a friend of mine her son was diagnosed with, um, a former rheumatoid arthritis. So he needs Humira, um which is the biologic, um, to treat the, to the disease.

And she has Blue Cross blue Shield and she was denied three times. The medication. 'cause they wanted him to take a a 1950 pill first, and that basically blows your stomach up and causes infections. And the doctor coded it right? The doctor said, no, he is not a candidate for that. He is a candidate for this.

And they had to go through four months of appeals before [00:35:00] finally somebody at Blue Cross Blue Shield approved it. Meanwhile they're paying know $2,000 a month in premiums and on the, the, the drug sheet that you get the tier one through tier five drugs. Yes, it's covered and you, and you're not getting it covered.

Right. So she had to basically go through a knife fight, you know, to finally get it covered. And I'm not condoning what happened to the UnitedHealthcare CEO months ago in New York. No. But you could see where some people who aren't stable can lose their minds over some of this stuff at some point in time.

Bill LuMaye: Well, this impacts your life in a big way. If it's your health, especially if it's serious and you're not getting the treatment that you feel you should be getting and your doctor feels you should be getting. In some cases it could even be you know, lifesaving kind of stuff. But even beyond that, I mean, it's not cheap for the average folks out there to get a bill from the hospital or from a doctor.

And some of this stuff is really quite expensive. I still don't understand why we haven't figured out. How to make this better. [00:36:00] The system set up, of course, to be very, very expensive, but people don't have the resources or the time maybe to do what you're going through. But, um, I don't know how you fight it other than what you're doing.

Jim Baker: Yeah. And unfortunately, it's really one of the few things in life that the end user, the, the patient in this case doesn't have power with the purse. Right. You know,

Bill LuMaye: and that is the problem.

Jim Baker: If I wanna buy life insurance, I buy life insurance. Right? Right. If I kick, I get the, my beneficiaries get some money, right?

I go get my car fixed, I'm paying for it. Right. Even though I have car insurance, um, you know, here the decisions are made between the provider, the institution, and the government and the insurance company. And, but we're the ones who are paying the insurance company to cover, but we don't have any power.

No, we have no power to control costs with the doctor. We have no power of anything. And I think if you really want to refine it and change it, you gotta figure out a way to give the power back to that, [00:37:00] to that individual.

Bill LuMaye: I think I want it. I think they've been conditioned. We all have a conditioned that well, insurance, it's free or cheap if I have this, but in the long run, of course, it's costing us so much more.

I was in a doctor's office and I had insurance. I saw what they were charging. The insurance company, it was like 300 and some bucks and a copay was minimal, but so I'm going, well, they're gonna pay for it. I only have to pay 20 bucks. Guy comes up and says I haven't got any insurance, so what's the cash price?

And it was 125 bucks. Right. Which is a third of what they were charging the insurance company. Right. And I've come to do that more often than not. Even with prescriptions, you'll be surprised at how cheap they really are. Right. Sometimes, many times cheaper than your insurance , right. Pay on it. So, um,

Jim Baker: so on the script side, what most insurance companies do is they'll negotiate a, a price, let's say with Walgreens.

Mm-hmm . And we'll just take a typical antibiotic, for example, um, let's say it's $50, [00:38:00] right? Then they'll go back to the manufacturer of the antibiotic and they'll say, Hey, I'm gonna cover you, but I need a $25 rebate. Right? Wow. Sure. So now. Insurance is getting the 50 they're paying the pharmaceutical 25.

They're making 50% on every single script. That's how it works.

Bill LuMaye: Well, that's wrong, Tim , it's wrong. And you're right. It is how it works. And I don't know if you could ever change it. There's so much money involved in this and so many people who are benefiting from it. That's ultimately the point. Everybody's got their

Jim Baker: hand in it except for the person that's actually sick.

Yeah. My biggest hot take, which we won't get into too much more on insurance. It's really more about the hospital. I was on the Duke Children's Leadership Board, um, years ago. Mm-hmm . And my daughter was sick over there for about 10 days and you know, she had a very positive experience at the time, I didn't really know much about how all this stuff worked, so I decided to give [00:39:00] back, you know, help out the hospital, et cetera.

And, but as I'm going to see my daughter all the time, I gotta pay to park. Think about that for a second. I gotta pay to park. Right? And then I'm noticing people are in vans, living in their vans in the garage because they have no place to stay because their kid is in that hospital. Wow. So I said, they kept saying, well, what do we need to do to be different?

I said first thing first, if you have a patient that's admitted to the hospital, they get free parking. You would think . I asked them to give away their healthcare for free. Are you kidding? Oh my god. Pushback. And they said they blame the university. Well, the university owns the parking garages. I'm like, so go to the university and tell 'em you, you, or do you know much there charges let need it for that

Bill LuMaye: hospital stay.

Yeah.

Jim Baker: Let's get, let's set up a donated fund that pays for the parking. Let's just do something so the patient's family isn't getting [00:40:00] bamboozled. Because a lot of these people that are going to this hospital, they're not coming from Kerry, North Carolina. They're traveling an hour, two hours, six hours away.

Sure. They don't have money. Right. It's their last hope. They might be kid might be getting chemo cancer treatments or whatever, and they don't have two niggles to run together and they gotta still pay for parking, which for them is cheaper to live in the parking garage in a van than it would be to go get a hotel someplace else.

That's wrong. Of course, it's so wrong.

Bill LuMaye: I've never thought that that was even an issue. So somehow he was transgressed over to here. But wow. And then if you just, it's mind boggling. It is mind maddening. It really is. All these things can be easily fixed really. If there was a desire to do it, they had somebody in power who wanted to do it.

And um, well, you know, the people are in power if they decide to do it, but they just. We're still compliant, we're easily maneuvered. We're just heard and we're easily directed. Yeah. I think once

Jim Baker: it's,

Bill LuMaye: it's been

Jim Baker: accepted, so to [00:41:00] speak, 'cause it's always been mm-hmm . You know, people just, I'm sure they wanna scream and they probably, it aggravates a heck at 'em, but they're like, well, you know, my kid's sick.

I gotta visit my kid. I have to pay this $10 a day to park in this bad garage. Yeah. Right. So it's outrageous. It is. I.

Bill LuMaye: You know it isn't outrageous. What's that? Your tea is delicious. And I don't mean to cut you off. If you have more you'd like to say. I don't, but the tea is absolutely delicious and I know at least I hope people who watch the podcast take it upon themselves anyway to at least try it.

How do they do that?

Jim Baker: Yeah.

Bill LuMaye: 50 cups

Jim Baker: tea.com. Um, I really love to sell the Looseleaf tea. As opposed to the bag tea. Okay. 'cause it's labor intensive with the bag tea. So last month for example, I was giving away a free teapot with a a filter. Um Oh nice. So you just put the loose leaf tea in there and it steeps.

You just pour it out and you're good to go, which is what we did today. Alright, very good. So no tea bags, you don't have to [00:42:00] worry about getting your fingers burned. And disposing of it someplace. Um, you just simply have the, the loose leaf. And I personally prefer the loose leaf over the, the bag tea anyhow.

Um, because although our bags are organic and they're, they're pure, there's not a lot of dyes are additive to 'em. Um, some of these bags are full with plastics and preservatives and everything else, and so loose leaf is the way to go. Perfect. And, um, 50 cups tea.com. And then as always, it's been a treat.

Hey. Thank you, Jim. As always, good

Bill LuMaye: to see you and get free tea, . Thank you. Have a good one. . [00:43:00]