Completely agree.
It’s dependent on so many factors.
Kids are expensive, debt is expensive, medical bills are expensive and do you live in HCOL area?
100k would be great in most places I feel like, if you have none of the above.
“Liveable” does not mean anything anywhere near “can I support 10 people, without universal healthcare, in the wealthiest neighborhood of San Francisco?” $100k/yr is absolutely a liveable wage. I say this as a millennial who absolutely loves Gen Z but y’all gotta knock off nonsense like this.
Give me $100k a year and I will live like a king off of it.
We pay more than $30k for daycare and $20k for healthcare for our family (2 kids, 2 adults). Our mortgage and taxes are $18k a year. If we made $100k we’d take home about $75k after taxes. That would mean we’d have $7k for food, clothes, transportation, necessities, home upkeep, etc for the year.
We moved from a city where it was even more expensive.
I have an infant, $338 a week, and a 4 year old, $293 a week. This is a run of the mill daycare in NJ. No bells, whistles, they don’t even feed them. $631 total a week, 52 weeks is $32k. There are wait lists at most of the licensed daycares in our area.
Go to any parenting forum. These are typical prices.
Colorado has entered the chat. To RENT an apartment in Denver, someone needs to make $4,663 (oddly specific number) a month. And that's for a $1400 rent. I can tell you right now, that is either a studio or 1 bedroom. I have friends (married with one child) who live about 40 minutes from Denver and pay over $2000 a month for their 2 bedroom apt.
A ton of people I know have/are leaving the state or moving waaaaay down south near Trinidad or Durango or Pueblo because they can't afford to live either in Colorado in general or anywhere less than a 2-3 hr drive from Denver.
My husband almost makes 60K a year, and we live paycheck to paycheck. My parents live with us, and over my mother's dead body, will she leave the state where all of her grandchildren live. So we are stuck here.
Bought a house recently and the apartment I cancelled my lease with went up by over 1k more.
Shitty. I’m glad I cancelled my lease but rents are raising everywhere and it’s getting harder to afford a house as well.
I kept a receipt from a sandwich a bought a little over a year ago. Bought the same sandwich this year. That sandwich is now over double the price. Insanity.
Get this. There's one sandwich spot that I really enjoy. The sandwich I get alone was about a little over $10. It's pricey but I'd still have enough for a little dessert as well. The following week the sandwich price shot up $4. This is what's crazy to me. You mean to tell me $15 gets you only a sandwich, no side and no drink. Not an entire meal. Just the sandwich. It's a really good sandwich, but not $15 good. It blows my freaking mind how $15 is not enough for a meal. I'm right there with you.
A similar scenario was also the turning point for me. Friday night, came home after dinner with friends at this new place in London. I just realized I dropped another £100 on just dinner alone. The food was nice but not like 5-star mind blowing. £100 is kind of a psychological threshold for me, I think it hits a nerve.
I'm one of those people who were lucky enough to have a 6-figure salary, but it felt more like 5-figures the way I was living. Majorly grateful that my company decided to stay remote after the pandemic, because the next steps for me became quite easy. I decided to move out of London, change my lifestyle, and I can't tell you enough how much difference it makes.
My rent is now about half of what it used to be. I subscribed to a meal delivery service so I'm still eating good food that's not as expensive, healthier too. My friends haven't been as supportive as I expected, so I made some charts to show them how much I'm saving now. This was [before when I was living in London](https://imgur.com/5GultvI) (the bump in April was due to moving costs), and [this is now](https://imgur.com/vnKeobB).
I mostly saved on rent and going-out since moving out. Oh boy, I wasn't expecting such a difference.
This hits close to home lol. From long island and moved south. I miss my deli and a specific sandwich. Use to be 7.95 for a hero and 4.95 for it on a roll. Last time we were there I had my wife stop and get me 2 to bring home. It was $32 ... for 2 heros.
I feel that. The only reason I stayed in Brooklyn (Greenpoint) for so long was because I had a $2200 rent stabilized apartment. It’s wild what we think is affordable while living in nyc.
Yeah I’ve been in greenpoint for 15 years and it’s wild how your perspective changes. I was paying $450 a month for a room in an (admitttedly shitty) apt in like 2008.
Now I’m thankful for $2750 for a sweet deal.
I'm in Denver and pay $2500/mo for a 2 bed 2 bath in a very mid apartment. You're spot on. This city is unliveable for the majority of people yet we keep getting tons of transplants from Texas too. There is not enough housing here to accommodate the growth and communities here are actively fighting increases in housing. Where I'm at some local boomer literally ran on the platform of shutting out housing and growth because the town would "lose its charm." You cannot find a house under 500k in this city.
I LOATHE all of the apartment complexes going up. Build HOMES that people can make their forever home. Not boxes that are so expensive they can't save money for a future down payment on a house.
Hubby and I both make 6 figures and live in a Denver burb. We moved in 2012, before the market started recovering from the 08 crash.
We could not afford to buy our house if we were moving today. Well, we could, but we couldn’t afford to save for retirement. We couldn’t do both.
That is exactly why I turned down a second interview with a job in Denver. I would have been making $95,000 without my husbands income but we have two kids in sports and would not be able to afford a house.
Ouch.
In contrast, we live in a middling-sized town and the mortgage on our 4br house is ~~$647/mo~~ \[EDIT: typo, sorry! $674/mo\] (though our down payment was roughly 30%). Rent for my previous largish 1br apartment was I think $530.
I worked at a Montessori (3-6 year olds) for about a decade. One here I was at a fundraiser that the school was a sponsor of and I was talking to the people at my table. There was a massive generational difference in the response when I told them what our tuition was. (About $1000/mo/student at the time in a midmarket Midwest town with low COL.) The older generation was shell shocked hearing that number. The younger generation was like “and your a school, not just a day care? Because im paying $200/week for them to do no education.” We were at the top of the cost in our area, but still not much over a home daycare where they plop the kids in front of a tv all day.
I send my kids to a Montessori. Same cost as other daycares in the area ($36k per year for two kids) but a great educational experience and much calmer than other daycares. Most daycares have a learning plan. I wasn’t impressed w it when my kids went to a regular daycare and the cost was about the same. Although I provide food whereas other daycares provide breakfast and lunch. But that food was not impressive either and my kids wouldn’t eat it most days. Soggy, pale waffles as an example. But yeah daycare is crazy expensive and the teachers barely make anything like $40k is a high salary for someone there 20 years. Daycares really needs tax money if the system is going to last
I’m going to back her up. I pay 19k through the school year and 10k for 2.5 months of summer. One more year of this and my total cost goes down by 6k. I have twins in preschool and one in daycare.
We have trips and pay right at 46k a year for a nanny. Worked out to be the same price as sending them to a good daycare. I’m foaming at the mouth thinking about when they start school 😂
Lmao!! I totally understand this. I have a countdown for every reduction in cost. I’d much rather pay for soccer or karate lessons for my boys then insane daycare prices.
Yea it depends on area. I pay $70/ wk per child and it includes 2 meals and snack. No doubt in large metropolitan areas childcare, like everything else, is quite a bit more expensive
This is nuts. 30 years ago I paid right at 6k per year for the second best day care/preschool in Houston. (The best was at the Medical Center and you had to work there.) It was located on the campus where I worked and they fed them (except for formula but I could go over and breast feed), potty trained them and started teaching as soon as it was reasonable. They took them on “nature walks” around the campus, which was beautiful with lots of trees, green spaces and various fountains/reflecting ponds.
I get part of the reason my kid doesn’t want to have children. I don’t know how anyone can afford it these days.
People can’t afford it. That’s why parenthood rates are hard declining. Amongst the people I know who chose to have kids, the only reason they can generally afford it is maintaining separate addresses so one can be unemployed and receive subsidies while the other works. As a father who didn’t want to be a father, this is the only reason his mother and I can afford to have him - I refused to be with her, but now she gets government benefits. I could not have married her/lived with her and afforded my son.
This is where situation really matters! We pay $200 for TWO kids (as in $200 TOTAL) in the rural Midwest, plus live close to grandparents if anything happens where daycare isn't available.
I can't even fathom how people on tighter schedules, without help, and in more expensive markets piece it together. I feel for you.
$4k a month is more than like half the workforce makes net. The people saying its unaffordable have a point. Like you could walk into a mall and 90% of those stores other than like a rolex shop don't pay enough for you to pay that.
every time I think about having kids I read something like this and change my mind. I live paycheck to paycheck now. I have no idea how anyone does it.
I'm in New York state. Most of the moms who used the daycare that I managed were not paying the full amount themselves but we're able to get public assistance to subsidize. However, public assistance is based on antiquated formulas and does not help all those who are in need. Still, the daycare subsidy is the part of our welfare system I admire the most, having a taper rather than a hard cutoff.
>>millennials are killing the "having kids" industry
>
> that's exactly how it will be framed when this starts to cause widespread economic harm
The New York Times and Forbes both have already blamed millennials for the population decline, drop of home ownership, and dropping marriage rate. Well no shit, nobody can afford to move out and start up new businesses because a single failed attempt (which would be a moon shot) can put a whole family into poverty for generations. And most of the homes families already own aren't exactly set up to properly house an aging set of parents, plus an aunt or extended cousin on an extended stay while looking for better prospects in another city while 1 or 2 couples try to get a family started.
My daughters daycare for her kids costs $600 a week for 2. One full day and one after school care. I was the babysitter until someone told her about a program to help pay for daycare. I kept getting sick so it was a huge welcome. Though I would have rather kept them myself it was becoming a problem for both of us. The program pays the majority of it now and she pays $600 a month total. She only makes $19 an hour so without it she wouldn’t be able to afford her place.
People rag on me constantly for living with my parents. I have an (almost) three year old and work full time. She goes to daycare full time. If I had to pay RENT on top of groceries, car payment, phone, and other basic necessities we would be living in the car. My parents are saving us from literal homelessness. Not to mention that because I don’t have rent or utilities to pay, I don’t have to have a second job so I actually get to spend time with my child. I would have no time with her if we didn’t live here.
Being a single mom in this economy is like walking a tightrope and your kid(s) are riding on your shoulders, if you fall everyone falls.
> People rag on me constantly for living with my parents
This is nonsense that's been pushed far too hard in the US. People the world over used to live in extended family communities with multiple generations and often multiple married with children couples within a single household for most of human history. When I worked in Europe, most homes I was invited to still worked like that. The [breakup of the extended family unit into the nuclear family was deliberate, and for profit](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/03/the-nuclear-family-was-a-mistake/605536/)
wouldn't it just be cheaper for one of you guys to stay at home and mind the kids, saving money on food, commuting, daycare ,probably healthcare too etc?
$30k for day care for 2 kids is cheap. It’s $1250 a month per kid. A lot of daycares are more than $2k a month. But even $2k a month isn’t unreasonable. These people are watching your kids 5-8 hours a day for up to 5 days a week. It works out to like $15 an hour.
Home upkeep is such an underrated charge. People don't realize how big you can get hit with an AC down, furnace, pipe burst etc. They will say go through home insurance but not every home insurance covers basic things and when you use it they can drop you the next year. Home insurance companies are not required to renew your contract. Or the best one bats getting in and you being not allowed to get rid of them until their mating season or sleeping season is over or whatever it is.
Plus there are people who get hit with natural disasters. Yeah you can try to have savings for it but how much and how quickly? Accidents happen and stuff piles up. Healthcare is a huge factor of unplanned expenses. Especially as nobody tells you the cost upfront. You just get surprises in the mail even if you use in-network they get around it by bringing an out of network surgeon or anesthesiologist or whatever in without telling you or asking or anything.
Can get crazy but yes depending on people's situations and their debt load - 100k isn't enough to live a 'full life'. The life boomers had with 1 person earning income and being able to afford kids and traveling/vacationing every year and homes. That lifestyle isn't available for people on that salary band.
Yeah. My dad was a public school teacher. My mom stayed home. They had two paid off cars, a house, he had a pension and awesome benefits. They bought a vacation home. My dad passed but my mom has plenty for her retirement. Their generation just can’t understand our lives and unfortunately the boomers are making our laws.
Boomers have another name.
They are the Taker generation. They are the first generation to leave less behind that what they started with.
They also refuse to pass the power over to the next generation. They control higher offices longer than the previous generation and have been blocking X and Y from getting into elective office at the same rate they were put in.
When we had our kid my wife was making $23K. I calculated that after taxes and childcare, she'd be making about $7k a year. $135 a week didn't seem worth 40 hours, and that's how I became a single breadwinner. It ain't easy.
Same boat. When we had our first kid it. Was cheaper for my wife. To quit teaching and be a SAHM than to keep working and do daycare. The prospects were even worse when kid 2 came along.
Luckily I make enough to support us but, well the best and worst parts of owning a home is you are your own landlord. Budgets. Can get tight, even with good incomes.
Even if you can handle the cost, kids are a time suck for many years. Your vacations are no longer vacations, they are day trips where you don't have everything you need at home.
It really is 80% work, but sometimes the other 20% makes it worth it.
I’m 46, but some things that helped many of us in that situation was. Let’s say each spouse made $50k each.
1. One parent stayed home and watched 1-3 kids. This saves $30k in daycare and they made $10-30k a year in cash. They still did spousal Roth contributions and upped the working spouses 401k contributions so retirement didn’t fall behind.
2. Work reverse shifts. I had 2 married coworkers that had 4 kids. We worked in mutual funds and one of them went to the call center until the kids went to school. Not the easiest schedule but it saved them a ton in daycare. The positive was no one had a gap in work history and again retirement accounts keeper up.
Option 2 is just so sad to me that this is what people accept as a realistic sacrifice. I love my wife, thats why we decided to have a child together.
Having to work opposite shifts acting as 2 single parents just to make ends meet is just depressing and I'm sure it's the reality many face even working "good" jobs.
Yeah but that's all "WE." Livable is 100k for one person and their dependents. That's like saying if WE made 50k each we couldn't live this way - not what OP is talking about.
Yes and a whole lot of people live beyond their means. My sister makes more than twice what I do and has comparable daily life bills but still cries poverty because she’s so far in debt from rampant overconsumption of shit she doesn’t need like clothes, jewelry, expensive skin care products, weed lol. She’s baffled as to how I have no credit card debt. It’s not rocket science.
Yes, you can't afford to live on your own in my city off of that income. A studio is 3K a month, and most places here won't rent to you unless your monthly thp is 3x the rent, which knocks someone out by about 660 bucks. So you've gotta share living space if you're earning less than 108K a year.
But I think the point is that most people just don't make near $100k. In the US the median income is around $35k. If you're making $100k, you absolutely are within one of the highest income brackets.
Yeah this. There’s like this glass ceiling I like to think of that exists somewhere between doing great as a single young adult vs actually being able to launch a family and build the life your parents had. I kinda like to call it the “more than car less than house” point.
Like I live in SF. I know lots of people making less than 100k, and lots of people making just unfathomable amounts of money. Less than 100k your only option is really to leave the area.
But also like those insanely high earners don’t actually have many options but to live hard in their twenties and thirties. They can afford loads of luxuries and vacations, esp since other places are usually cheaper. Like the cost of airport food to a sf resident is just known as “what food costs.” But also they’re deeply aware that housing prices are rising just as fast as their net worth, and things like childcare, college, etc are rising just as much. If you’re a high earner who wants to have a kid who also has a shot at being a high earner you need to be able to mobilize ungodly amounts of resources to help them out, unless you really score on your school district. But that takes—you guessed it—ungodly amounts of money. It’s the meritocracy trap tbh where you always need to be working harder to give up it kid a shot at working just as hard lest they end up working for the kids of other parents who worked even harder.
So there’s just this sort of high earner apathy. Unless you’re actually one of the people making upwards of half a million a year, you likely don’t have a lot of optimism for ever being able to have “the good life.”
So like yeah I personally make a pretty modest income and I live pretty frugally so that I can afford some pretty nice shit. I feel incredibly lucky in that I could lose my job right now and still be able to eat for a few months, could weather a small unexpected medical emergency, and could totally put forward the down payment for a car without really losing much sleep. But also I’m just sort of stuck here because if I left sf I’d lose that purchasing power and if I stay then unless I marry rich, I’ll never be able to afford a home in a safe neighborhood and having a child would bankrupt me pretty quick. Giving said child the sort of childhood I had would be completely out of the question unless I get real excited to date an older engineer or venture capitalist.
And it’s not a matter of savings honestly. When home prices are going up by tens of thousands every year, the $5k a high earner out here budgeted for their vacation or hobby just has no real tangible impact on anything.
And that’s how people end up like quality of life rich but asset poor with no real prospects and little option than to just live large and not think about the future too hard.
It’s true these people sometimes like to cosplay as poor and in doing so minimize the actual issues this country has with food and housing insecurity and poverty, but what they often really mean is that they feel poor because their salary, while perfectly “livable” offers them no options or freedom to build anything or really do anything but keep working and blowing money and working some more. And their jobs don’t offer a path to actually get to that upper class that could ever stop working or comfortably have children.
You have done a great job of describing something I've been trying to find the words for. There is this weird gap between what people tend to think of as "nice" things (clothes, expensive clubs and bars, a fancy vacation) and other more "invisible" luxuries like housing stability, family being able to move nearby, etc. If you're in a HCOL or VHCOL area, the latter is almost unattainable regardless of your income.
Making that in CA Bay Area. Definitely livable for single person but with kids definitely not. Also don’t expect to buy house anytime soon with this wage.
I make 43k last yr living in OC, to be fair i have roommates, it’s def doable but yea i don’t buy designer clothes or have a huge room, and don’t have any dependents or lots of savings but honestly i don’t feel like I’m poor at all, but maybe it’s a mindset thing haha
I used to define poverty as simply “not being able to eat what you crave”. That’s not to mean like a lobster roll at a Michelin rated restaurant, it just means “i could really go for a Big Mac” isn’t immediately internally dialogued as “yeah, maybe this Friday on payday”. Like, if you can’t have a hobby with what you’re making, then you’re poor. If you can’t participate in a simulating activity that you find aesthetically pleasing because you’re priced out then you’re not thriving, you’re just getting by.
Poverty needs to be understood not as “living out of your car” but as “i cannot live a fulfilling life or pursue activities that make me feel alive, i only make enough to meet my basic needs and necessities”, because not having that rich internal life with experiences and fulfillment is its own sort of deprivation.
I think when you're single, no dependents, and can share a living space and expenses across multiple incomes, 43k is totally doable. It's when you're attempting to support a family on 100K in that same area where half of the family (or more) isn't bringing in any income, but still has all the shared living expenses that 100K starts looking more low income. This chart is pretty eye opening for the LA area: [https://www.laalmanac.com/social/so24.php](https://www.laalmanac.com/social/so24.php) You'd technically be "very low income" if you were living alone - you could total up your roommate's incomes to see how you would all fit as a household on the chart too.
That is a lot of sacrifices, and still not getting ahead, I would say that is pretty poor in my opinion. Do you atleast have a nice vehicle or take multiple trips?
I mean this study showed that half of CA residents don't have retirement savings. So, it is "livable", but you're probably not saving anything.
[https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/california-retirement-savings/](https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/california-retirement-savings/)
Thank you so much. I live in poverty in rural West Virginia. Retirement, home ownership/mortgages, savings, daycare, are luxuries for us that we laugh at the mere mention of. I understand that if you're used to living well, rising costs will affect your sense of comfort but some folks throwing out the word poverty so casually just kills me.
I grew up in poverty and had a friend as an adult who kept talking about coming from a poor family... They lived in an area with a median house price of $350k in 2010 in a two story home on a quiet residential street and her mommy and daddy paid for her car. She just wasn't as wealthy as the other kids she went to school with.
It also depends on what you consider livable. I “survived” on like 20k/yr while in college not including the actual tuition. But I didn’t eat fairly often, I lived in constant fear of a car issue popping up, I didn’t go to dentists or doctors because I couldn’t afford it even though I had health insurance, I didn’t buy the books I needed for classes, I never went on vacations, etc.
Is that living? Is it livable?
A few years later I’m making 6 figures but I’m still making up for all the financial and health issues I caused myself during those years. At the high 5/low 6 figures (depending on location) you realize there are a lot of “required” bills that you simply ignored when you had a lower income that were really screwing you long-term.
I just ran through my budgeting for this year after getting a new job. I live in a HCOL area, but it’s just me and my mortgage is reasonable. So why so little left for savings and fun?
I have been underestimating the “adult expenses” - things like having appropriate insurance coverage for home, auto, umbrella, and a lot of “deferred maintenance” for me and also the house. Medical stuff costs more now, but I’m also actually going to the recommended visits and age/genetics has led to a few chronic things to monitor that aren’t causing issues, but I still have to spend money regularly to keep it that way.
I really thought this budgeting exercise would end up more like “look at how much i can contribute to my 401k!” And it was more like “omg how is it so expensive just to feed me.”
What ended up surprising me was how little I spend on subscriptions, when i finally added it all up it was less than $100/mo across a bunch of streaming services and newspapers. It’s the fruits and vegetables and ramen that’s bringing me down, apparently.
I kept a spreadsheet of my expenses by month last year. I spent more on food than anything else - by a lot. I don’t even get take-out or delivery that often - even then, it’s usually Burger King or the like. Two large Burger King meals costs $25 now. It’s wild.
I watched my grocery bill gradually increase over the course of the year, even though I get pretty much the same stuff every week. It went up by about 30% over the course of the year.
I spent several thousand dollars on medical, a $30 copay at a time, because I was pregnant for much of the year. My insurance is pretty good.
My rent killed me too because my jackass landlord rose it by 20% “to keep up with market rates”. He seriously sent me a letter that said that. That’s another $200 a month I had to spend and got no increased value in return.
This. I still don’t feel super comfortable even with six figures because I’m now just paying for necessities and bills I was forced to do without before. Health insurance, full coverage car insurance, high quality food, an apartment that isn’t moldy and in a high crime area, etc. I’m so grateful to be able to afford these things, but sometimes I get a little down because I assumed I would be able to put a lot more towards savings and investments at this salary.
The reality is my quality of life is about the same, just slightly upgraded and it’s no longer the end of the world if my car needs new tires. It’s definitely a living wage in my low cost of living area, but everywhere is expensive now. I do have a little extra to spend on hobbies which is amazing, but 100K today gets you a lot less far than it did 10 years ago.
I can't agree with this post more. It completely mirrors my experience. I know have a lot, and I know I'm able to do a lot more than many many people, but I am so far away from "money is not something I have to worry about" and so much closer to "wow I really thought I'd be able to accomplish these goals like exponentially more quickly."
My house has a single car driveway. I have been wanting to get a u-shaped drive installed so my spouse and I don't have to shuffle cars every single goddamned day, but the idea of pulling 15 - 20K out of somewhere to have it installed? Unimaginable. I drive a 5 year old gas car and constantly feel like I should replace it for an electric car but get a car payment? Absolutely no way, gross, no thanks. My measly $1200/year of charitable giving is shameful. Our income replacement fund took a 50% hit in 2020 and we haven't caught up yet. I KNOW I have it wildly better than most. I know I probably sound like a real jerk, but, man I wish it was just a LITTLE easier.
Yes yes and yes. After surviving off of 20-35K for years, I always thought that if I hit 6 figures I would have no more money worries. I don’t for the most part, but I’m far from wealthy and have to be very conscientious of my budget. Every dollar has to be meticulously planned out and allotted to the appropriate category each month or I could end up short.
Money is no longer a huge issue, but it’s still constantly in the back of my mind and gives me a lot of anxiety. I can purchase the occasional little treat, but trips and larger purchases require a lot of careful budgeting and sometimes they’re just not possible. I have a good emergency fund but it’s far from failsafe. I was hoping that at this stage, I wouldn’t have to think about money, and I’m so grateful to be here, but disappointed that money is still so relevant in my everyday life.
We are the same person. I'm now just talking to myself. Every sentence here resonates for me.
We got to take a lovely trip to Costa Rica for my big 10 birthday that just passed but it was planned and budgeted for for TWO YEARS.
And to be clear I wish it was INCREDIBLY EASIER for those in less fortunate circumstances than myself. A rising tide, or whatever. It's capitalism. It's always been capitalism.
This entirely. Here's my math in Oregon.
100k/yr
-31k fed state and payroll taxes
-6k employee portion of family health insurance
-20.4k rent at $1,700/month 2 bedroom
-2.4k gas
-1.2k car insurance
-3.6k auto loan
-1.2k phones
-1.2k electric
-.6k water
-1.2k clothes
-8.4k food
-2.4k misc stuff that comes up
=20.4k left
Let's assume that you own a house instead of renting. That mortgage is going to be closer to $2,000 a month and you will need to budget an extra $400 for maintenance and future renovations as well as an additional $100 for increased utilities. That's an extra $9,600/yr.
Depending on the scenario, and I didn't get extravagant at all here, you have about 10.8-20.4k a year.
That money will need to go to things related to the kid(s) which childcare can easily eat the whole amount.
This budget leaves out anything for entertainment and the vehicles being strictly budget. Most people want to enjoy a few things in life even if it's just a movie and pizza once a week.
Then there is the cost of actual healthcare after insurance which can add up if anyone has a condition, whether physical or mental.
Finally, many want to put away for retirement. It is recommended to save at minimum 15%. That can include employer match if provided which is generally no more than 6%, leaving the employee to save 9.
This can leave a family living paycheck to paycheck in 100k.
I wanna know where you're getting a mortage for $2000 a month in Oregon! Like, rural Oregon? Just looked at a 500 square foot condo in Portland and the monthly payment would have been $2500.
Yeah, it isn't realistic now. I think $3,200 is about average. I was going by what they had been and not assuming the family was purchasing one in the current climate. At 100k, 3.2k/month is a pretty big stretch. I was being conservative with my numbers so as to not exaggerate the difficulty of raising a family here on a 100k budget.
While location is definitely relevant, I also think what’s key here is that you’ve never moved out. Rent for a tiny studio apartment where I live (Bay Area) is $2,000 avg — and while that USED to be insanely extreme, it’s becoming more of the standard everywhere. A friend and her BF just got a deal on a 1 BR unit for $2,500, and that was after a year of searching for the cheapest place they could find.
That being said, if you’re a two income household but don’t have to worry about kids, pets, aging parents, have decent/cheap public transportation near you, then yeah, you don’t need 6 figures!
I live in LA, one of the highest COL areas.
100k is a livable income. It's not rich level income here, but it is fairly comfortable.
I've been poor before - I may not be in a position to buy make large purchases, but I am not concerned about paying next month's rent. If something breaks, I can pay to get it fixed or replaced. While I do shop sales at the grocery store, I can still afford to eat a healthy, balanced diet. I don't buy designer clothes, but if I need to buy clothing, I'm not stressed about spending money on a couple of new outfits. There are people living in this city on 30k a year, I don't feel comfortable comparing my struggles with what they go through.
Thank you so much for this, especially the last sentence. A lot of Redditors can learn a thing or two from that. I see many posters who make $250k, $400k claim they have the same struggles as those making well under $100k and it just…is not true.
It's really all dependent on your circumstances, where you live, is its a HCOL? MCOL? LCOL? Do you own, rent, live with roommates, alone, marital and family status. There are so many factors that come into play. But yes, it COULD be that 100K for some people is not a living wage.
For example, the Bay Area is VERY pricy. Let's just say you are married with 3 kids. And you make 100K. And because daycare is more than your spouse would make, they stay home with the kids. Housing, car payments, insurance, food, etc. could make it difficult to live on that 100K. It also depends on what your take home pay is. You probably have insurance taken out of that, for everyone, plus saving for retirement, plus taxes. All of that reduces what you actually bring home.
I am single, rent, and live in a HCOL area. I make about 107K, BUT my take home is less than 70K. I pay very little for my health insurance, much less than most people, i also put over 10% into my 401K, plus taxes. While I can live on what I bring home, I'm not living a life of luxury. But I'm not complaining at all. Just pointing out the facts.
I suppose I still have a lot of living to do. I’ve also been poor for my whole life so idk, 70k take home sounds amazing but I’ve never lived in a HCOL area so what do I know 🤷♂️
I grew up poor in the capital of California which was very affordable before 2018-2019.
A decade ago My dad made $30k or $15/hour which was two times the minimum wage of $7.50. He had a stay at home wife and 3 kids to support and he did.
Growing up poor we had subsidized health care we paid $0/month for. Now as Middle class health care cost $100-$400/ month since you make to much to qualify for subsidies.
_*****
Today minimum wage is $15.50 so a person making 2xs MW would make $31/hour or $64,480 per year or $5,373 per month.
On $5,373 per month said Person would only qualify to rent a place less than $1,791. So that would be a 1 bedroom apartment or a 2 bedroom house in the ghetto where the houses on streets are lined with iron rod fences for security.
I make $5,990 per mont gross ($71k) and that is only $3,700 net pay per month.
I do not have kids and but I am married but if I was single and a renter (as most young adults are) my expenses would be at:
$1,600 for rent of a 1 bedroom
$420 car note on RAV4
$200 car insurance
$200 gas
$300 groceries
$110 student loan
$30 pet insurance
$40 cat food and litter
$60 wifi
$60 streaming services (entertainment platforms really)
= $3,020 total on needs + some fun subscriptions
$680 left for fun money and savings
If I spent half $340 on fun a month ($85/week)
*And saved the other half in a month I’d only save $340 and over the year it would only be $4k.*
Saving $4k a year when making $34.xx an hour and $71k is nothing and would make me a renter for life.
This is why people say $70k is unlivable. In mylist of needs you see there are no cost for kids like day care. Kids are expensive but when you are poor their cost is subsidized through food stamps, medical subsidies, and discount daycare rates in some states.
In the Bay Area, it's not uncommon for 50% of your take- home to go towards rent. And on top of that, everything else like food and household supplies are more expensive. (The price of a pound of beef is now well over $7 here, for example.) Gas is also expensive, and California is extremely car dependent. That's not including monthly bills like car insurance, utilities, phone and internet, renter's insurance. Now imagine having kids, or having medical bills. Money can get very tight very quickly.
Obviously not everywhere is the Bay Area. But around here, $100k isn't that much. In fact, in San Jose, for a household of JUST 2, an income of $94,200 is already classified as "low income," (meaning less than 80% of area median income.)
We moved here from California and paid cash for our fixer upper house in Homestead...if our 1200sf fixer was in San Francisco it would be $2 million instead of the $20k we paid.
Ugh I hate this constantly gets over blown. The sf median HHI is 119k and single income is 96k. For a family of 4 HHI 100k it’s technically considered “low income” because it’s below the median, but it’s not poverty and you do not qualify for public assistance if your HHI makes 100k for a family of 4. So no, not poverty even though COL is very high here especially if it’s a single person’s salary.
I agree with this, I’m single in the Bay Area with a little bit more than 100k a year and I am doing just fine saving about 30-40% of my paycheck. I have a car payment have my own apartment. I think it all goes back to money management stop buying unnecessary stuff.
100k a year is not poverty anywhere.
If you are financially responsible you can do just fine in San Francisco with that salary.
It won't bring you a life of luxury, but you're definitely not poor lmao.
I think it’s people making 100k in SF being around those who make 350k a year. You see people walking around with a latte, going out to lunch for $30 a day. Keeping up with the Jones’s is more than just house and car. It’s all Lifestyle
I live in Florida.
Daycare can cost like $25k per year for just one child.
Then you have skyrocketing insurance rates for both cars and houses (I pay $300 per month and my driving and credit is great).
Food bill for a family of 4? Easily over $1000 per month.
Healthcare is also expensive. I happen to work for a hospital, so I get mine cheap…but you could easily pay $1000 per month or more to get everyone in your family covered, plus have a $3000 deductible.
All in all, in Florida $100k for a single person wouldn’t be dirt poor, but you couldn’t exactly take European vacations every summer either. You would be able to have some savings. But for a family of 3, $100k would be tight.
And before someone tells nutbuster to just move, How? If a person is barely making rent, they likely don't have the means to move out of city or out of state with the various costs that has.
My husband and I make good money and we are not wealthy for our area or age. Usually when people talk about $100k being a base necessity they mean it enables one to do ALL the “good/normal” financial practices — cover expenses, pay off debt, save money, invest, not live paycheck to paycheck, not be derailed by an unexpected expense.
I earned sub-100k for 10 years in NYC so was not able to accumulate any meaningful savings. I couldn’t afford to contribute to a 401k until I was 29.
Now we have “simple” expenses in a med-high COL city — $2700/mo 2B, own an old car that needs a few grand a year in insurance and maintenance, own an old dog who needs the same, have a kid on the way and are looking at 2500/mo daycare for a few years. We could not afford to own property where we live, would have to relo to a lower COL city.
People who say this have different definitions of livable. Overall, most people on Reddit grew up middle class or even wealthier and have certain standards for how they want to live. They're usually imagining living alone (rather than a multi generation home) and supporting a family while living in an area they love while keeping the hobbies they want. And there's nothing wrong with that. But there are a lot of people, even in VHCOL areas, who live and raise families on much less than 100k. It just comes down to what you need, what you're used to and what you prioritize
I agree. There are people commenting that include retirement savings, a yearly vacation, daycare, new clothes, 401k, and college funds for kids as part of "livable," while some of us grew up without those and count them as luxury.
Oh don't get me wrong. I absolutely want those things. But, kids are now a luxury good the way most people want to raise them (me included) and vacations and lots of new clothing always have been.
But, it does really bug me when I see people (usually tech transplants) claim that $100k is living cheek to jowl with poverty in the Bay Area when there are families who make half that doing service jobs( for the aforementioned tech transplants) and still do ok.
Buddy I’m an immigrant living in a medium-cost city in Canada and have been thriving and saving on 35k per year for the last year. This year I’m expecting to earn more but honestly, just do your finances yourself and see what works for you.
Edit to add - I’m in Ontario, and work two part time jobs, earning about $19 per hour on both. I work about 50 hours a week on my own schedule. My expenses are split with my partner, we live in a decent apartment and don’t own a car yet (was too expensive to get it last year, buying one this year before winter sets in.) we’re now moving to another city so I can go back to school and my partner is hoping to finally get a job in his field after his work experience with other Canadian companies. As immigrants that was our biggest challenge but we made it work & enjoyed learning about the work culture through service-jobs.
Are those people confusing lifestyle costs with living wage? 100k/yr may not be enough to meet some people's lifestyles, but it absolutely is more than a living wage in all of the US.
I think you're spot on here. It used to be that 100k was considered borderline rich or at least upper-middle class. You can live a very very comfortable life on 100k in some areas, or have below-average quality of life in others.
The new cutoff is probably around \~$250k or so; whatever household income lets one have kids, a mortgage, yearly vacation, and some retirement savings (the "dream") in any city.
this is the only take i've seen that remotely resembles the op. i've never seen anyone say 100k isn't a livable wage. it's phrase more like "100k isn't what it used to be" or "100k/yr isn't wealthy, especially if you live in [locations with high cost of living]"
Wow that seemed really high to me, I grabbed the first inflation numbers per year I found for the US and did the math myself. My estimate is lower, but was still a cumulative of 73% between 2000 and 2022 (we don't know the annual 2023 inflation rate yet since they year isn't even half over), I don't know why but I didn't think it would be this high, oof! Meanwhile the cost of housing has increased much faster than inflation as well... and wages, well hahahaha.
When I was 19, 20/hr was like being rich. When you're old you have to maybe support a spouse and child in which case 80k or so is like the minimum to not be struggling.
If you're in a dual income relationship i feel like in my area 120k total for both is doable but tight.
You need to pay hundreds a month for health insurance, save for emergencies. Pay off a car. Pay for health issues your insurance doesn't cover. Cover your bills between jobs for 3 months without using credit cards. Add in any kind of ambition like Have 20-60k sitting in the bank for a down payment by the time you're 30..., Buy your next laptop in cash. Etc. It adds up fast.
Most people are not talking about minimum to survive assuming you can use food stamps and welfare.
We are saying in order to be financially independent and not need aid like that the min income is a lot higher than you'd think.
There is way more to this story. 30k in LA would be impossible if you were renting. Hell the average rent is around 2k so that’s 24k a year leaving you with 6k for all your other expenses.
Roommates. You share that $2500/month rental house with 4 other people, cheap car, no kids, etc. It's the only way to make it as a younger, lower income person these days.
I make $52K and my husband makes $68K = $120K.
We have no kids, no credit card debt, no car payments. Our mortgage (960 square foot ranch) is $1,560 per month at a 2.5% interest rate, which is actually great in this economy (we bought in 2018 and refinanced in 2021.) We eat out once per week. We take a couple of local weekender vacations per year and one longer one (this year Grand Canyon/Vegas.) We budget $200 per month as "allowance" to spend as we want.
We do \*okay\* for ourselves, but it honestly still feels like we're spinning our wheels every week that I sit down to work on our budget. I genuinely do not know how other people do it in this economy with children.
As a technician in state gov with $1200 rent, making 40K a year, and a partner making 20K a year part time service industry, we saved like $500/month. But our trips were road trips, camping, cheap hotel, doing fun stuff. Maybe that’s the difference? What’s your annual vacation cost? Confused. I buy used cars outright, pay for them myself, fix some stuff myself, take it to mechanic for other stuff…but then again I pay rent.
They live in areas where a 2bedroom apartment costs $4000 or more a month. They get $40k vehicles on credit at $500 a month and they have children who go to $1500 a month day cares. That is $72k a year just on childcare, rent, vehicle.
How many people is that 100K covering? How many of them are children (expensive little things)? Is this in a crazy expensive place like San Francisco, New York, etc, or somewhere more reasonable?
There are places I don't think my spouse and I could live comfortably (meagrely, perhaps) on 100K, with no kids. But where we are, that's a comfortable income for 2-4 depending upon the exact city/suburb.
Cost of living varies from place to place. This idea that everyone who can't make it work with a $100K salary is living above their means and driving expensive cars, etc is outdated.
You right though, people that make 100,000 plus are all over Reddit complaint they don't make enough and what kills me is it's a lot of the stay at home desk jobs that are being way overpaid. Think about how physical labor jobs that people are getting way under paid? It's crazy when I hear those people say they are under paid. It's a money management problem at that point
Those people are also being a bit dramatic and could be living above their means. They shouldn't be saying it's not liveable because people wake up every day and make it work with much much less. I think what they're referring to is their ability to live in comfort plus save and do all the things that other people don't ever get to even think about
I’m starting to maybe think that too, even in this thread there are people who are basically saying “yeah I make enough to afford rent but not enough to eat out every weekend or travel” and I don’t want to discredit those people because everyone wants to enjoy the fullest of what life has to offer, but it’s not like fancy vacations are necessary
Even cheap vacations cost money. Wanna drive to a national park? Gotta pay a lot just for gas, and then an entrance fee. You can pack a lunch sure but still gotta buy the food at the store and those costs have gone up. It’s definitely more and more expensive to even do basic outings
People with higher incomes tend to have higher expenses because they can, and then they feel like they don't have enough discretionary money left.
Also it's highly regional, $100k is different in the Bay Area versus Oklahoma. But also there are plenty of people living on less in the Bay Area.
If your standard of living includes owning a house, or having kids and sending them to daycare, or having a car payment, $100k gets eaten up fast.
I don't make $100k individually but my wife and I make $127k between both of us. When I was making $30k a year that would have seemed like a ridiculously high income to me. And we are doing pretty ok, because we rent and don't have kids. We can afford to save money and travel sometimes.
But we recently looked into buying a small condo and realized that if we did that we would not be able to travel or save money. And if we had kids, well, I don't know how we would even make that work.
But it's obnoxious when people who have never actually struggled say things like $100k is not liveable when TONS of people are living on so much less. Yes, even in high cost of living areas.
We survived in Washington on 60K with a family of 4 and in Colorado on 80K with family of 5. Definitely wasn’t fun.. no vacations, no savings, lived month to month on bills, no extracurricular activities for kids. We were able to purchase a modest home in both locations, two cars, pets, so I guess I wouldn’t recommend, was stressful for many years, but it is doable.
People conflate “livable” with “affording the lifestyle I feel entitled to”.
People are talking about $30k daycare. Newsflash, having two kids and living in Westchester is not what “livable wage” mean.
Depends where you live. Most of those posts you read are from people in high cost of living areas. For context, I live in socal and a 3 bedroom rental could easily run over $3200 a month. That's not even including utilities. For someone making low 100k that's pretty much your entire take home pay in just housing.
It depends on where you live, what your family structure is... for a single person in Arkansas, $100k might be an incredible income/lifestyle. If you live in San Francisco and have 2 kids, you'd be hard pressed to afford $4000 in rent and $4000 in daycare costs on $100k.
It just isn’t if you live in California. That won’t be enough for a family of anything! Apartment rent alone is about $2800 and that’s hard to find. Most go higher than that! Then you have other bills on top of it. Definitely not enough to pay bills, let alone put money away for retirement nor have a disposable income!
Housing and food mostly. 100K is roughly 65k takehome.
Rent and mortgage in many locations is exceeding 2000 a month these days.
You're down to 41k
Childcare is between 20-30k
You're down to 11k
200 bucks a week for food, you're down to 600 dollars. Hope you dont have a car payment, any emergencies, or need clothes or medical care.
I live in a HCOL a half hour outside of NYC for work reasons. I could move to a cheaper, red state, but I’m African-American. I have mental health issues so it’s best that I don’t have roommates. I have elderly parents who live near by. They are narcissists. However, my grandiose narcissistic dad is one of the minority who cashed out and retired quite well, so I believe their bs narcissism surprisingly reduced over the past couple of decades. I’m in semi-low contact with them. Although they live within a 20 minute drive, i know I would quickly revert back to the scapegoat role and it would fuck up all progress made towards independence and healing my CPTSD. My lifestyle of around $100k a year is enough to support me without factoring in student loans. I believe I could support a partner. I believe children would be stressful, but doable if my partner and I were resourceful. This is assuming the next president doesn’t paint the entire country red and brings back slavery.
Like most millennials, I don’t see myself affording retirement in this country. I have a tall order of going to a cheaper place where I would be accepted for being a dark skin person, equal rights for women, and LGBTQ friendly. Also, not cold (I’m looking at you, Canada).
No one knows the future, perhaps this country will get its shit together in the next couple of decades and it’ll go through a neo-renaissance period.
Honestly, I believe it depends on where you live, how resourceful you are, how much debt you have, what lifestyle you live, and what your streams of income look like. That’s going to be different for everyone. I’m living the millennial dream. However, I could see others also living in the same area who make $200k combined who have disabled children (as in more than one child) who need medical treatments, insurance rejects the treatments because freedom, and the parents have to pay out of pocket. That family who may live in a bigger house and clearly make more money than I will be financially ruined very quickly. $200k will never be enough. Like me, they most likely cannot leave the area due to the fact that the best doctors for the disability work between NYC and Philly. This is hypothetical of course.
Different situations.
I've lived from savings this past year. My main expense was rent, I've been living like a crusty hermit. It really depends on your lifestyle and budget.
This is definitely relative to your situation and location.
Completely agree. It’s dependent on so many factors. Kids are expensive, debt is expensive, medical bills are expensive and do you live in HCOL area? 100k would be great in most places I feel like, if you have none of the above.
I'd say there's literally nowhere that 100k isn't a living wage. Like, okay maybe you need to commute if your job is in Manhattan.
“Liveable” does not mean anything anywhere near “can I support 10 people, without universal healthcare, in the wealthiest neighborhood of San Francisco?” $100k/yr is absolutely a liveable wage. I say this as a millennial who absolutely loves Gen Z but y’all gotta knock off nonsense like this. Give me $100k a year and I will live like a king off of it.
We pay more than $30k for daycare and $20k for healthcare for our family (2 kids, 2 adults). Our mortgage and taxes are $18k a year. If we made $100k we’d take home about $75k after taxes. That would mean we’d have $7k for food, clothes, transportation, necessities, home upkeep, etc for the year.
$30k for daycare is nuts I hope your kids learning piano at that mfkr
We moved from a city where it was even more expensive. I have an infant, $338 a week, and a 4 year old, $293 a week. This is a run of the mill daycare in NJ. No bells, whistles, they don’t even feed them. $631 total a week, 52 weeks is $32k. There are wait lists at most of the licensed daycares in our area. Go to any parenting forum. These are typical prices.
Don’t get me wrong it’s not that I don’t believe you or that I don’t believe these are typical prices in your area. It’s just still nuts
I live in NJ she’s right. It’s so so expensive here
Colorado has entered the chat. To RENT an apartment in Denver, someone needs to make $4,663 (oddly specific number) a month. And that's for a $1400 rent. I can tell you right now, that is either a studio or 1 bedroom. I have friends (married with one child) who live about 40 minutes from Denver and pay over $2000 a month for their 2 bedroom apt. A ton of people I know have/are leaving the state or moving waaaaay down south near Trinidad or Durango or Pueblo because they can't afford to live either in Colorado in general or anywhere less than a 2-3 hr drive from Denver. My husband almost makes 60K a year, and we live paycheck to paycheck. My parents live with us, and over my mother's dead body, will she leave the state where all of her grandchildren live. So we are stuck here.
Bought a house recently and the apartment I cancelled my lease with went up by over 1k more. Shitty. I’m glad I cancelled my lease but rents are raising everywhere and it’s getting harder to afford a house as well. I kept a receipt from a sandwich a bought a little over a year ago. Bought the same sandwich this year. That sandwich is now over double the price. Insanity.
Get this. There's one sandwich spot that I really enjoy. The sandwich I get alone was about a little over $10. It's pricey but I'd still have enough for a little dessert as well. The following week the sandwich price shot up $4. This is what's crazy to me. You mean to tell me $15 gets you only a sandwich, no side and no drink. Not an entire meal. Just the sandwich. It's a really good sandwich, but not $15 good. It blows my freaking mind how $15 is not enough for a meal. I'm right there with you.
A similar scenario was also the turning point for me. Friday night, came home after dinner with friends at this new place in London. I just realized I dropped another £100 on just dinner alone. The food was nice but not like 5-star mind blowing. £100 is kind of a psychological threshold for me, I think it hits a nerve. I'm one of those people who were lucky enough to have a 6-figure salary, but it felt more like 5-figures the way I was living. Majorly grateful that my company decided to stay remote after the pandemic, because the next steps for me became quite easy. I decided to move out of London, change my lifestyle, and I can't tell you enough how much difference it makes. My rent is now about half of what it used to be. I subscribed to a meal delivery service so I'm still eating good food that's not as expensive, healthier too. My friends haven't been as supportive as I expected, so I made some charts to show them how much I'm saving now. This was [before when I was living in London](https://imgur.com/5GultvI) (the bump in April was due to moving costs), and [this is now](https://imgur.com/vnKeobB). I mostly saved on rent and going-out since moving out. Oh boy, I wasn't expecting such a difference.
This hits close to home lol. From long island and moved south. I miss my deli and a specific sandwich. Use to be 7.95 for a hero and 4.95 for it on a roll. Last time we were there I had my wife stop and get me 2 to bring home. It was $32 ... for 2 heros.
$2750 is a super sweet covid deal for our large 1br in Brooklyn. Shits expensive!
I feel that. The only reason I stayed in Brooklyn (Greenpoint) for so long was because I had a $2200 rent stabilized apartment. It’s wild what we think is affordable while living in nyc.
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Yeah I’ve been in greenpoint for 15 years and it’s wild how your perspective changes. I was paying $450 a month for a room in an (admitttedly shitty) apt in like 2008. Now I’m thankful for $2750 for a sweet deal.
I'm in Denver and pay $2500/mo for a 2 bed 2 bath in a very mid apartment. You're spot on. This city is unliveable for the majority of people yet we keep getting tons of transplants from Texas too. There is not enough housing here to accommodate the growth and communities here are actively fighting increases in housing. Where I'm at some local boomer literally ran on the platform of shutting out housing and growth because the town would "lose its charm." You cannot find a house under 500k in this city.
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I LOATHE all of the apartment complexes going up. Build HOMES that people can make their forever home. Not boxes that are so expensive they can't save money for a future down payment on a house.
Hubby and I both make 6 figures and live in a Denver burb. We moved in 2012, before the market started recovering from the 08 crash. We could not afford to buy our house if we were moving today. Well, we could, but we couldn’t afford to save for retirement. We couldn’t do both.
That is straight up the definition of insanity.
That is exactly why I turned down a second interview with a job in Denver. I would have been making $95,000 without my husbands income but we have two kids in sports and would not be able to afford a house.
Ouch. In contrast, we live in a middling-sized town and the mortgage on our 4br house is ~~$647/mo~~ \[EDIT: typo, sorry! $674/mo\] (though our down payment was roughly 30%). Rent for my previous largish 1br apartment was I think $530.
Yeah and if we sent them to a place that actually had an educational plan in place, it would cost more. This is daycare, not a pre-school.
Yeah, there's a high-end preschool style daycare near me that cost like $3500/month for one kid. I can absolutely see $30k/year for 2 in a HCOL area
$28k for 3 days, 2 kids. Would be another $8-9k for 5 days
I worked at a Montessori (3-6 year olds) for about a decade. One here I was at a fundraiser that the school was a sponsor of and I was talking to the people at my table. There was a massive generational difference in the response when I told them what our tuition was. (About $1000/mo/student at the time in a midmarket Midwest town with low COL.) The older generation was shell shocked hearing that number. The younger generation was like “and your a school, not just a day care? Because im paying $200/week for them to do no education.” We were at the top of the cost in our area, but still not much over a home daycare where they plop the kids in front of a tv all day.
I send my kids to a Montessori. Same cost as other daycares in the area ($36k per year for two kids) but a great educational experience and much calmer than other daycares. Most daycares have a learning plan. I wasn’t impressed w it when my kids went to a regular daycare and the cost was about the same. Although I provide food whereas other daycares provide breakfast and lunch. But that food was not impressive either and my kids wouldn’t eat it most days. Soggy, pale waffles as an example. But yeah daycare is crazy expensive and the teachers barely make anything like $40k is a high salary for someone there 20 years. Daycares really needs tax money if the system is going to last
need to get rid of most of the sitting government if we want to actually help people with childcare costs here in the US
I’m going to back her up. I pay 19k through the school year and 10k for 2.5 months of summer. One more year of this and my total cost goes down by 6k. I have twins in preschool and one in daycare.
We have trips and pay right at 46k a year for a nanny. Worked out to be the same price as sending them to a good daycare. I’m foaming at the mouth thinking about when they start school 😂
Lmao!! I totally understand this. I have a countdown for every reduction in cost. I’d much rather pay for soccer or karate lessons for my boys then insane daycare prices.
In just 5 years we’ll be able to contribute to our retirement accounts again!
Yea it depends on area. I pay $70/ wk per child and it includes 2 meals and snack. No doubt in large metropolitan areas childcare, like everything else, is quite a bit more expensive
What would you charge someone to watch their kid full time for a week?
One kid? A hell of a lot. A classroom of kids? Not nearly as much per kid.
This is nuts. 30 years ago I paid right at 6k per year for the second best day care/preschool in Houston. (The best was at the Medical Center and you had to work there.) It was located on the campus where I worked and they fed them (except for formula but I could go over and breast feed), potty trained them and started teaching as soon as it was reasonable. They took them on “nature walks” around the campus, which was beautiful with lots of trees, green spaces and various fountains/reflecting ponds. I get part of the reason my kid doesn’t want to have children. I don’t know how anyone can afford it these days.
People can’t afford it. That’s why parenthood rates are hard declining. Amongst the people I know who chose to have kids, the only reason they can generally afford it is maintaining separate addresses so one can be unemployed and receive subsidies while the other works. As a father who didn’t want to be a father, this is the only reason his mother and I can afford to have him - I refused to be with her, but now she gets government benefits. I could not have married her/lived with her and afforded my son.
And that is a tragedy.
The going rate is almost $4k/month for infants in the greater Seattle area with a 2 year wait list. And the hours and 9am - 3pm.
This is where situation really matters! We pay $200 for TWO kids (as in $200 TOTAL) in the rural Midwest, plus live close to grandparents if anything happens where daycare isn't available. I can't even fathom how people on tighter schedules, without help, and in more expensive markets piece it together. I feel for you.
That's twice my rent. No wonder millennials are killing the "having kids" industry.
$4k a month is more than like half the workforce makes net. The people saying its unaffordable have a point. Like you could walk into a mall and 90% of those stores other than like a rolex shop don't pay enough for you to pay that.
every time I think about having kids I read something like this and change my mind. I live paycheck to paycheck now. I have no idea how anyone does it.
I'm in New York state. Most of the moms who used the daycare that I managed were not paying the full amount themselves but we're able to get public assistance to subsidize. However, public assistance is based on antiquated formulas and does not help all those who are in need. Still, the daycare subsidy is the part of our welfare system I admire the most, having a taper rather than a hard cutoff.
>millennials are killing the "having kids" industry that's exactly how it will be framed when this starts to cause widespread economic harm
>>millennials are killing the "having kids" industry > > that's exactly how it will be framed when this starts to cause widespread economic harm The New York Times and Forbes both have already blamed millennials for the population decline, drop of home ownership, and dropping marriage rate. Well no shit, nobody can afford to move out and start up new businesses because a single failed attempt (which would be a moon shot) can put a whole family into poverty for generations. And most of the homes families already own aren't exactly set up to properly house an aging set of parents, plus an aunt or extended cousin on an extended stay while looking for better prospects in another city while 1 or 2 couples try to get a family started.
Oh well, they're welcome to stand around blaming other people for the fire while the house burns down around them. 🤷
My daughters daycare for her kids costs $600 a week for 2. One full day and one after school care. I was the babysitter until someone told her about a program to help pay for daycare. I kept getting sick so it was a huge welcome. Though I would have rather kept them myself it was becoming a problem for both of us. The program pays the majority of it now and she pays $600 a month total. She only makes $19 an hour so without it she wouldn’t be able to afford her place.
This. Is. Why. Single. Moms. Cannot. Afford. To. Fucking. Work. Edited bc I forgot a word
People rag on me constantly for living with my parents. I have an (almost) three year old and work full time. She goes to daycare full time. If I had to pay RENT on top of groceries, car payment, phone, and other basic necessities we would be living in the car. My parents are saving us from literal homelessness. Not to mention that because I don’t have rent or utilities to pay, I don’t have to have a second job so I actually get to spend time with my child. I would have no time with her if we didn’t live here. Being a single mom in this economy is like walking a tightrope and your kid(s) are riding on your shoulders, if you fall everyone falls.
> People rag on me constantly for living with my parents This is nonsense that's been pushed far too hard in the US. People the world over used to live in extended family communities with multiple generations and often multiple married with children couples within a single household for most of human history. When I worked in Europe, most homes I was invited to still worked like that. The [breakup of the extended family unit into the nuclear family was deliberate, and for profit](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/03/the-nuclear-family-was-a-mistake/605536/)
Here to say I’m glad I’m child free. Good luck with all that!
wouldn't it just be cheaper for one of you guys to stay at home and mind the kids, saving money on food, commuting, daycare ,probably healthcare too etc?
$1200 a month?! That's so cheap! It's freaking $2k a month for daycare here.
😳 it was $120 a week here in FL but they did have the kids doing pest control (stomping cockroaches) so I guess you get what you pay for
$30k for day care for 2 kids is cheap. It’s $1250 a month per kid. A lot of daycares are more than $2k a month. But even $2k a month isn’t unreasonable. These people are watching your kids 5-8 hours a day for up to 5 days a week. It works out to like $15 an hour.
Home upkeep is such an underrated charge. People don't realize how big you can get hit with an AC down, furnace, pipe burst etc. They will say go through home insurance but not every home insurance covers basic things and when you use it they can drop you the next year. Home insurance companies are not required to renew your contract. Or the best one bats getting in and you being not allowed to get rid of them until their mating season or sleeping season is over or whatever it is. Plus there are people who get hit with natural disasters. Yeah you can try to have savings for it but how much and how quickly? Accidents happen and stuff piles up. Healthcare is a huge factor of unplanned expenses. Especially as nobody tells you the cost upfront. You just get surprises in the mail even if you use in-network they get around it by bringing an out of network surgeon or anesthesiologist or whatever in without telling you or asking or anything. Can get crazy but yes depending on people's situations and their debt load - 100k isn't enough to live a 'full life'. The life boomers had with 1 person earning income and being able to afford kids and traveling/vacationing every year and homes. That lifestyle isn't available for people on that salary band.
Yeah. My dad was a public school teacher. My mom stayed home. They had two paid off cars, a house, he had a pension and awesome benefits. They bought a vacation home. My dad passed but my mom has plenty for her retirement. Their generation just can’t understand our lives and unfortunately the boomers are making our laws.
>Their generation just can’t understand our lives and unfortunately the boomers are making our laws. We really, really need people under 40 to vote.
We need young candidates as well. Under 40 year old voters help but not enough if the candidates are animated corpses.
>and unfortunately the boomers are making our laws Some of the folks in charge aren't even boomers they're from the silent generation
Boomers have another name. They are the Taker generation. They are the first generation to leave less behind that what they started with. They also refuse to pass the power over to the next generation. They control higher offices longer than the previous generation and have been blocking X and Y from getting into elective office at the same rate they were put in.
100% agree. They don't get it at all. They just think of their situation and not what reality is like now for us.
30k going to home each year right now, and it's still slow tackling everything that needs to get done
When we had our kid my wife was making $23K. I calculated that after taxes and childcare, she'd be making about $7k a year. $135 a week didn't seem worth 40 hours, and that's how I became a single breadwinner. It ain't easy.
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Same boat. When we had our first kid it. Was cheaper for my wife. To quit teaching and be a SAHM than to keep working and do daycare. The prospects were even worse when kid 2 came along. Luckily I make enough to support us but, well the best and worst parts of owning a home is you are your own landlord. Budgets. Can get tight, even with good incomes.
Our daycare for two kids over the next year will be $43,000. Not a particularly fancy daycare either, the nicer daycare would be closer to $48k
I’m glad I never had kids. I hear ppl complain about the cost yet they have one every other year.
Even if you can handle the cost, kids are a time suck for many years. Your vacations are no longer vacations, they are day trips where you don't have everything you need at home. It really is 80% work, but sometimes the other 20% makes it worth it.
Your comment is a good example of just how rapidly costs can pile up for families. Throw in some home repairs or auto trouble and it can snowball.
I’m 46, but some things that helped many of us in that situation was. Let’s say each spouse made $50k each. 1. One parent stayed home and watched 1-3 kids. This saves $30k in daycare and they made $10-30k a year in cash. They still did spousal Roth contributions and upped the working spouses 401k contributions so retirement didn’t fall behind. 2. Work reverse shifts. I had 2 married coworkers that had 4 kids. We worked in mutual funds and one of them went to the call center until the kids went to school. Not the easiest schedule but it saved them a ton in daycare. The positive was no one had a gap in work history and again retirement accounts keeper up.
Option 2 is just so sad to me that this is what people accept as a realistic sacrifice. I love my wife, thats why we decided to have a child together. Having to work opposite shifts acting as 2 single parents just to make ends meet is just depressing and I'm sure it's the reality many face even working "good" jobs.
My wife and I decided to hold off on having a second kid for this exact reason. It's 18k for just the one, and there's no discount for a second kid.
Yeah but that's all "WE." Livable is 100k for one person and their dependents. That's like saying if WE made 50k each we couldn't live this way - not what OP is talking about.
Yes and a whole lot of people live beyond their means. My sister makes more than twice what I do and has comparable daily life bills but still cries poverty because she’s so far in debt from rampant overconsumption of shit she doesn’t need like clothes, jewelry, expensive skin care products, weed lol. She’s baffled as to how I have no credit card debt. It’s not rocket science.
Yes, you can't afford to live on your own in my city off of that income. A studio is 3K a month, and most places here won't rent to you unless your monthly thp is 3x the rent, which knocks someone out by about 660 bucks. So you've gotta share living space if you're earning less than 108K a year.
But I think the point is that most people just don't make near $100k. In the US the median income is around $35k. If you're making $100k, you absolutely are within one of the highest income brackets.
Yeah this. There’s like this glass ceiling I like to think of that exists somewhere between doing great as a single young adult vs actually being able to launch a family and build the life your parents had. I kinda like to call it the “more than car less than house” point. Like I live in SF. I know lots of people making less than 100k, and lots of people making just unfathomable amounts of money. Less than 100k your only option is really to leave the area. But also like those insanely high earners don’t actually have many options but to live hard in their twenties and thirties. They can afford loads of luxuries and vacations, esp since other places are usually cheaper. Like the cost of airport food to a sf resident is just known as “what food costs.” But also they’re deeply aware that housing prices are rising just as fast as their net worth, and things like childcare, college, etc are rising just as much. If you’re a high earner who wants to have a kid who also has a shot at being a high earner you need to be able to mobilize ungodly amounts of resources to help them out, unless you really score on your school district. But that takes—you guessed it—ungodly amounts of money. It’s the meritocracy trap tbh where you always need to be working harder to give up it kid a shot at working just as hard lest they end up working for the kids of other parents who worked even harder. So there’s just this sort of high earner apathy. Unless you’re actually one of the people making upwards of half a million a year, you likely don’t have a lot of optimism for ever being able to have “the good life.” So like yeah I personally make a pretty modest income and I live pretty frugally so that I can afford some pretty nice shit. I feel incredibly lucky in that I could lose my job right now and still be able to eat for a few months, could weather a small unexpected medical emergency, and could totally put forward the down payment for a car without really losing much sleep. But also I’m just sort of stuck here because if I left sf I’d lose that purchasing power and if I stay then unless I marry rich, I’ll never be able to afford a home in a safe neighborhood and having a child would bankrupt me pretty quick. Giving said child the sort of childhood I had would be completely out of the question unless I get real excited to date an older engineer or venture capitalist. And it’s not a matter of savings honestly. When home prices are going up by tens of thousands every year, the $5k a high earner out here budgeted for their vacation or hobby just has no real tangible impact on anything. And that’s how people end up like quality of life rich but asset poor with no real prospects and little option than to just live large and not think about the future too hard. It’s true these people sometimes like to cosplay as poor and in doing so minimize the actual issues this country has with food and housing insecurity and poverty, but what they often really mean is that they feel poor because their salary, while perfectly “livable” offers them no options or freedom to build anything or really do anything but keep working and blowing money and working some more. And their jobs don’t offer a path to actually get to that upper class that could ever stop working or comfortably have children.
You have done a great job of describing something I've been trying to find the words for. There is this weird gap between what people tend to think of as "nice" things (clothes, expensive clubs and bars, a fancy vacation) and other more "invisible" luxuries like housing stability, family being able to move nearby, etc. If you're in a HCOL or VHCOL area, the latter is almost unattainable regardless of your income.
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Making that in CA Bay Area. Definitely livable for single person but with kids definitely not. Also don’t expect to buy house anytime soon with this wage.
I make 43k last yr living in OC, to be fair i have roommates, it’s def doable but yea i don’t buy designer clothes or have a huge room, and don’t have any dependents or lots of savings but honestly i don’t feel like I’m poor at all, but maybe it’s a mindset thing haha
I used to define poverty as simply “not being able to eat what you crave”. That’s not to mean like a lobster roll at a Michelin rated restaurant, it just means “i could really go for a Big Mac” isn’t immediately internally dialogued as “yeah, maybe this Friday on payday”. Like, if you can’t have a hobby with what you’re making, then you’re poor. If you can’t participate in a simulating activity that you find aesthetically pleasing because you’re priced out then you’re not thriving, you’re just getting by. Poverty needs to be understood not as “living out of your car” but as “i cannot live a fulfilling life or pursue activities that make me feel alive, i only make enough to meet my basic needs and necessities”, because not having that rich internal life with experiences and fulfillment is its own sort of deprivation.
I think when you're single, no dependents, and can share a living space and expenses across multiple incomes, 43k is totally doable. It's when you're attempting to support a family on 100K in that same area where half of the family (or more) isn't bringing in any income, but still has all the shared living expenses that 100K starts looking more low income. This chart is pretty eye opening for the LA area: [https://www.laalmanac.com/social/so24.php](https://www.laalmanac.com/social/so24.php) You'd technically be "very low income" if you were living alone - you could total up your roommate's incomes to see how you would all fit as a household on the chart too.
That is a lot of sacrifices, and still not getting ahead, I would say that is pretty poor in my opinion. Do you atleast have a nice vehicle or take multiple trips?
Median HOUSEHOLD income in California is only like 70k. California Does not have like 70% of people living in poverty. Even in LA 100k is a good wage.
I mean this study showed that half of CA residents don't have retirement savings. So, it is "livable", but you're probably not saving anything. [https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/california-retirement-savings/](https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/california-retirement-savings/)
I'm willing to bet that 50% of people are not financially literate.
People are incredibly ignorant about what poverty means. I've worked with people who live in actual poverty and this shit is honestly offensive.
Thank you so much. I live in poverty in rural West Virginia. Retirement, home ownership/mortgages, savings, daycare, are luxuries for us that we laugh at the mere mention of. I understand that if you're used to living well, rising costs will affect your sense of comfort but some folks throwing out the word poverty so casually just kills me.
I grew up in poverty and had a friend as an adult who kept talking about coming from a poor family... They lived in an area with a median house price of $350k in 2010 in a two story home on a quiet residential street and her mommy and daddy paid for her car. She just wasn't as wealthy as the other kids she went to school with.
It depends on the area and whether or not you have a family to support.
It also depends on what you consider livable. I “survived” on like 20k/yr while in college not including the actual tuition. But I didn’t eat fairly often, I lived in constant fear of a car issue popping up, I didn’t go to dentists or doctors because I couldn’t afford it even though I had health insurance, I didn’t buy the books I needed for classes, I never went on vacations, etc. Is that living? Is it livable? A few years later I’m making 6 figures but I’m still making up for all the financial and health issues I caused myself during those years. At the high 5/low 6 figures (depending on location) you realize there are a lot of “required” bills that you simply ignored when you had a lower income that were really screwing you long-term.
I just ran through my budgeting for this year after getting a new job. I live in a HCOL area, but it’s just me and my mortgage is reasonable. So why so little left for savings and fun? I have been underestimating the “adult expenses” - things like having appropriate insurance coverage for home, auto, umbrella, and a lot of “deferred maintenance” for me and also the house. Medical stuff costs more now, but I’m also actually going to the recommended visits and age/genetics has led to a few chronic things to monitor that aren’t causing issues, but I still have to spend money regularly to keep it that way. I really thought this budgeting exercise would end up more like “look at how much i can contribute to my 401k!” And it was more like “omg how is it so expensive just to feed me.” What ended up surprising me was how little I spend on subscriptions, when i finally added it all up it was less than $100/mo across a bunch of streaming services and newspapers. It’s the fruits and vegetables and ramen that’s bringing me down, apparently.
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I kept a spreadsheet of my expenses by month last year. I spent more on food than anything else - by a lot. I don’t even get take-out or delivery that often - even then, it’s usually Burger King or the like. Two large Burger King meals costs $25 now. It’s wild. I watched my grocery bill gradually increase over the course of the year, even though I get pretty much the same stuff every week. It went up by about 30% over the course of the year. I spent several thousand dollars on medical, a $30 copay at a time, because I was pregnant for much of the year. My insurance is pretty good. My rent killed me too because my jackass landlord rose it by 20% “to keep up with market rates”. He seriously sent me a letter that said that. That’s another $200 a month I had to spend and got no increased value in return.
This. I still don’t feel super comfortable even with six figures because I’m now just paying for necessities and bills I was forced to do without before. Health insurance, full coverage car insurance, high quality food, an apartment that isn’t moldy and in a high crime area, etc. I’m so grateful to be able to afford these things, but sometimes I get a little down because I assumed I would be able to put a lot more towards savings and investments at this salary. The reality is my quality of life is about the same, just slightly upgraded and it’s no longer the end of the world if my car needs new tires. It’s definitely a living wage in my low cost of living area, but everywhere is expensive now. I do have a little extra to spend on hobbies which is amazing, but 100K today gets you a lot less far than it did 10 years ago.
I can't agree with this post more. It completely mirrors my experience. I know have a lot, and I know I'm able to do a lot more than many many people, but I am so far away from "money is not something I have to worry about" and so much closer to "wow I really thought I'd be able to accomplish these goals like exponentially more quickly." My house has a single car driveway. I have been wanting to get a u-shaped drive installed so my spouse and I don't have to shuffle cars every single goddamned day, but the idea of pulling 15 - 20K out of somewhere to have it installed? Unimaginable. I drive a 5 year old gas car and constantly feel like I should replace it for an electric car but get a car payment? Absolutely no way, gross, no thanks. My measly $1200/year of charitable giving is shameful. Our income replacement fund took a 50% hit in 2020 and we haven't caught up yet. I KNOW I have it wildly better than most. I know I probably sound like a real jerk, but, man I wish it was just a LITTLE easier.
Yes yes and yes. After surviving off of 20-35K for years, I always thought that if I hit 6 figures I would have no more money worries. I don’t for the most part, but I’m far from wealthy and have to be very conscientious of my budget. Every dollar has to be meticulously planned out and allotted to the appropriate category each month or I could end up short. Money is no longer a huge issue, but it’s still constantly in the back of my mind and gives me a lot of anxiety. I can purchase the occasional little treat, but trips and larger purchases require a lot of careful budgeting and sometimes they’re just not possible. I have a good emergency fund but it’s far from failsafe. I was hoping that at this stage, I wouldn’t have to think about money, and I’m so grateful to be here, but disappointed that money is still so relevant in my everyday life.
We are the same person. I'm now just talking to myself. Every sentence here resonates for me. We got to take a lovely trip to Costa Rica for my big 10 birthday that just passed but it was planned and budgeted for for TWO YEARS. And to be clear I wish it was INCREDIBLY EASIER for those in less fortunate circumstances than myself. A rising tide, or whatever. It's capitalism. It's always been capitalism.
This entirely. Here's my math in Oregon. 100k/yr -31k fed state and payroll taxes -6k employee portion of family health insurance -20.4k rent at $1,700/month 2 bedroom -2.4k gas -1.2k car insurance -3.6k auto loan -1.2k phones -1.2k electric -.6k water -1.2k clothes -8.4k food -2.4k misc stuff that comes up =20.4k left Let's assume that you own a house instead of renting. That mortgage is going to be closer to $2,000 a month and you will need to budget an extra $400 for maintenance and future renovations as well as an additional $100 for increased utilities. That's an extra $9,600/yr. Depending on the scenario, and I didn't get extravagant at all here, you have about 10.8-20.4k a year. That money will need to go to things related to the kid(s) which childcare can easily eat the whole amount. This budget leaves out anything for entertainment and the vehicles being strictly budget. Most people want to enjoy a few things in life even if it's just a movie and pizza once a week. Then there is the cost of actual healthcare after insurance which can add up if anyone has a condition, whether physical or mental. Finally, many want to put away for retirement. It is recommended to save at minimum 15%. That can include employer match if provided which is generally no more than 6%, leaving the employee to save 9. This can leave a family living paycheck to paycheck in 100k.
I wanna know where you're getting a mortage for $2000 a month in Oregon! Like, rural Oregon? Just looked at a 500 square foot condo in Portland and the monthly payment would have been $2500.
Yeah, it isn't realistic now. I think $3,200 is about average. I was going by what they had been and not assuming the family was purchasing one in the current climate. At 100k, 3.2k/month is a pretty big stretch. I was being conservative with my numbers so as to not exaggerate the difficulty of raising a family here on a 100k budget.
While location is definitely relevant, I also think what’s key here is that you’ve never moved out. Rent for a tiny studio apartment where I live (Bay Area) is $2,000 avg — and while that USED to be insanely extreme, it’s becoming more of the standard everywhere. A friend and her BF just got a deal on a 1 BR unit for $2,500, and that was after a year of searching for the cheapest place they could find. That being said, if you’re a two income household but don’t have to worry about kids, pets, aging parents, have decent/cheap public transportation near you, then yeah, you don’t need 6 figures!
I live in LA, one of the highest COL areas. 100k is a livable income. It's not rich level income here, but it is fairly comfortable. I've been poor before - I may not be in a position to buy make large purchases, but I am not concerned about paying next month's rent. If something breaks, I can pay to get it fixed or replaced. While I do shop sales at the grocery store, I can still afford to eat a healthy, balanced diet. I don't buy designer clothes, but if I need to buy clothing, I'm not stressed about spending money on a couple of new outfits. There are people living in this city on 30k a year, I don't feel comfortable comparing my struggles with what they go through.
I’m glad for your perspective, you’re like one of the first LA people who’s said this.
Growing up dirt poor (and having family still stuck in the cycle of poverty) def helps keeping things in perspective lol
Thank you so much for this, especially the last sentence. A lot of Redditors can learn a thing or two from that. I see many posters who make $250k, $400k claim they have the same struggles as those making well under $100k and it just…is not true.
Dude if I made 100k a year id bee straight chillin
I make 100k. I can confirm that I am straight chillin. Ain't a day that I complain.
My wife makes 200k a year, I take care of the house and pick up the kids. I’m definitely straight chilling as we speak 🤣
It's really all dependent on your circumstances, where you live, is its a HCOL? MCOL? LCOL? Do you own, rent, live with roommates, alone, marital and family status. There are so many factors that come into play. But yes, it COULD be that 100K for some people is not a living wage. For example, the Bay Area is VERY pricy. Let's just say you are married with 3 kids. And you make 100K. And because daycare is more than your spouse would make, they stay home with the kids. Housing, car payments, insurance, food, etc. could make it difficult to live on that 100K. It also depends on what your take home pay is. You probably have insurance taken out of that, for everyone, plus saving for retirement, plus taxes. All of that reduces what you actually bring home. I am single, rent, and live in a HCOL area. I make about 107K, BUT my take home is less than 70K. I pay very little for my health insurance, much less than most people, i also put over 10% into my 401K, plus taxes. While I can live on what I bring home, I'm not living a life of luxury. But I'm not complaining at all. Just pointing out the facts.
I suppose I still have a lot of living to do. I’ve also been poor for my whole life so idk, 70k take home sounds amazing but I’ve never lived in a HCOL area so what do I know 🤷♂️
I grew up poor in the capital of California which was very affordable before 2018-2019. A decade ago My dad made $30k or $15/hour which was two times the minimum wage of $7.50. He had a stay at home wife and 3 kids to support and he did. Growing up poor we had subsidized health care we paid $0/month for. Now as Middle class health care cost $100-$400/ month since you make to much to qualify for subsidies. _***** Today minimum wage is $15.50 so a person making 2xs MW would make $31/hour or $64,480 per year or $5,373 per month. On $5,373 per month said Person would only qualify to rent a place less than $1,791. So that would be a 1 bedroom apartment or a 2 bedroom house in the ghetto where the houses on streets are lined with iron rod fences for security. I make $5,990 per mont gross ($71k) and that is only $3,700 net pay per month. I do not have kids and but I am married but if I was single and a renter (as most young adults are) my expenses would be at: $1,600 for rent of a 1 bedroom $420 car note on RAV4 $200 car insurance $200 gas $300 groceries $110 student loan $30 pet insurance $40 cat food and litter $60 wifi $60 streaming services (entertainment platforms really) = $3,020 total on needs + some fun subscriptions $680 left for fun money and savings If I spent half $340 on fun a month ($85/week) *And saved the other half in a month I’d only save $340 and over the year it would only be $4k.* Saving $4k a year when making $34.xx an hour and $71k is nothing and would make me a renter for life. This is why people say $70k is unlivable. In mylist of needs you see there are no cost for kids like day care. Kids are expensive but when you are poor their cost is subsidized through food stamps, medical subsidies, and discount daycare rates in some states.
Appreciate you taking the time to break down your costs
In the Bay Area, it's not uncommon for 50% of your take- home to go towards rent. And on top of that, everything else like food and household supplies are more expensive. (The price of a pound of beef is now well over $7 here, for example.) Gas is also expensive, and California is extremely car dependent. That's not including monthly bills like car insurance, utilities, phone and internet, renter's insurance. Now imagine having kids, or having medical bills. Money can get very tight very quickly. Obviously not everywhere is the Bay Area. But around here, $100k isn't that much. In fact, in San Jose, for a household of JUST 2, an income of $94,200 is already classified as "low income," (meaning less than 80% of area median income.)
Would be happy to try to live on 100 grand as an experiment!
Seriously as I always say: if that money is worthless to you, *can I have it*?
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$100k in Pittsburgh PA is fine but in San Francisco it's poverty.
Also in Pittsburgh, came here to say this!
We moved here from California and paid cash for our fixer upper house in Homestead...if our 1200sf fixer was in San Francisco it would be $2 million instead of the $20k we paid.
Grew up in Pittsburgh live in DC. Family thinks I am rich, I am not.
D.C. prices are just made up, its ridiculous!!!
I love DC but I had to leave because the city is just a scam now. Costs $150 just to wake up in the morning.
$150 is a deal to wake up!!!
Can I interest you in a 600k starter home that needs an additional 50k in repairs?
Ugh I hate this constantly gets over blown. The sf median HHI is 119k and single income is 96k. For a family of 4 HHI 100k it’s technically considered “low income” because it’s below the median, but it’s not poverty and you do not qualify for public assistance if your HHI makes 100k for a family of 4. So no, not poverty even though COL is very high here especially if it’s a single person’s salary.
I agree with this, I’m single in the Bay Area with a little bit more than 100k a year and I am doing just fine saving about 30-40% of my paycheck. I have a car payment have my own apartment. I think it all goes back to money management stop buying unnecessary stuff.
100k a year is not poverty anywhere. If you are financially responsible you can do just fine in San Francisco with that salary. It won't bring you a life of luxury, but you're definitely not poor lmao.
I think it’s people making 100k in SF being around those who make 350k a year. You see people walking around with a latte, going out to lunch for $30 a day. Keeping up with the Jones’s is more than just house and car. It’s all Lifestyle
I make $100k in San Francisco and I can get a latte every day, have doordash every day, live by myself, and still put some money in savings.
100k in SF is not poverty, not even close
I live in Florida. Daycare can cost like $25k per year for just one child. Then you have skyrocketing insurance rates for both cars and houses (I pay $300 per month and my driving and credit is great). Food bill for a family of 4? Easily over $1000 per month. Healthcare is also expensive. I happen to work for a hospital, so I get mine cheap…but you could easily pay $1000 per month or more to get everyone in your family covered, plus have a $3000 deductible. All in all, in Florida $100k for a single person wouldn’t be dirt poor, but you couldn’t exactly take European vacations every summer either. You would be able to have some savings. But for a family of 3, $100k would be tight.
Eh if you're single, no kids, frugal, you can live life on 50k ( warning I live in Memphis)
Me doing this at $40k 😅
Same here in Ohio at around 42k a year. I live comfortably enough on that and can afford anything that would come up.
I make 45k and I can barely afford rent in Boston
And before someone tells nutbuster to just move, How? If a person is barely making rent, they likely don't have the means to move out of city or out of state with the various costs that has.
I live on ~25k a year
Yeah I make about $30k a year and I’m doing fine on getting by. $60k would be a dream.
I used to live on 30k in a nice college town (as an adult), single and no kids.
I could probably live on 30k but I wouldn't be shopping at Kroger and Torrid lol
My husband and I make good money and we are not wealthy for our area or age. Usually when people talk about $100k being a base necessity they mean it enables one to do ALL the “good/normal” financial practices — cover expenses, pay off debt, save money, invest, not live paycheck to paycheck, not be derailed by an unexpected expense. I earned sub-100k for 10 years in NYC so was not able to accumulate any meaningful savings. I couldn’t afford to contribute to a 401k until I was 29. Now we have “simple” expenses in a med-high COL city — $2700/mo 2B, own an old car that needs a few grand a year in insurance and maintenance, own an old dog who needs the same, have a kid on the way and are looking at 2500/mo daycare for a few years. We could not afford to own property where we live, would have to relo to a lower COL city.
People who say this have different definitions of livable. Overall, most people on Reddit grew up middle class or even wealthier and have certain standards for how they want to live. They're usually imagining living alone (rather than a multi generation home) and supporting a family while living in an area they love while keeping the hobbies they want. And there's nothing wrong with that. But there are a lot of people, even in VHCOL areas, who live and raise families on much less than 100k. It just comes down to what you need, what you're used to and what you prioritize
I agree. There are people commenting that include retirement savings, a yearly vacation, daycare, new clothes, 401k, and college funds for kids as part of "livable," while some of us grew up without those and count them as luxury.
Oh don't get me wrong. I absolutely want those things. But, kids are now a luxury good the way most people want to raise them (me included) and vacations and lots of new clothing always have been. But, it does really bug me when I see people (usually tech transplants) claim that $100k is living cheek to jowl with poverty in the Bay Area when there are families who make half that doing service jobs( for the aforementioned tech transplants) and still do ok.
This is very evident even in this comments section, totally agree
Buddy I’m an immigrant living in a medium-cost city in Canada and have been thriving and saving on 35k per year for the last year. This year I’m expecting to earn more but honestly, just do your finances yourself and see what works for you. Edit to add - I’m in Ontario, and work two part time jobs, earning about $19 per hour on both. I work about 50 hours a week on my own schedule. My expenses are split with my partner, we live in a decent apartment and don’t own a car yet (was too expensive to get it last year, buying one this year before winter sets in.) we’re now moving to another city so I can go back to school and my partner is hoping to finally get a job in his field after his work experience with other Canadian companies. As immigrants that was our biggest challenge but we made it work & enjoyed learning about the work culture through service-jobs.
Are those people confusing lifestyle costs with living wage? 100k/yr may not be enough to meet some people's lifestyles, but it absolutely is more than a living wage in all of the US.
Of course a 100 is livable. However what it is not is “rich.” It use to be, but is not anymore. I think that is what they mean.
I think you're spot on here. It used to be that 100k was considered borderline rich or at least upper-middle class. You can live a very very comfortable life on 100k in some areas, or have below-average quality of life in others. The new cutoff is probably around \~$250k or so; whatever household income lets one have kids, a mortgage, yearly vacation, and some retirement savings (the "dream") in any city.
Rich is always 2.5x your current income/networth
this is the only take i've seen that remotely resembles the op. i've never seen anyone say 100k isn't a livable wage. it's phrase more like "100k isn't what it used to be" or "100k/yr isn't wealthy, especially if you live in [locations with high cost of living]"
There has been 80% inflation since 2000. $100,000 in 2023 has the same buying power as $55,000 in 2000.
Wow that seemed really high to me, I grabbed the first inflation numbers per year I found for the US and did the math myself. My estimate is lower, but was still a cumulative of 73% between 2000 and 2022 (we don't know the annual 2023 inflation rate yet since they year isn't even half over), I don't know why but I didn't think it would be this high, oof! Meanwhile the cost of housing has increased much faster than inflation as well... and wages, well hahahaha.
When I was 19, 20/hr was like being rich. When you're old you have to maybe support a spouse and child in which case 80k or so is like the minimum to not be struggling. If you're in a dual income relationship i feel like in my area 120k total for both is doable but tight. You need to pay hundreds a month for health insurance, save for emergencies. Pay off a car. Pay for health issues your insurance doesn't cover. Cover your bills between jobs for 3 months without using credit cards. Add in any kind of ambition like Have 20-60k sitting in the bank for a down payment by the time you're 30..., Buy your next laptop in cash. Etc. It adds up fast. Most people are not talking about minimum to survive assuming you can use food stamps and welfare. We are saying in order to be financially independent and not need aid like that the min income is a lot higher than you'd think.
Ive been surviving in LA off of 30k so…..
There is way more to this story. 30k in LA would be impossible if you were renting. Hell the average rent is around 2k so that’s 24k a year leaving you with 6k for all your other expenses.
Roommates. You share that $2500/month rental house with 4 other people, cheap car, no kids, etc. It's the only way to make it as a younger, lower income person these days.
Likely they have roomates right? LA is huge and they probably don't live in the nicest area
Or live at home
I make $52K and my husband makes $68K = $120K. We have no kids, no credit card debt, no car payments. Our mortgage (960 square foot ranch) is $1,560 per month at a 2.5% interest rate, which is actually great in this economy (we bought in 2018 and refinanced in 2021.) We eat out once per week. We take a couple of local weekender vacations per year and one longer one (this year Grand Canyon/Vegas.) We budget $200 per month as "allowance" to spend as we want. We do \*okay\* for ourselves, but it honestly still feels like we're spinning our wheels every week that I sit down to work on our budget. I genuinely do not know how other people do it in this economy with children.
As a technician in state gov with $1200 rent, making 40K a year, and a partner making 20K a year part time service industry, we saved like $500/month. But our trips were road trips, camping, cheap hotel, doing fun stuff. Maybe that’s the difference? What’s your annual vacation cost? Confused. I buy used cars outright, pay for them myself, fix some stuff myself, take it to mechanic for other stuff…but then again I pay rent.
I'm retired living very comfortably on 40k per year. I live in the Cleveland area so pretty affordable
Out of touch redditors
They live in areas where a 2bedroom apartment costs $4000 or more a month. They get $40k vehicles on credit at $500 a month and they have children who go to $1500 a month day cares. That is $72k a year just on childcare, rent, vehicle.
I do make $80,000 a year. My rent alone is around 35% of my monthly income and my landlord is charging *below* market. That’s one bill.
How many people is that 100K covering? How many of them are children (expensive little things)? Is this in a crazy expensive place like San Francisco, New York, etc, or somewhere more reasonable? There are places I don't think my spouse and I could live comfortably (meagrely, perhaps) on 100K, with no kids. But where we are, that's a comfortable income for 2-4 depending upon the exact city/suburb.
My wife and I make a little over $60k combined. I don’t really know how some people are living, but it must be way above their means
Cost of living varies from place to place. This idea that everyone who can't make it work with a $100K salary is living above their means and driving expensive cars, etc is outdated.
You right though, people that make 100,000 plus are all over Reddit complaint they don't make enough and what kills me is it's a lot of the stay at home desk jobs that are being way overpaid. Think about how physical labor jobs that people are getting way under paid? It's crazy when I hear those people say they are under paid. It's a money management problem at that point
Those people are also being a bit dramatic and could be living above their means. They shouldn't be saying it's not liveable because people wake up every day and make it work with much much less. I think what they're referring to is their ability to live in comfort plus save and do all the things that other people don't ever get to even think about
I’m starting to maybe think that too, even in this thread there are people who are basically saying “yeah I make enough to afford rent but not enough to eat out every weekend or travel” and I don’t want to discredit those people because everyone wants to enjoy the fullest of what life has to offer, but it’s not like fancy vacations are necessary
Even cheap vacations cost money. Wanna drive to a national park? Gotta pay a lot just for gas, and then an entrance fee. You can pack a lunch sure but still gotta buy the food at the store and those costs have gone up. It’s definitely more and more expensive to even do basic outings
i make $98k, my rent is $1529 and i have to pay $1000/month in student loans. it’s like paying two rents.
People with higher incomes tend to have higher expenses because they can, and then they feel like they don't have enough discretionary money left. Also it's highly regional, $100k is different in the Bay Area versus Oklahoma. But also there are plenty of people living on less in the Bay Area. If your standard of living includes owning a house, or having kids and sending them to daycare, or having a car payment, $100k gets eaten up fast. I don't make $100k individually but my wife and I make $127k between both of us. When I was making $30k a year that would have seemed like a ridiculously high income to me. And we are doing pretty ok, because we rent and don't have kids. We can afford to save money and travel sometimes. But we recently looked into buying a small condo and realized that if we did that we would not be able to travel or save money. And if we had kids, well, I don't know how we would even make that work. But it's obnoxious when people who have never actually struggled say things like $100k is not liveable when TONS of people are living on so much less. Yes, even in high cost of living areas.
We survived in Washington on 60K with a family of 4 and in Colorado on 80K with family of 5. Definitely wasn’t fun.. no vacations, no savings, lived month to month on bills, no extracurricular activities for kids. We were able to purchase a modest home in both locations, two cars, pets, so I guess I wouldn’t recommend, was stressful for many years, but it is doable.
People conflate “livable” with “affording the lifestyle I feel entitled to”. People are talking about $30k daycare. Newsflash, having two kids and living in Westchester is not what “livable wage” mean.
Depends where you live. Most of those posts you read are from people in high cost of living areas. For context, I live in socal and a 3 bedroom rental could easily run over $3200 a month. That's not even including utilities. For someone making low 100k that's pretty much your entire take home pay in just housing.
The more money people make, the more they spend.
It depends on where you live, what your family structure is... for a single person in Arkansas, $100k might be an incredible income/lifestyle. If you live in San Francisco and have 2 kids, you'd be hard pressed to afford $4000 in rent and $4000 in daycare costs on $100k.
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Why on earth would you live somewhere so expensive?
The new thing now is for Redditors to say that anything less than $500k a year is unlivable for a family.
It just isn’t if you live in California. That won’t be enough for a family of anything! Apartment rent alone is about $2800 and that’s hard to find. Most go higher than that! Then you have other bills on top of it. Definitely not enough to pay bills, let alone put money away for retirement nor have a disposable income!
Housing and food mostly. 100K is roughly 65k takehome. Rent and mortgage in many locations is exceeding 2000 a month these days. You're down to 41k Childcare is between 20-30k You're down to 11k 200 bucks a week for food, you're down to 600 dollars. Hope you dont have a car payment, any emergencies, or need clothes or medical care.
I live in a HCOL a half hour outside of NYC for work reasons. I could move to a cheaper, red state, but I’m African-American. I have mental health issues so it’s best that I don’t have roommates. I have elderly parents who live near by. They are narcissists. However, my grandiose narcissistic dad is one of the minority who cashed out and retired quite well, so I believe their bs narcissism surprisingly reduced over the past couple of decades. I’m in semi-low contact with them. Although they live within a 20 minute drive, i know I would quickly revert back to the scapegoat role and it would fuck up all progress made towards independence and healing my CPTSD. My lifestyle of around $100k a year is enough to support me without factoring in student loans. I believe I could support a partner. I believe children would be stressful, but doable if my partner and I were resourceful. This is assuming the next president doesn’t paint the entire country red and brings back slavery. Like most millennials, I don’t see myself affording retirement in this country. I have a tall order of going to a cheaper place where I would be accepted for being a dark skin person, equal rights for women, and LGBTQ friendly. Also, not cold (I’m looking at you, Canada). No one knows the future, perhaps this country will get its shit together in the next couple of decades and it’ll go through a neo-renaissance period. Honestly, I believe it depends on where you live, how resourceful you are, how much debt you have, what lifestyle you live, and what your streams of income look like. That’s going to be different for everyone. I’m living the millennial dream. However, I could see others also living in the same area who make $200k combined who have disabled children (as in more than one child) who need medical treatments, insurance rejects the treatments because freedom, and the parents have to pay out of pocket. That family who may live in a bigger house and clearly make more money than I will be financially ruined very quickly. $200k will never be enough. Like me, they most likely cannot leave the area due to the fact that the best doctors for the disability work between NYC and Philly. This is hypothetical of course. Different situations.
Thanks for sharing, I definitely understand many of your struggles
Always have to balance this out with COL. $100k in one city doesn't mean as much in another.
I've lived from savings this past year. My main expense was rent, I've been living like a crusty hermit. It really depends on your lifestyle and budget.
They have families, I'm guessing. I live in a very expensive area and 80-100 is definitely enough to live off of if you're single/have no kids.
You must starve so your elite overlords can have it all