Families in the top five most expensive U.S. states require an annual income exceeding $270,000 to live comfortably.This visualization illustrates the income necessary for two working adults with two children to maintain a comfortable lifestyle in each state.“Comfortable” is defined as the income needed to cover a 50/30/20 budget, with 50% allocated to necessities like housing and utilities, 30% to discretionary spending, and 20% to savings or investments.The calculations for family income needed in each state were done by SmartAsset, using the cost of necessities sourced from the MIT Living Wage Calculator, last updated on Feb. 14, 2024.
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252 sats \ 4 replies \ @kepford 23 May
Calling BS. These numbers are stupid high.
I'll say this. Cost of living varies greatly as does income depending on where you live in most states so breaking down by state can really skew things like this.
Another point. A few years ago I dove head first into trying to compare MY cost of living in various places in the US. What I learned is that most of these sites that provide comparisons are off in key areas. There are far to many factors. Which city or county you live in, your income, and fees/taxes that these sites seem to overlook.
Don't trust, verify. The data is out there. If you really want to know you need to do your own homework. Things like electricity tariffs, different fees for car licenses, auto insurance rates, gas prices, availability of natural gas, property taxes vs property prices. Make a spreadsheet and start getting your hands dirty.
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10 sats \ 3 replies \ @kepford 23 May
When I say stupid high I mean double what I would guess. This(source) seems like it is either lazy or clickbait. Maybe both.
In general most sites that do this kind of stuff are sus to me.
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12 sats \ 2 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
Just to confirm my understanding, you're saying that an average annual income of $135k is enough to live in California with a wife and two kids on a 50/30/20 budget? I agree that the term "comfortable" is subjective, but are the numbers that different from your perception?
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford 23 May
I mean I'd argue the numbers are off in other states too. I know plenty of people that live very well in some of the other states. I just think articles like these get attention. Don't get me wrong, it is getting harder to survive but I don't think inflating stats is the answer.
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford 23 May
Depending on WHERE in the state and other factors like how large your home is... yes. Unless I'm missing something with the budget. It would be tight with that budget but It would be closer to 130 than 277. The problem is that most people in California live in SoCal or SF area and those areas for sure are in that range.
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31 sats \ 1 reply \ @grayruby 23 May
These numbers seem very high.
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20 sats \ 0 replies \ @Hamstr 24 May
Agreed. Something doesn't look right.
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31 sats \ 14 replies \ @Undisciplined 23 May
That's preposterous.
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21 sats \ 13 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
At first I thought so too, but then I looked into what they consider to be comfortable.
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52 sats \ 12 replies \ @Undisciplined 23 May
That's the part that's preposterous.
At the risk of doxxing myself, I live in one of those places and make quite a bit less than the amount supposedly needed to live comfortably.
We're so abundantly comfortable, that we're considering downsizing a bit in order to gain a bit more land-use freedom.
This just reeks of what a bunch of whiny entitled narcists Americans have become.
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52 sats \ 10 replies \ @grayruby 23 May
Person who created this definitely lives in NY and goes out to dinner 7 times a week and spends 4k a month on rent for a 500sqft apartment.
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50 sats \ 9 replies \ @Undisciplined 23 May
It's so insane. We're the richest people in the history of the world and yet somehow only the top 10% of us are even comfortable.
How did this word even come into being, if it describes something that basically never existed until very recent history?
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71 sats \ 7 replies \ @kepford 23 May
My thoughts exactly @Undisciplined and @grayruby.
Due to the free market, technology advancement, and more human freedom for more people we live very well. Even the poor in the US have it better than the poor during the great depression.
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122 sats \ 6 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
Is this source more in line with reality?
This map does not include discretionary spending or savings/investments (50%).
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71 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford 23 May
I mean it seems to be more aligned with my experience.
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98 sats \ 4 replies \ @Undisciplined 23 May
Yeah, those numbers match my intuition much better.
There are a lot of different things going on:
One of which is that people don't have homothetic preferences, meaning we don't need as large a share of discretionary spending as our budgets increase.
Another is that many people have benefits through their jobs that provide savings and supplement other costs, so the first graph is doing some double counting.
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41 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford 24 May
Good point.
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
🤐
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26 sats \ 2 replies \ @Satosora 23 May
These numbers are way off.
125% of the poverty line is 39k for 4 people.
These numbers can make you live comfortably, but it isnt very reasonable.
On a side note, I have always wanted to move to vermont because of its green mountains. lol
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11 sats \ 1 reply \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
All the disagreement with these figures has to do with the definition of comfortable.
Can you explain it better?
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @Satosora 23 May
100% is $32k
Usually a family can survive on that.
If two people are working, its even easier.
I dont know their definition of comfortable.
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26 sats \ 1 reply \ @TheWildHustle 23 May
My state is in the top ten most expensive...
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Hamstr 25 May
My thing isn't even listed
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32 sats \ 0 replies \ @hodlpleb 23 May
I think the "2 kids & 2 working adults" throws the whole thing off. My wife does not "have a job", which I believe saves us money because she is generally available to handle the endless other things that come up in our life - scheduling appointments, shuttling kids, managing the household, buying groceries - which then leaves us with more family time, etc.
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21 sats \ 2 replies \ @cryotosensei 23 May
No wonder so many Americans live from pay cheque to pay cheque. The bar is set so high!
My wife and I definitely don’t command such an annual income, not even for the cheapest state. Yet we are considered middle class in Singapore
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @kilianbuhn 23 May
"paycheck to paycheck" is a shit metric because it doesn't differentiate between poor people and the financially irresponsible.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
In America, everything is big
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16 sats \ 2 replies \ @kilianbuhn 23 May
lmfao the doordash generation 🤣
People need to talk more with their parents/grandparents and how they grew up as children. And they turned out fine.
Doesn't ofc mean one shouldn't strive for more. And ofc "comfortable" isn't just scraping by. But jfc the audacity 😂
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16 sats \ 1 reply \ @kepford 23 May
Yeah, I'd be curious how they define "comfortable". I can tell you, where I live very few have these salaries and most seem pretty comfortable to me.
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
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21 sats \ 0 replies \ @Athena 24 May
Needs vary person to person, so these numbers are little bit high.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Hamstr 24 May
Damn, These numbers are too high. Guess I'll live next to the dumpster.
It makes more sense for Americans families to live abroad and renounce.
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0 sats \ 2 replies \ @DEADBEEF 23 May
I don’t even make enough to live comfortably in the lowest state. I question these numbers.
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @0xbitcoiner OP 23 May
Do you live a "comfortable" life as defined by the study (50/30/20 budget)?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DEADBEEF 23 May
No I don’t. But in my state it says I should be making almost twice what I actually am to live comfortably. I feel the squeeze every paycheck but not by that much.
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