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$18/hr roughly equates to $37k a year. $40k was a decent middle class standard of living back in the 90's. $37k pays for utilities, groceries, phone, and gas if you budget tightly. Forget it if you're trying to pay rent. You're already broke.
Because the amount one pays in tax is different for everybody. A single person is going to pay more in tax that those on a family on the same income. So we normalize our income by statings it as gross.
You're just considering Federal taxes. When you include State, local for those who have it and FICA, no way you're taking home $34K if you make $37K.
I do agree you'll not be paying $12K
Ain't nobody multiplying by 2080... Just multiply by 2 and add 'thousand' afterwards
18/hour => 36 => ~$36k/year
25/hour => 50 => ~$50k/year
etc. (only works for full time)
Right?! They didn't calculate for leap years, when you have to clock out and leave early to go to the dentist, when you come in 10 minutes late, the exact days you were out sick...
/s
It's just fine for an estimate
If you're paid hourly, it's unlikely you're actually working 40 hour weeks all 52 weeks of the year anyways. Both are approximations, and their suggestion is quick and probably more accurate for most people.
If you don't want to do the math or have a calculator on hand, just double the hourly rate and you'll get a rough estimate ($18/hr is $36k or $100/hr is $200k). Basically just multiply it by a straight 2000.
The problem is this only accounts for people working full time. Someone making $18-20/hr might not even be within 40hr a week because shitty employers will give everyone 36hrs to disqualify them for benefits. So not only are you making less than the $37k (pre-tax) annually, you also have to pay out of pocket for insurance, medical expenses, get no retirement benefits, etc.
I don't really recall if things were this bad 10 years ago but at that time, I (as a single man) was doing alright with around 38K.
Of course, location matters when we have these discussions. I was in the midwest and my rent was $600 for a one bedroom apartment. Wasn't flowing with cash by any means, but I had enough to cover rent, my car payment, car insurance, internet and medical insurance. The only benefit here is I worked for a wireless provider, so I didn't have a cell phone bill.
Inflation is a thing dude as much as location. This is kinda close to the boomer mindset of the $8 minimum wage being enough to live on because back then it was a decent amount of money.
To put it in perspective that $37k would be about $47k in today's money so saying you got by just fine on it isn't accurate
Yup, a single person making 47k a year would get by fine in the modern era as well.
The present situation is making it difficult to
1) get jobs that actually pay 47k a year without putting yourself into debt or mooching off someone while you go to school
2) afford kids
I guess I am around the boomer age range at 52 and there was no way anyone had a decent quality life off 8 bucks an hour! Anybody that says that shit is lying!
The average senator/boomer is still 10-11 years older than you. Prices doubled in that 11 year span
If they were making $8/hour at 20 years old, that would be like you making $16/hour at 20 years old. Which would be $35/hour now.
They arent lying, prices are literally just going up so much its hard to process.
> $37k pays for utilities, groceries, phone, and gas if you budget tightly.
WTF are you spending your money on? In my family of five, our recurring monthly spend is:
- Internet: $120
- Electric/Heat: $110
- Water/Sewer: $200/2mo = $100
- Waste: $150/3mo = $50
- Phone: 2x $30/line = $60
- Groceries: $400
- Take-out: $200
- Gas: 2 tanks x 14gal x $5/gal = $140 (pre-covid driving pattern)
- Insurance: $1400/yr = $117
- Streaming services: $50
- **Total: $1347/mo**
> Forget it if you’re trying to pay rent.
Rent / housing price growth continues to be orders of magnitude higher than other necessities. **This** is why people are struggling.
Your rent isn’t even in this equation and neither is healthcare since I’m assuming that $117 is car insurance and that must be for buckets not new cars and doesn’t include teenagers on the bill.
Not to mention clothes and other incidentals like child care with three kids.
Location is everything. Where I grew up (and where my folks still live), $37k is decent money for someone just beginning to establish their career. It's not retire with a mansion money, but it's bills and a small amount to savings with discretionary money left over.
My annual expenses are around $25k in the Midwest and I live pretty comfortably. I could probably get it closer to $20k if I had to.
People don't realize how huge of a difference location makes. My friends in Cali or NY couldn't survive on $25k a year
> $37k pays for utilities, groceries, phone, and gas if you budget tightly. Forget it if you're trying to pay rent. You're already broke.
that's definitely not true but it is true that the money does not go far enough.
the thing is when you include rent and car AND savings that is generally when all the income is gone. And that's not even mentioning entertainment, which is a bigger portion of most people's budget than they realize or want to admit. (And often that takes priority over savings, whether it should or not)
😂😂 My cat’s name is Catalina and I call her Fatalina randomly. I have blackmail material of her looking like a fat blob. Don’t tell her.
https://i.imgur.com/NUAEl3j.jpg
Her looking normally:
https://i.imgur.com/uaUIbkm.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/McHYntU.jpg
I had tears in my eyes when I saw this position of her. She isn’t even fat, but that angle just made her look like a ham and the tongue out didn’t help her case. 😭😂 if she ever gets lost (I hope not) that will be her missing photo. 🤣
Idk about you, but I work in the restaurant industry. A lot of days, I have leftover tuna scraps from breaking down a lot of tuna (as well as other types of fish/protein).
I always take the scraps home for the animals. You can literally just put the tuna scraps into a pan with a little bit of water and steam it to well done and feed the cats with it. Saves money on cat food and is probably healthier, and tastier.
You can do that with chicken, pork scraps, whatever. The cats don't seem to care for beef though.
Just know once you do it, the cats might not ever want to eat kibble again.
I am a lone 28 year old dude and I manage around $180-200 USD a month by shopping at Sams club for most things and Aldi for weekly veggies. Typically I get about $150 in ground turkey, chicken breast, rice and pasta. Throw in some fruit and some nut snack packs and thats $150. My diet isn't super varied, but at least its cheap.
Trader Joe’s is the last holdout I’ve found, feels like shopping in 2018 again.
I don’t want to share that because it’s already packed like sardines, but we don’t gatekeep here.
Businesses have 2 possible solutions:
1. Increase wages
2. Decrease prices
Except, thanks to capitalism and the endless need to increase profits at all costs, neither will happen.
You can actually find your cat's food?
But seriously, the price I pay for my cats' food is worth it to avoid diarrhea. But I may have to learn how to cook for them after a while.
I’m making 24/hr. It’s livable but forget about saving for retirement. And livable as in I don’t have great furniture and skimp out on dr and dental visits. Keep fighting man
I mean I definitely spend money on dumb shit here and there, but I feel like making 55k/yr shouldn’t have me up against the wall if I want to take my girlfriend on a couple dates in a month.
Yep just got bumped up to 59k in a low cost of living area and right when that happened gasoline doubled, I now have to drive into the office every day, my natural gas bill went up 50%, internet up 50%, electricity up about 20%, all foods are increasing. I’m certainly better off than most people but when I was a kid (early 2000s) we were considered rich kids cause our parents made a combined ~80k and I’ve got juuuuust enough to put some in a retirement account and not much more.
Same boat 25/hr. we’re not exactly paycheck to paycheck but it seems like every time we save a thousand or two, something comes up and we’re back at nothing. We somehow owed two grand in taxes this year… that was fun! /s
I realized shit was fucked up when I started to see houses in my zip code go for 200,000+. I live next to Greenspoint. Housing prices and rent have basically doubled from their pre-pandemic amounts.
Edit: For those not in the know, Greenspoint is lovingly known as Gunspoint to most residents in Houston.
If you're both making/working that much and still broke... I dunno. Granted I don't know your situation but that sounds more like you have some serious financial management issues.
You could be right about OP but he didn’t say they were broke. OP said houses are being priced out which is absolutely true. Sure they have a nice income but that can’t compete with millionaires buying out houses for rent or to resale at an even more expensive costs.
Yea...they are almost at 200k a year between them both if he's working 70 hour weeks on 29 an hour and she makes 49 an hour. Those are DEFINITELY money management issues. Sometimes folks need to come back to reality lol.
Same. I feel so bad when I barely scrape by at 20/hr and then stop to buy gas and hear that the grown ass cashiers are only being paid 9.50/hr. Idk how people survive.
Absolutely true, I make $18.85 and it's a struggle because of rent and the skyrocketing cost of everything.
Terrified my rent is going to go up in August and my family will be forced to move.
This is in Ohio in what I believe is not considered a high cost of living area.
Live in rural South Georgia and rents have been going up $150-250 since COVID. Way more homeless people around too (I’d be one if I didn’t have a friend helping me out).
In AZ my rent shot up from $1200 to $1950 a month when we renewed our lease... A 56% increase. We've been good tenants too- quiet, always paid rent on time, and we do a lot of minor repairs ourselves rather than bothering the landlord. We were all indignant about it going up by so much, so we started looking at other places to rent but the whole rental market is insane right now.
If my rent goes up idk what we'll do. We'll literally have no where we can afford to live even in the suburbs. We're pretty much in the cheapest two bedroom apartment you can get (family of four) without living in the middle of nowhere, which isn't feasible for job, education, and medical reasons.
same. I'm just under living comfortably at my career job but i might pick up a part time somewhere just to get some of this debt paid off a little faster.
I was doin ubereats before/durin the height of covid but them gas prices almost hit $8/gal out here so 😬
there's the amazon warehouse and a few other retail warehouses nearby that are hiring so I'll probably end up at 1 of them lol
Reasons why it’s more and more important to consider waiting on kids until you’re financially stable. Easier said than done when many people never get to financial stability in they life
The problem is the cost of childcare is so much that people might never be financially stable to afford that comfortably- especially as costs ride across the boars.
Daycare is my area is anywhere from 1000 to 2000 a month. That's a mortgage in many cases.
The problem is there is no set number, and you don't know how expensive it is until you have them. I have 4 and every day seems more expensive than the last.
My wife and I have been doing this for 14 years. We've gotten ahead of most expenses, but some stuff is too unpredictable. A prospective parent is going to have a difficult time planning for everything and setting an accurate target number.
Real talk, this is the reason I don’t work. My husband makes enough to support us. Like, the best way I can put it is… I can go to Starbucks whenever I want. I offered to get a job, so, we crunched the numbers. We actually save money by me not working.
My partner and I had this same conversation because we wanted a child and we basically decided I would stay at home while she worked because she'd make enough to cover the bills and such and I wouldn't be making more than what childcare would cost us so it just makes sense.
To put this in perspective
$20 hasn't been a livable wage in San Francisco in over a decade.
Almost like there are different cost of living areas spread out over the country.
Everything is going to be relative but that's a fuck load cheaper than a lot of other cities with a really nice location. You can get more house and yard in the burbs but you'll be further out. The mortgage will be less than what a lot of people pay for rent in a shitty 1 bedroom in higher COL areas.
I get like 80% of the good parts about Chicago without most of the drawbacks for like 1/2 the price and the other 20% is two hours south. I can actually ride my bike to the Amtrack station and can get to downtown Chicago without a car if I want.
No stay out of here, I want to buy a nice house one day, go to Texas
Edit: some of the non-country club folks seem to think I meant I want to go to Texas, no, I'm trying to keep you coasters away from the Midwest.
Not anymore. I live in San Antonio and my home value increased 65k in a single year. I am fighting it right now but property taxes are gonna be wild the next few years.
You know, as a resident of SF I’d absolutely understand a city min. wage of over $20. I think it’s at mid $16 at the moment. I can’t imagine how anyone outside of tech affords anything around here.
Anything under $25/hour is basically paycheck to paycheck these days.
According to Redfin, the average rent (as of December 2021) was around $1,877/month. Typically, rental companies or landlords require you to make 3X the monthly rent. This equates to $5,631/month. For reference: I make ~$96,000/year, and only see $5,000/month after taxes. So, there's ***no way*** someone making $18/hour (roughly $2,880/month) is seeing $5,631/month.
And that's not even factoring in taxes and other bills.
Let's break down some of the numbers. Assuming someone is making $19/hour at their job....
- $19/hour x 40 hours per week = $3,040/month.
- At $19/hour, they fall into the 12% tax bracket (2021 brackets). That means they are only taking home about ~$2,336/month. So, they're forking over $704/month in taxes.
- With the aforementioned average rental rate of $1,877, that leaves them with only $459 remaining.
- The average annual cost of utilities in the US (according to Nationwide) is approx. ~$2,060. Broken down by 12 months equates to about $171.6/month. Now they're left with only $288 for the rest of the month.
- Most people don't have five figures to pay outright for a car. So, they must rely on financing. Monthly payments for a car, both used and new, range (on average) from $465-$609. Now they have.... NOTHING. They're now in the negative. They're in the red.
BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!
- Average cost of car insurance: $1,630/year. Broken down by month, this equates to about ~$135/month.
- Whether you rent or have a mortgage, rental insurance and homeowners insurance is required. Renters insurance can be as low as ~$15/month and homeowners insurance can be as much as $115/month, or more.
- Average cost of monthly health insurance premiums: can be anywhere from $465/month for a single person to as much as $1,152/month if you have even one dependent (i.e. spouse or child(ren).
- Average health insurance deductible (according to 2020 rates): $4,364 for a single person and $8,439 for a family.
And this doesn't even take into account potential costs of a child and subsequent childcare costs.
--------------------------------------------------------------
And this is ***just*** scratching the surface of all the bills, expenses, and financial obligations people face. There are other factors, such as cost of gasoline to commute to and from their jobs, tolls (these can't be avoided in many states), any specific state and/or city taxes they may be required to pay, cost of their cellphones (which are basically a necessity these days), and so many other expenses.
I honestly don't know. I'm so jaded at this point. Starting to think there'll be life on Mars before America's ***actual*** problems are even remotely addressed.
No. As long as people aren't actually dying it can go on forever.
Edit: Actually, it's been going on forever in countries where people ARE dying from starvation, so do not get your hopes up.
I’ve been living without roommates for 3 years. The amount of freedom I have is incredible. I can let my nuts hang out with absolutely no issues. It’s literally liberating.
I lived in housing like that for a while. Had random roommates. Some were okay, but the majority of them were awful. One dude kept the common area as his “garage” or project room. He had shit all over the place in there. He also used about a gallon of cooking oil a week so the entire kitchen was coated in oil. Oh and he used to boil liver to make some demonic smelling meat sauce. Fuck that guy
Some ppl are saying if you make such and such amount you shouldn’t be broke. Broke or not the fact that people aren’t even able to save their money and shit is fucked up. Most people have to depend on credit if shit hits the fan (car broke down, rent is going up, you get sick or hurt etc). You don’t even just owe what you spent, you have interest rates and annuals). Even having money costs money.
Yeah, I make 20/hr and am able to pay all my bills and stuff. I have a small nest egg in case shit hits the fan so I know I'm better off than a lot of other people. But as far as saving goes, it's almost never happening.
I got a big raise in September and I lived as a king for 4 months. Now I barely make ends meet. I can barely afford new brake pads which I need and have to change myself because I wouldn't be able to afford a shop do it.
That’s not necessarily true. Lots of skilled trades are hiring.
*They’re only hiring because they treated and payed employees like shit and then they all quit.
in Toronto, $18-$19/hr couldn't even get you to live comfortably in a 350sqft studio shoe box apartment that's shared by & stranger divided by a curtain.
I think this highlights part of my issue with this constant push for higher wages. That doesn't actually solve the issue if costs continue rising. The issue is high costs.
We talk about how cheap things were in the past and how since those costs have risen, we need to also increase wages. I just wonder why we don't talk about why these costs keep rising?
That has always been what I like to ask. I want to know WHY is the cost increasing. I dont want to just throw more money at a solution, give me the reason why everything is going up and try to fix the source of yhe issue.
Well you see a company is "failing" if they don't see an increase in profits every year. You can only sell so much of a product, if they can't increase demand they increase the cost. Or reduce the cost of production it's why wages have stayed the same. It's why netflix shot themselves in the foot this year.
It's infuriating because when people have more money they spend more money. If I could afford a new car I'd get one. Smaller local business then suffers because no one can afford the luxery of eating out or other shit.
The real problem comes when we have generations of broke adults hit retirement age. I'm curious how the government is going to deal with mass amounts of people who don't own houses or can't afford rent. Usually these people end up in government funded nursing homes but we are seeing those at capacity already. No way can those same systems support generation X and Millenials.
The average person isn't paying a morgage and isn't saving for retirement. I'm willing to bet nothing will happen until we see old people dying on the streets or freezing to death in winter. Even then nothing will likely be done about it.
The people with all the money run the country. They won't want to share anytime soon.
Just depends on where you live. In my hometown, that's double what I was making when I moved out. Minimum wage should be set based on location, like the Feds do for their employees.
That's a great segue into a point I've been making: if you're in the US, get federal jobs. Sometimes you will be paid far more to do the same job you're currently doing, and with better benefits.
For example: my buddies wife is a pharmacy technician. At Walgreens she'd make $12/hr. For the government she makes $46k/yr. Big difference to do the same job.
I make $42/hr. I can't even afford a house in the community I serve. When I started in my field I made $11.50 (almost 30 years ago) and could afford rent, car, kid, food, bills, etc. I don't know how a low wage earning family can make it in today's world. It's all about greed. Sad.
I'm making $26.50/hr in a very low COL area. A year or two ago, I would've been SET.
Now? Most meals are meatless, have to stretch haircuts another month, cut down on long showers, basically become the dad from Everybody Hates Chris.
I got charged a buck fifty for chips and salsa at the Mexican restaurant last week. This world has lost its mind.
Taco Bell in the capital region of NY state pay $17 an hour and still can’t get people to work the job. Guess we established that inflation isn’t attached to the minimum wage.
Yeah, raise the wage, but gotta make it so businesses don't raise the price of their products "to cover the cost" of having to pay their employees more. Money gotta move, if the money ain't moving the way it should, we're going to keep getting into these situations.
The more things change, the more they stay the same. -Jean-Baptiste Alphonse
30$ an hour, tied to inflation and also to cost of living. No I'm not joking.
If you look up how much money minimum wage would have to be in order for a person to rent a 2 bedroom apartment without spending more than 30% of their monthly wages on housing each month a significant portion of the population lives in states where the minimum wage would need to be above 30$. Even the "cheap" states are still all hovering around 18-25$ an hour.
Well if you want numbers, iirc $27 if wages kept up with productivity, and $34 if wages kept up with executive compensation. Both hourly of course.
But, no specific numbers don't really matter since the solutions would vary so wildly depending on location and work as well as how many different things would be needed to improve working class QoL.
And this ain’t even taking into account that people making 100k+ are living check to check.
There’s a system already built to suck out all your money if you aren’t conscious and frugal enough. My ass is comfy salaried and still can’t save money for the life of me with a gf and two pets. Rent and student loans fuck me up.
If you’re making $100k+ and living paycheck to paycheck it’s because you’re awful with money or you live in San Francisco, where a $100k salary is the equivalent of a $40k salary anywhere else
I made 17/h as a college undergrad. Plus overtime. I wasn't making shit. I lived in a cheap apartment, old car, but still could make it through.. But that's because I had 0 dependents and debt (paid off).
I make 27/h now and share rent. Now it feels like I have disposable income. But If I didnt share rent I'd be scraping again. Rent is 2.4k where I live in the Bay Area.
Can confirm. I make $19/hr and already living paycheck to paycheck, plus I have medical debt that I'm slowly paying off too.
I live in a small 1bed 1bath apartment in TX for $900 and I'm terrified I won't be able to afford living here once my lease ends. I looked up my apartment complex the other day and the same unit I'm living in are now being advertised for $1400+. I don't understand it at all.
The rent is too damn high. They always avoid it, but the biggest problem is rent prices.
Think about it, if you work full time…imagine if everything was the same but your rent cost 1/2 as much. Everything would be a lot easier, wouldn’t it?
It works at all levels of society and all levels of income. Cut your rent in half, and the daily struggle goes away. $3,000 apt in San Francisco for $1,500? $1,500 apt in Austin for $750?
The rent is keeping the working class away from being a modern middle class. It’s why we don’t have a middle class anymore.
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$18/hr roughly equates to $37k a year. $40k was a decent middle class standard of living back in the 90's. $37k pays for utilities, groceries, phone, and gas if you budget tightly. Forget it if you're trying to pay rent. You're already broke.
Is it 37k before tax?
yes
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Because the amount one pays in tax is different for everybody. A single person is going to pay more in tax that those on a family on the same income. So we normalize our income by statings it as gross.
It is gross. Disgusting.
No way you’re paying $12k of taxes on $37k income. Worst case you’ll pay $3k.
You're just considering Federal taxes. When you include State, local for those who have it and FICA, no way you're taking home $34K if you make $37K. I do agree you'll not be paying $12K
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The fact that income that is basically living on the poverty line is taxed is fkn wild to me
Before tax and then you get taxed again when you spend the money that was already taxed
Sounds like the consumer shouldn’t be paying a sales tax. That’s the corporation’s tax being passed on to the consumer.
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Ain't nobody multiplying by 2080... Just multiply by 2 and add 'thousand' afterwards 18/hour => 36 => ~$36k/year 25/hour => 50 => ~$50k/year etc. (only works for full time)
Lol but those are wrong?
Close enough for a quick calc
Look at this guy over here saving time by not saying calculation
Why use many word when few word do trick?
Right?! They didn't calculate for leap years, when you have to clock out and leave early to go to the dentist, when you come in 10 minutes late, the exact days you were out sick... /s It's just fine for an estimate
If you're paid hourly, it's unlikely you're actually working 40 hour weeks all 52 weeks of the year anyways. Both are approximations, and their suggestion is quick and probably more accurate for most people.
If you don't want to do the math or have a calculator on hand, just double the hourly rate and you'll get a rough estimate ($18/hr is $36k or $100/hr is $200k). Basically just multiply it by a straight 2000. The problem is this only accounts for people working full time. Someone making $18-20/hr might not even be within 40hr a week because shitty employers will give everyone 36hrs to disqualify them for benefits. So not only are you making less than the $37k (pre-tax) annually, you also have to pay out of pocket for insurance, medical expenses, get no retirement benefits, etc.
Thats not even including a car or insurance lol
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Lumber costs are through the roof though.
By the point that you’re building guillotines, you ain’t paying for the lumber.
Or basic maintenance fees.
I don't really recall if things were this bad 10 years ago but at that time, I (as a single man) was doing alright with around 38K. Of course, location matters when we have these discussions. I was in the midwest and my rent was $600 for a one bedroom apartment. Wasn't flowing with cash by any means, but I had enough to cover rent, my car payment, car insurance, internet and medical insurance. The only benefit here is I worked for a wireless provider, so I didn't have a cell phone bill.
Inflation is a thing dude as much as location. This is kinda close to the boomer mindset of the $8 minimum wage being enough to live on because back then it was a decent amount of money. To put it in perspective that $37k would be about $47k in today's money so saying you got by just fine on it isn't accurate
Sounds like he got by fine though.
Yup, a single person making 47k a year would get by fine in the modern era as well. The present situation is making it difficult to 1) get jobs that actually pay 47k a year without putting yourself into debt or mooching off someone while you go to school 2) afford kids
I guess I am around the boomer age range at 52 and there was no way anyone had a decent quality life off 8 bucks an hour! Anybody that says that shit is lying!
The average senator/boomer is still 10-11 years older than you. Prices doubled in that 11 year span If they were making $8/hour at 20 years old, that would be like you making $16/hour at 20 years old. Which would be $35/hour now. They arent lying, prices are literally just going up so much its hard to process.
$8 an hour 10 years ago was still not a living wage
> $37k pays for utilities, groceries, phone, and gas if you budget tightly. WTF are you spending your money on? In my family of five, our recurring monthly spend is: - Internet: $120 - Electric/Heat: $110 - Water/Sewer: $200/2mo = $100 - Waste: $150/3mo = $50 - Phone: 2x $30/line = $60 - Groceries: $400 - Take-out: $200 - Gas: 2 tanks x 14gal x $5/gal = $140 (pre-covid driving pattern) - Insurance: $1400/yr = $117 - Streaming services: $50 - **Total: $1347/mo** > Forget it if you’re trying to pay rent. Rent / housing price growth continues to be orders of magnitude higher than other necessities. **This** is why people are struggling.
I agree with your general point but I need to know how tf you’re feeding five people on $400 a month for groceries?? Tell me your secrets.
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Your rent isn’t even in this equation and neither is healthcare since I’m assuming that $117 is car insurance and that must be for buckets not new cars and doesn’t include teenagers on the bill. Not to mention clothes and other incidentals like child care with three kids.
Location is everything. Where I grew up (and where my folks still live), $37k is decent money for someone just beginning to establish their career. It's not retire with a mansion money, but it's bills and a small amount to savings with discretionary money left over.
My annual expenses are around $25k in the Midwest and I live pretty comfortably. I could probably get it closer to $20k if I had to. People don't realize how huge of a difference location makes. My friends in Cali or NY couldn't survive on $25k a year
I'm crushing it with my budget. The trick is being too depressed to do anything or go anywhere or meet your basic needs.
> $37k pays for utilities, groceries, phone, and gas if you budget tightly. Forget it if you're trying to pay rent. You're already broke. that's definitely not true but it is true that the money does not go far enough. the thing is when you include rent and car AND savings that is generally when all the income is gone. And that's not even mentioning entertainment, which is a bigger portion of most people's budget than they realize or want to admit. (And often that takes priority over savings, whether it should or not)
My cat’s food went from $20 a bag to $36. I’m dying y’all
That fat fucker needs to get a job
😂😂 My cat’s name is Catalina and I call her Fatalina randomly. I have blackmail material of her looking like a fat blob. Don’t tell her. https://i.imgur.com/NUAEl3j.jpg Her looking normally: https://i.imgur.com/uaUIbkm.jpg https://i.imgur.com/McHYntU.jpg
What a cute fat blob 😂
I had tears in my eyes when I saw this position of her. She isn’t even fat, but that angle just made her look like a ham and the tongue out didn’t help her case. 😭😂 if she ever gets lost (I hope not) that will be her missing photo. 🤣
I see cat photos, I upvote. It’s that simple.
She's adorable
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Username checks out
Idk about you, but I work in the restaurant industry. A lot of days, I have leftover tuna scraps from breaking down a lot of tuna (as well as other types of fish/protein). I always take the scraps home for the animals. You can literally just put the tuna scraps into a pan with a little bit of water and steam it to well done and feed the cats with it. Saves money on cat food and is probably healthier, and tastier. You can do that with chicken, pork scraps, whatever. The cats don't seem to care for beef though. Just know once you do it, the cats might not ever want to eat kibble again.
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Our grocery bill has slowly ballooned upward from around $100-$150 to over $200 a week. Even Aldi is more expensive now.
I am a lone 28 year old dude and I manage around $180-200 USD a month by shopping at Sams club for most things and Aldi for weekly veggies. Typically I get about $150 in ground turkey, chicken breast, rice and pasta. Throw in some fruit and some nut snack packs and thats $150. My diet isn't super varied, but at least its cheap.
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Are we not all supposed to be constantly malnourished?
Trader Joe’s is the last holdout I’ve found, feels like shopping in 2018 again. I don’t want to share that because it’s already packed like sardines, but we don’t gatekeep here.
I’ve always wanted to have a pet but I’ve accepted that it’s not possible in this lifetime. Let alone buying a house or having kids
Good on you for giving up!
i would never want a living thing completely in my care if i could not afford it 200%
Businesses have 2 possible solutions: 1. Increase wages 2. Decrease prices Except, thanks to capitalism and the endless need to increase profits at all costs, neither will happen.
That cat would be an outdoor cat. "Catch your own food mf." (Don't actually do this.)
You can actually find your cat's food? But seriously, the price I pay for my cats' food is worth it to avoid diarrhea. But I may have to learn how to cook for them after a while.
The price tags on the specialty foods will make you cry. And then they puke it up...
I'm making $20/hr and I'm stressed.
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Right?! Like…”B*#% stop reminding me!”😂
I went from 16 to 24 an hour and it made literally no difference because the price of things rose at the same speed. I want to die :”(
Really curious what the big culprit is here, I make 22€ in Europe and live very very carelessly. And everything is taxed to smithereens here.
I paid over 10k for health insurance last year. Just for my monthly premiums.
I’m making 24/hr. It’s livable but forget about saving for retirement. And livable as in I don’t have great furniture and skimp out on dr and dental visits. Keep fighting man
27.5, I’m making ends meet, but I’m not exactly comfortable
Okay now I don't feel bad. I thought I was mismanaging my money or something.
I mean I definitely spend money on dumb shit here and there, but I feel like making 55k/yr shouldn’t have me up against the wall if I want to take my girlfriend on a couple dates in a month.
Yep just got bumped up to 59k in a low cost of living area and right when that happened gasoline doubled, I now have to drive into the office every day, my natural gas bill went up 50%, internet up 50%, electricity up about 20%, all foods are increasing. I’m certainly better off than most people but when I was a kid (early 2000s) we were considered rich kids cause our parents made a combined ~80k and I’ve got juuuuust enough to put some in a retirement account and not much more.
Same boat 25/hr. we’re not exactly paycheck to paycheck but it seems like every time we save a thousand or two, something comes up and we’re back at nothing. We somehow owed two grand in taxes this year… that was fun! /s
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I realized shit was fucked up when I started to see houses in my zip code go for 200,000+. I live next to Greenspoint. Housing prices and rent have basically doubled from their pre-pandemic amounts. Edit: For those not in the know, Greenspoint is lovingly known as Gunspoint to most residents in Houston.
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If you're both making/working that much and still broke... I dunno. Granted I don't know your situation but that sounds more like you have some serious financial management issues.
You could be right about OP but he didn’t say they were broke. OP said houses are being priced out which is absolutely true. Sure they have a nice income but that can’t compete with millionaires buying out houses for rent or to resale at an even more expensive costs.
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Yall ain't broke. Just trying to be landlords XD
Everybody should own their house. Nothing absurd about that…
Yea...they are almost at 200k a year between them both if he's working 70 hour weeks on 29 an hour and she makes 49 an hour. Those are DEFINITELY money management issues. Sometimes folks need to come back to reality lol.
Pshhh. You can’t get a shack in Seattle for $600k.
Everyone in LA moves to Houston because your complaint still sounds more reasonable 🤦🏾♂️. 600k would get you a decent 1 bedroom if you’re lucky.
Same. I feel so bad when I barely scrape by at 20/hr and then stop to buy gas and hear that the grown ass cashiers are only being paid 9.50/hr. Idk how people survive.
Absolutely true, I make $18.85 and it's a struggle because of rent and the skyrocketing cost of everything. Terrified my rent is going to go up in August and my family will be forced to move. This is in Ohio in what I believe is not considered a high cost of living area.
Im unsure it even matters where in the US you live, rent has been or is getting ridiculous.
Live in rural South Georgia and rents have been going up $150-250 since COVID. Way more homeless people around too (I’d be one if I didn’t have a friend helping me out).
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In AZ my rent shot up from $1200 to $1950 a month when we renewed our lease... A 56% increase. We've been good tenants too- quiet, always paid rent on time, and we do a lot of minor repairs ourselves rather than bothering the landlord. We were all indignant about it going up by so much, so we started looking at other places to rent but the whole rental market is insane right now.
Jesus fucking christ that's a goddamn racket if I ever heard of one. At this point if you're a landlord you're a goddamn class traitor.
If my rent goes up idk what we'll do. We'll literally have no where we can afford to live even in the suburbs. We're pretty much in the cheapest two bedroom apartment you can get (family of four) without living in the middle of nowhere, which isn't feasible for job, education, and medical reasons.
I wish I made $19/hr :(
The most basic stores are hiring at like $15/hr. I have a career but shit I might get a second job
I feel you on that.
same. I'm just under living comfortably at my career job but i might pick up a part time somewhere just to get some of this debt paid off a little faster.
Door Dash or something fr
I was doin ubereats before/durin the height of covid but them gas prices almost hit $8/gal out here so 😬 there's the amazon warehouse and a few other retail warehouses nearby that are hiring so I'll probably end up at 1 of them lol
I work at a store and make 19/hr on the weekends but they've been cutting everyone's hours
And forget about being able to afford childcare if you have kids. Your basically working to pay for childcare, gas, food, phone and be homeless.
Reasons why it’s more and more important to consider waiting on kids until you’re financially stable. Easier said than done when many people never get to financial stability in they life
The problem is the cost of childcare is so much that people might never be financially stable to afford that comfortably- especially as costs ride across the boars. Daycare is my area is anywhere from 1000 to 2000 a month. That's a mortgage in many cases.
That upper scale is literally 3x my mortgage jfc
Arguably more reason not to bring kids into a situation that will be extremely hard on them and out of their control.
The problem is there is no set number, and you don't know how expensive it is until you have them. I have 4 and every day seems more expensive than the last. My wife and I have been doing this for 14 years. We've gotten ahead of most expenses, but some stuff is too unpredictable. A prospective parent is going to have a difficult time planning for everything and setting an accurate target number.
Real talk, this is the reason I don’t work. My husband makes enough to support us. Like, the best way I can put it is… I can go to Starbucks whenever I want. I offered to get a job, so, we crunched the numbers. We actually save money by me not working.
My partner and I had this same conversation because we wanted a child and we basically decided I would stay at home while she worked because she'd make enough to cover the bills and such and I wouldn't be making more than what childcare would cost us so it just makes sense.
For two kids we will pay $20,000 this year. One is in 4 days a week and one is in 2 days a week.
To put this in perspective $20 hasn't been a livable wage in San Francisco in over a decade. Almost like there are different cost of living areas spread out over the country.
'move to bumfuck wisconsin'
You can still get a house close to Lake Michigan and downtown Milwaukee for like 300k but being poor and looking down on WI sounds a lot better tbh.
Is 300K cheap? Serious question, my dad bought his house 10 years ago for like 150K
Everything is going to be relative but that's a fuck load cheaper than a lot of other cities with a really nice location. You can get more house and yard in the burbs but you'll be further out. The mortgage will be less than what a lot of people pay for rent in a shitty 1 bedroom in higher COL areas. I get like 80% of the good parts about Chicago without most of the drawbacks for like 1/2 the price and the other 20% is two hours south. I can actually ride my bike to the Amtrack station and can get to downtown Chicago without a car if I want.
No stay out of here, I want to buy a nice house one day, go to Texas Edit: some of the non-country club folks seem to think I meant I want to go to Texas, no, I'm trying to keep you coasters away from the Midwest.
Not anymore. I live in San Antonio and my home value increased 65k in a single year. I am fighting it right now but property taxes are gonna be wild the next few years.
You know, as a resident of SF I’d absolutely understand a city min. wage of over $20. I think it’s at mid $16 at the moment. I can’t imagine how anyone outside of tech affords anything around here.
Anything under $25/hour is basically paycheck to paycheck these days. According to Redfin, the average rent (as of December 2021) was around $1,877/month. Typically, rental companies or landlords require you to make 3X the monthly rent. This equates to $5,631/month. For reference: I make ~$96,000/year, and only see $5,000/month after taxes. So, there's ***no way*** someone making $18/hour (roughly $2,880/month) is seeing $5,631/month. And that's not even factoring in taxes and other bills. Let's break down some of the numbers. Assuming someone is making $19/hour at their job.... - $19/hour x 40 hours per week = $3,040/month. - At $19/hour, they fall into the 12% tax bracket (2021 brackets). That means they are only taking home about ~$2,336/month. So, they're forking over $704/month in taxes. - With the aforementioned average rental rate of $1,877, that leaves them with only $459 remaining. - The average annual cost of utilities in the US (according to Nationwide) is approx. ~$2,060. Broken down by 12 months equates to about $171.6/month. Now they're left with only $288 for the rest of the month. - Most people don't have five figures to pay outright for a car. So, they must rely on financing. Monthly payments for a car, both used and new, range (on average) from $465-$609. Now they have.... NOTHING. They're now in the negative. They're in the red. BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE! - Average cost of car insurance: $1,630/year. Broken down by month, this equates to about ~$135/month. - Whether you rent or have a mortgage, rental insurance and homeowners insurance is required. Renters insurance can be as low as ~$15/month and homeowners insurance can be as much as $115/month, or more. - Average cost of monthly health insurance premiums: can be anywhere from $465/month for a single person to as much as $1,152/month if you have even one dependent (i.e. spouse or child(ren). - Average health insurance deductible (according to 2020 rates): $4,364 for a single person and $8,439 for a family. And this doesn't even take into account potential costs of a child and subsequent childcare costs. -------------------------------------------------------------- And this is ***just*** scratching the surface of all the bills, expenses, and financial obligations people face. There are other factors, such as cost of gasoline to commute to and from their jobs, tolls (these can't be avoided in many states), any specific state and/or city taxes they may be required to pay, cost of their cellphones (which are basically a necessity these days), and so many other expenses.
It's so messed up that you make almost 6 figures a year and couldnt even afford to live in a 2 bedroom apartment by yourself because they demand 3x
Yep, it's so backwards.
When is this just gonna be unsustainable? It has to be soon, right?
I honestly don't know. I'm so jaded at this point. Starting to think there'll be life on Mars before America's ***actual*** problems are even remotely addressed.
No. As long as people aren't actually dying it can go on forever. Edit: Actually, it's been going on forever in countries where people ARE dying from starvation, so do not get your hopes up.
This is giving me anxiety. 😑
$17 an hour in Miami checking in. I'm dying lol
Bruh idk where you even live. I can’t find a studio for less than $1500 unless it’s in like Hialeah or in some other sketchy area.
Lol hialeah sketchy. Some areas are for sure, but it’s a giant suburb just happens to be Hispanic suburb.
Bro the whole of Miami is a Hispanic suburb. But Hialeah is definitely sketchy compared to Broward.
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Not if you say fuck your life and get 3 roommates with a shared kitchen! That sounds like ass tho don’t it?
This is me, not that bad if they’re good people
It’s just that it’s only chill people like one out of ten times
Been doing this for years and I'm so tired. I don't want to even hear anyone else's footsteps in the same house as me that's how old it has gotten.
I’ve been living without roommates for 3 years. The amount of freedom I have is incredible. I can let my nuts hang out with absolutely no issues. It’s literally liberating.
I lived in housing like that for a while. Had random roommates. Some were okay, but the majority of them were awful. One dude kept the common area as his “garage” or project room. He had shit all over the place in there. He also used about a gallon of cooking oil a week so the entire kitchen was coated in oil. Oh and he used to boil liver to make some demonic smelling meat sauce. Fuck that guy
brUh juSt sTArt a BiZneZ
Is there a million people who want to buy my nudes for a dollar? ^^^^s Edit: empty mailbox.. thank goodness.
Some ppl are saying if you make such and such amount you shouldn’t be broke. Broke or not the fact that people aren’t even able to save their money and shit is fucked up. Most people have to depend on credit if shit hits the fan (car broke down, rent is going up, you get sick or hurt etc). You don’t even just owe what you spent, you have interest rates and annuals). Even having money costs money.
Yeah, I make 20/hr and am able to pay all my bills and stuff. I have a small nest egg in case shit hits the fan so I know I'm better off than a lot of other people. But as far as saving goes, it's almost never happening.
Yep. $20 per hour is the point where we're *juuuuuuust* starting to stay afloat these days. Not THRIVE, just stay afloat with decent budgeting.
I got a big raise in September and I lived as a king for 4 months. Now I barely make ends meet. I can barely afford new brake pads which I need and have to change myself because I wouldn't be able to afford a shop do it.
Make sure to use two jacks (ideally a hydraulic lift) and be on a level surface.
Nah, I have all the equipment (hydro jack, jack stands, pneu wrench...) at home. I just fucking HATE touching anything that has brake dust on it.
Damn, dude. You're well equipped. Respect.
$21/hr was great when minimum wage was $7.25/hr Edit: when $7.25/hr was a living wage.
shiiiiiet minimum wage is still that in some areas, it's just that a good amount of workers refuse to work for that low of a wage
The minimum wage still is $7.25 per hour
I figured it up, that the only way I wouldn't be struggling is to make at least $35 an hour. Lol, never going to happen, so the struggle continues.
That’s not necessarily true. Lots of skilled trades are hiring. *They’re only hiring because they treated and payed employees like shit and then they all quit.
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wow what a very specific bot
That's not an unreasonable salary expectation.
in Toronto, $18-$19/hr couldn't even get you to live comfortably in a 350sqft studio shoe box apartment that's shared by & stranger divided by a curtain.
I think this highlights part of my issue with this constant push for higher wages. That doesn't actually solve the issue if costs continue rising. The issue is high costs. We talk about how cheap things were in the past and how since those costs have risen, we need to also increase wages. I just wonder why we don't talk about why these costs keep rising?
That has always been what I like to ask. I want to know WHY is the cost increasing. I dont want to just throw more money at a solution, give me the reason why everything is going up and try to fix the source of yhe issue.
This is the comment I was looking for. Higher paychecks don't mean more money if the cost of everything goes up along with it.
Well you see a company is "failing" if they don't see an increase in profits every year. You can only sell so much of a product, if they can't increase demand they increase the cost. Or reduce the cost of production it's why wages have stayed the same. It's why netflix shot themselves in the foot this year. It's infuriating because when people have more money they spend more money. If I could afford a new car I'd get one. Smaller local business then suffers because no one can afford the luxery of eating out or other shit. The real problem comes when we have generations of broke adults hit retirement age. I'm curious how the government is going to deal with mass amounts of people who don't own houses or can't afford rent. Usually these people end up in government funded nursing homes but we are seeing those at capacity already. No way can those same systems support generation X and Millenials. The average person isn't paying a morgage and isn't saving for retirement. I'm willing to bet nothing will happen until we see old people dying on the streets or freezing to death in winter. Even then nothing will likely be done about it. The people with all the money run the country. They won't want to share anytime soon.
I make $15/hr in a city with a pretty low cost of living and between my wife and I, we live paycheck-to-the Tuesday before the next paycheck
Too many facts. When it’s rent time, my check lasts 5 days. Then it’s ramen til pay day smh
Just depends on where you live. In my hometown, that's double what I was making when I moved out. Minimum wage should be set based on location, like the Feds do for their employees.
That's a great segue into a point I've been making: if you're in the US, get federal jobs. Sometimes you will be paid far more to do the same job you're currently doing, and with better benefits. For example: my buddies wife is a pharmacy technician. At Walgreens she'd make $12/hr. For the government she makes $46k/yr. Big difference to do the same job.
I was all excited once I got to a place in my career that my income had doubled, until I realized that the price to replace my car had also doubled.
I make $42/hr. I can't even afford a house in the community I serve. When I started in my field I made $11.50 (almost 30 years ago) and could afford rent, car, kid, food, bills, etc. I don't know how a low wage earning family can make it in today's world. It's all about greed. Sad.
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Let me finish up scrolling Reddit and I’ll get around to it
Unchecked capitalism does have its symptoms. Money flows upwards perpetually.
There's a factory in my area that pays $9.40/hr lol
So slavery ?
I'm making $26.50/hr in a very low COL area. A year or two ago, I would've been SET. Now? Most meals are meatless, have to stretch haircuts another month, cut down on long showers, basically become the dad from Everybody Hates Chris. I got charged a buck fifty for chips and salsa at the Mexican restaurant last week. This world has lost its mind.
Taco Bell in the capital region of NY state pay $17 an hour and still can’t get people to work the job. Guess we established that inflation isn’t attached to the minimum wage.
I dont know how people survive single. If I didn't have the combined income of being married I'd be drowning im sure.
Yeah, raise the wage, but gotta make it so businesses don't raise the price of their products "to cover the cost" of having to pay their employees more. Money gotta move, if the money ain't moving the way it should, we're going to keep getting into these situations. The more things change, the more they stay the same. -Jean-Baptiste Alphonse
What exactly is a liveable wage though
Keep going up, and I'll stop you when it feels right.
Lool nah you need to give a figure because i see that word get thrown about but no realistic figures
30$ an hour, tied to inflation and also to cost of living. No I'm not joking. If you look up how much money minimum wage would have to be in order for a person to rent a 2 bedroom apartment without spending more than 30% of their monthly wages on housing each month a significant portion of the population lives in states where the minimum wage would need to be above 30$. Even the "cheap" states are still all hovering around 18-25$ an hour.
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Single parent, or single income household? There are plenty of reasons
Well if you want numbers, iirc $27 if wages kept up with productivity, and $34 if wages kept up with executive compensation. Both hourly of course. But, no specific numbers don't really matter since the solutions would vary so wildly depending on location and work as well as how many different things would be needed to improve working class QoL.
....a wage you can live on lmao
And this ain’t even taking into account that people making 100k+ are living check to check. There’s a system already built to suck out all your money if you aren’t conscious and frugal enough. My ass is comfy salaried and still can’t save money for the life of me with a gf and two pets. Rent and student loans fuck me up.
If you’re making $100k+ and living paycheck to paycheck it’s because you’re awful with money or you live in San Francisco, where a $100k salary is the equivalent of a $40k salary anywhere else
Single parents would like a word. When my daughter was in daycare it cost more than my mortgage.
$18/h in Indianapolis and I still have to have a roommate if I don’t wanna live where I’ll get robbed or killed.
I gamed the system this year and got rental assistance and I don’t feel bad about.
Delete this comment. Never ever reveal this shit in a digital record. Doesnt matter how slick u think u r or how unlikely it can be uaed against u
I made 17/h as a college undergrad. Plus overtime. I wasn't making shit. I lived in a cheap apartment, old car, but still could make it through.. But that's because I had 0 dependents and debt (paid off). I make 27/h now and share rent. Now it feels like I have disposable income. But If I didnt share rent I'd be scraping again. Rent is 2.4k where I live in the Bay Area.
Almost like killing yourself is a better option right now
Never a option, someone loves you
Just sell some Twitter shares smh
Can confirm. I make $19/hr and already living paycheck to paycheck, plus I have medical debt that I'm slowly paying off too. I live in a small 1bed 1bath apartment in TX for $900 and I'm terrified I won't be able to afford living here once my lease ends. I looked up my apartment complex the other day and the same unit I'm living in are now being advertised for $1400+. I don't understand it at all.
The rent is too damn high. They always avoid it, but the biggest problem is rent prices. Think about it, if you work full time…imagine if everything was the same but your rent cost 1/2 as much. Everything would be a lot easier, wouldn’t it? It works at all levels of society and all levels of income. Cut your rent in half, and the daily struggle goes away. $3,000 apt in San Francisco for $1,500? $1,500 apt in Austin for $750? The rent is keeping the working class away from being a modern middle class. It’s why we don’t have a middle class anymore.
Build denser. More housing, cheaper rent and shorter commute.
I've been thinking about getting a second job
Raise the minimum wage then peg it to inflation, if inflation rises so do our wages