Universal basic income and universal healthcare so I (and everybody else) don’t have to worry about a job, being able to work, retirement, disability, and employers will have to offer meaning, increased quality of life, and actual respect to attract employees.
These social safety nets would be a huge win for worker’s rights too. If you can tell a job to go fuck itself on the spot, they can’t operate without treating people right.
The day I got signed on for 120k was the day all my financial anxieties went away. I’m not rich by any means. My rent is still stupid high. My bills never stop coming in. But I can finally afford furniture. I can finally afford to visit my family when I want to. I don’t worry about min-maxing at the grocery store. I’m not “happy” but it’s the closest I’ve ever been
Being able to walk into a store and drop 50 dollars on something on rare occasion without having to have a panic attack and spend the day before doing in depth financial analysis and math, I cant imagine how much healthier my life would be without that stress.
That sounds like a pretty good number to me too. Currently quite a bit lower.
Congratulations! I’m surviving but without furniture lol.
I’ve got a little bit of disposable income, but just had to go out of network for a surgery because my insurance is weak.
I don’t really have financial worries either though. What’s weird is I make just under $50k now, but the most I ever made was $110k, and at that time I had financial stress. Now is the first time I’ve ever gotten off the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle.
But my financial success currently stops at furniture, so I know exactly what you’re saying. I’ve got a futon, a 5x7 rug, a table, a dining chair, and an armchair. The futon and the rug are the only ones I paid for; the rest was free from craigslist. I carried that damn furniture for miles. Well I had a vehicle for the armchair.
Next thing, after my savings recovers from the surgery, is a 7x9 rug to fill the other half of my main living space, so I can cut down on the creaking boards. Then padding for under the rugs. Then finally another dining chair so I can invite someone over for dinner.
120k what? Bananas per hour?
Dumb questions per fortnight
That is far too many bananas. You wouldn’t even be able to sell them fast enough.
Bananas are for eating my friend
I earn enough, I’d rather just halve my hours.
the amount you need to make in order to afford the ever-fleeting american dream is about $140k right now. so I want 280k
I’m sorry but this can’t be correct. I live within 30 minutes of two minor cities with plenty to do and me and my wife combined make around 100k. We live comfortably and have 50k in the bank in addition to retirement. We also have one kid. This is highly dependent on where you live. I am not saying the cost of housing,etc is not a problem but some of these numbers need to be put in context.
When did you purchase your housing (rough year range) if you don’t mind?
That sounds awesome, but I live in low CoL area make more and feel like I’m just eaking by sometimes.
Genuinely curious, where does that number come from?
$140k won’t buy you a house in almost any even remotely popular city or its suburbs.
$140k per year is enough to afford a mortgage on a $500k house. You’d have to make crazy money to buy a house outright on a year’s salary, so nobody evaluates it that way.
Is 500k a house to raise a family in or just a place to stay in?
In Boston, where I live? $500k is an unheated garage.
San Diego checking in. $500k is a shack in someone’s backyard. Fuck I love it here but damn sometimes I really don’t.
ok ok I exaggerate a little. But everything is crazy expensive here. Nice weather and beaches though. Get to surf every week. Can’t complain.
$500k houses don’t exist in popular cities.
That’s why I live way the hell out in the suburbs
I remember a time when someone making “six figures” was extremely wealthy. Now six figures just seems to be the baseline for even having a chance at tackling home ownership in suburban areas. 120k is probably ideal. I don’t likely need more than that and it should be enough to pay for a comfortable lifestyle.
Getting there is the tricky part.
I make $115k per year, my wife makes another $20k or so, we have one kid, a tiny house in a slightly sketch part of our Midwestern city that I bought a decade ago when it was almost cheap, and both our cars are paid off… and we’re treading water financially. I don’t know how anybody my age is affording big houses and new cars, unless it’s just by snowballing debt at an alarming pace. I’m already underfunding my 401k just to maintain some liquidity.
120k what? Bananas per hour?
You are not as funny as you think you are.
I’m not trying to be funny. As a non-American am I supposed to assume that everyone is talking about US dollars? Why don’t people just specify units?
It’s the world reserve currency, it’s a safe bet to assume it’s USD when people are talking money unless specified otherwise
No, you’re confused. K is the currency, they only need 120 of them.
Salary? No. Stipend, yes. Give me enough to comfortably live on and pursue interests and hobbies with no requirement for work. That’s the closest money would get to making me happy.
UBI
DING DING DING DING
Enough to cover my living expenses, working expenses, retirement fund, savings, etc. at about 8-12 hours of work/week.
For varying levels of retirement and savings, this is what non-agricultural humans have done for most of the history of our species.
Time travel has truly revolutionized our understanding of pre-civilized human culture.
If only there was some way to leave traces and/or study left traces. Would definitely cut down on all the time travel pollution
Bills plus car fuel and maintenance plus the cost of good quality food plus full coverage of medical insurance plus deductible (yay America) plus mortgage payments plus 10-20% on top of that.
Basically, cover the cost of very comfortable living and take the financial worry out of being alive.
Edit: echoing other comments, this would not make me happy directly. It would open up more possibilities to pursue the things in life that bring/grow happiness.
Enough that I didn’t have to worry about not being able to pay rent and bills.
One that would leave me not thinking about it anymore
Laid back, with my mind on my honey and my honey on my mind
Hey you guys, how for away do you think that mirage is?
Yep. One’s lifestyle (almost) always expands to fit their means.
As soon as you make what feels “comfortable,” you’ll want another 10-20k.
It depends where you live but it was figured out to be about 110k a decade ago on average in the US. Where I live that sounds pretty close maybe 140. However, I am biased since I truly don’t want to own a house. Would rather rent.
I really hated renting, I would rather pay someone to manage my own house than put up with landlords again
I don’t have a solid answer.
Money alone isn’t going to make me happy. Yeah, it removes a lot of one type of stress. But it can also be a trap. Like, I’m doing solidly okay in my job, but it’s enough that I can’t easily quit and start over in a different career, even though I stopped caring about this one a decade ago. And a high-paying job can come with a lot of other stressors, things that keep you working harder and longer hours than you otherwise would.
$100k would probably seem pretty good for a long time, given where I currently live. If I had to live in NYC, I’d probably say more like $500k.
I make 120k in a medium sized city where the median income is about 75k. I’m pretty content, tbh. I also don’t buy shit i don’t need. Most of my expenses are my hobbies. I do have a lot of hobbies. But I still make enough every two weeks where I’m able to stash it away in a savings account.
Now if I only knew how to and had the balls to invest beyond retirement accounts.
Investing tip #1: don’t take advise from strangers on the Internet
Investing tip #2: get a zero commission trading app, like Fidelity or TD Ameritrade, and just squirrel away a bit of each paycheck/monthly/whatever into a low expense ratio, broad market ETF, like VOO (https://etfdb.com/etf/VOO/#etf-ticker-profile)
Start slow, but contribute regularly. Keep enough cash in the bank for emergencies, and don’t bother even thinking about trying to “time the market” - just set it and forget it.
Yeah I think my issue had always been no knowledge of how to pick even the right etf. For example, how did you even land on that one?
Criteria for that one: low expense ratio, so you aren’t losing (much) money to the fund manager, large market cap, so you are less succeptible to shock, and the ETF probably isn’t going anywhere, and as a S&P 500 ETF, it holds stocks from all 500 businesses in the S&P 500 (weighted by the respective market cap of said businesses), so it’s not tied to any single sector, making it more resilient for long-term investment.
$13k/yr post tax, just depends on how much work I’d have to do for it
A question like this could be an intro to a shady MLM pitch. Break the ice, get the conversation going and gain a sense of the range of numbers to make up for earnings examples.
