I know everyone here making $150,000 is somehow scraping by and thinks $100K is nothing but it's top 7% and unless you are a financial idiot you should have no problem getting by on that salary. $200K puts you in the top 2%.
I know everyone here making $150,000 is somehow scraping by and thinks $100K is nothing but it's top 7% and unless you are a financial idiot you should have no problem getting by on that salary. $200K puts you in the top 2%.
The zip codes where $100,000 is a commonplace salary are the same zip codes where $100,000 has very little buying power in the real estate market. It's all about housing.
kokoro wrote:
The zip codes where $100,000 is a commonplace salary are the same zip codes where $100,000 has very little buying power in the real estate market. It's all about housing.
So live where other people make 100K instead of trying to live where people make 200K.
Think of it like a 5K time. By percentile, a 20 minute 5K is extraordinary. I don't know exactly what percent of the population could go out the door and run that fast right now, but it has to be less than 7% (I'd guess less than 1% could do this).
But is 20 minutes really a good 5K time? Any young, fit male with a little bit of natural ability who consistently trains hard and focusses on getting faster will easily run much faster than that.
So yeah, not many people earn $100K, but it is attainable for people who work hard and focus on the goal of earning 6 figures.
riccc wrote:
I know everyone here making $150,000 is somehow scraping by and thinks $100K is nothing but it's top 7% and unless you are a financial idiot you should have no problem getting by on that salary. $200K puts you in the top 2%.
Make 100k in Mississippi and youre crazy rich....make that in a ski town in colorado or cali coast or nyc and you are poor
Demographics wrote:
riccc wrote:
I know everyone here making $150,000 is somehow scraping by and thinks $100K is nothing but it's top 7% and unless you are a financial idiot you should have no problem getting by on that salary. $200K puts you in the top 2%.
Make 100k in Mississippi and youre crazy rich....make that in a ski town in colorado or cali coast or nyc and you are poor
Then don't live in NYC, idiot.
I live in the Midwest making right around that, would like to move to West coast but it's so expensive. My life in the Midwest is way better. Anywhere decent in the west coast a house that's nothing special to midwestern standards is going to be $750k+. The mortgage payment for 30 years would be $40k or more each year. And when you're making $100k your total tax rate is over 20-25% for fed+state, so your post-tax income is in the $75k range. Now take out that $40k+ and you're around $35k left to spend in the year. Oh wait, you've got to save for retirement. Let's just put a modest $7k away, small percentage of income. Now we're at $28k. Now gas prices and car insurance are a lot higher on west coast too, there's another $7k to bring us down to $21k to spend. Car depreciates $3k per year. Now we're at $18k. Have kids? Daycare rates are higher on west coast too because their rent is higher for the building, I'll way undercut it at $10k per year. Now we're left at $8k to spend. Oh yeah, we have to eat food, so that takes up everything else. So any spending on clothes or fun things has to come from the spouse.
I'll stay in the midwest and spend $15k+ less each year on my midwest house (that is nicer, too) and use that for other things. Maybe with all of my savings and investments I can retire early?
20 minute 5K wrote:
So yeah, not many people earn $100K, but it is attainable for people who work hard and focus on the goal of earning 6 figures.
I really wish someone would one day define the notion of 'hard work' as applies to earning money or being successful in one's field / life. You hear this cliche everywhere but it has no meaning.
Hard work in athletic terms, easy to understand. You stress the body a certain amount, then rest, you get stonger. But hard work in terms of business success, what does that even mean? What does it look like? What does it mean to tell someone who works in an office this cliche about hard work? What is hard work for that man? Staying late? Working weekends? Most of success is about blind luck, not hard work. Being in the right place at the right time. And / or being extremely charismatic or good looking.
Enough with this hard work makes you rich bull. Unless you are a fruit picker getting paid by the pound, how successful or rich you are, IN TODAY'S WORLD, has absolutely nothing to do with how 'hard' you are working.
Mo' money, mo' problems
Work hard and focus on the goal of earning 6 figures. You seem to be ignoring the second part. Right. Working hard without a plan isn't going to get you anywhere. So don't work hard without a plan.
This could take different forms depending on what type of profession you are interested in. For example, if you work hard enough in undergrad to get into medical school, you are essentially guaranteed an income well into the six figures.
Good employment opportunities are becoming more concentrated in cities where the housing and transportation can't keep up. Thus the housing prices are going up faster than the economy is actually growing and traffic gets worse. So 100k sounds like a lot compared to most of the USA but most of those jobs are in places where 100k gets you a small apartment and a bus commute.
Success is also about putting yourself out there, being visible, and networking every single moment of your life. The $ will follow.
Work smart, not hard...
Hard work meaning being diligent to learn what you need to learn and putting in the time. If you're unhappy with your job making $40k per year then do some research on some job that makes more than that, and learn the skills you need to do that job. The work started in high school, getting good grades to learn what you need to know to get into the college program you want to get into, that college program is needed to learn the skills required to get acceptance to the job you want. And it doesn't stop there, continue learning and gaining more skills to keep moving up. OR you can learn how to do something that pays decent, and put in the hours to make the amount of money you want. Like being a contractor for anything like carpentry, plumbing, eletricians, learn some trade and work more than 40 hours per week and you can make a bunch of money. Don't get cozy in your 40 hour week job doing mindless work and then complain about it. It probably pays low because millions and millions of people can do that job and are willing to do that job.
The reason people end up feeling like 100k isnt that much is because of the amount of debt that most are required to take on if they don't have parents that can help them out financially until they are making that 100k. At least speaking for myself, my wife and I make just over 100k and yeah we are necessarily 'scraping by' as much as someone making much less, but when adding in both our student loans, house, child care costs etc... it sure doesnt feel like a lot. Then again, I probably am a financial idiot, growing up poor and not really getting my sh!t together until later in life.
Ok, so where's the 'hard' come in? This all just sounds like regular work to me. Have an interest, and follow it. Study in school, sure. Get good grades, sure. What part of any of this supplies the 'hard' modifier in the term 'hard work'? Learn something, put in the hours, etc... that's just work. You're doing the work. So where's the hard? Learning something you don't want to learn? Putting in hours you don't want to be working? I just don't get it. You're not working hard. You're just working. And then for a few people, a lucky opportunity comes along on which they are able to capitalise, and they are consequently more successful than some of the other people who are doing the same thing. And they think "yeah I worked harder than they did..." Nope. You were just either lucky or better looking.
I read once somewhere the movie actor steve mcqueen was asked something about his success as a movie actor, or something about how rich he was at the time. And he explained it like this: "I worked hard. And when you work hard, you get the goodies." Explain to me how something like that, a f-ing movie actor, 'works hard' and thus becomes successful. Sorry steve, you simply got the lucky break, and maybe were better looking.
I don’t care how much I make, I care how much in assets I got
Luck is an element though. As a writer I'm trying to get a book published but that industry is all luck and connections.
So you are mostly right in some instances, but not all.
As someone who is far better off than my parents were I can say for certain that it has very little to do with 'hard work' and much more to do with opportunity. You have to be able to have good judgement to understand what type of job you would be good at that will pay well. Not job you want to do, not where your passion is, hard facts. What jobs pay well, what out of those jobs are you capable of doing. Sure it helps if you have some interest in it. For myself that is with computers, sure I have a certain amount of passion with technology but actual work in IT is not something I necessarily have a passion for. But it is something I am capable at and pays well.
That said I think the number 1 thing I've seen with people growing up where I did is actually with following through. So many people don't follow through on opportunities. They will say things like 'I am going to go to trade school to be a plumber' etc.. but then don't do it. They realize what jobs pay good, and which things they would be capable or incapable of doing but most people in that situation (financially struggling) just don't follow through on things that would lead to opportunity or take opportunities when they are there.
Hardloper wrote:
So 100k sounds like a lot compared to most of the USA but most of those jobs are in places where 100k gets you a small apartment and a bus commute.
LOL on the bus. I've never heard of any $100K workers riding the bus unless the bus was privately owned by their employer.
Yeah but here on Letsrun the median income is 250k.