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Living on $100k a Year

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Re: Living on $100k a Year

#151

Post by scarface74 »

nunez wrote: post #129
scarface74 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well if you live in northeast GA (as do I) you know that a software developer with 5-10 years of experience can easily make $110-140K and that easily affords you to live in some of the nicest part of Atlanta. True. We aren't around "900 of the world's top 1000" companies, but in the 20 years I've lived here, I've never found there to be a lack of development jobs. As a single person, you could easily live comfortably…

Not everyone wants to work for a huge corporation, where most of those jobs with the salaries that you cite are located.

I have only worked for a large corporation for two out of the 21 years I've been working. I'll never do that again.

Benefits may be better at a larger company but salaries are about the same.

Even so, don't complain that you can't live off of 100K. They are purposefully making lifestyle choices that the median household making 70K a year can't make.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#152

Post by scarface74 »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #146
scarface74 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poor people already often can't afford healthy food. What do you think happens when food prices go up because farmers have to pay 5x as much to attract labor? Yes there are farmers who are offering five times as much and still can't find reliable labor. On the other hand, I'm sure overprocessed sodium filled food and fast food will become a lot more attractive than even what it is today.

>Poor people already often can't afford healthy food. That's a serious problem, if only there was some way to raise their wages. >farmers have to pay 5x as much to attract labor Yep, there it is. Some of those poor people will transition to these new higher wages in farming. This will reduce labor supply in other sectors which will push wages up across the board. Rinse and repeat for other industries full of illegal…

That's not what's happening. Americans have alternatives to hard manual labor - welfare, "disability", food stamps etc.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/05/15/north...

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#153

Post by Consultant32452 »

scarface74 wrote: post #152
Consultant32452 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Poor people already often can't afford healthy food. That's a serious problem, if only there was some way to raise their wages. >farmers have to pay 5x as much to attract labor Yep, there it is. Some of those poor people will transition to these new higher wages in farming. This will reduce labor supply in other sectors which will push wages up across the board. Rinse and repeat for other industries full of illegal…

That's not what's happening. Americans have alternatives to hard manual labor - welfare, "disability", food stamps etc. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/05/15/north...

If welfare and food stamps are better than performing farm labor then farm wages and working conditions clearly haven't improved enough yet.

I accept your data/claims at face value, that illegal immigration and temporary worker visas have suppressed wages of the poor in some sectors so much that even increasing the wage 5x is insufficient to attract native laborers. What we disagree on is whether or not that wage suppression is a good thing.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#154

Post by libertyEQ »

killercup wrote: post #61
azinman2 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention high quality education through university.

Yeah, that's something I always forget about when talking to people from the US: I don't have any student loans. A semester at a university in Germany costs around 250€ (plus housing and food), so it's hard to get to a point where you need 10 years to pack back loans. I had a part time job all through university and even saved up a reasonable amount of money.

Does everybody in Germany get to go to college for for 250€ ?

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#155

Post by nunez »

scarface74 wrote: post #151
nunez wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not everyone wants to work for a huge corporation, where most of those jobs with the salaries that you cite are located.

I have only worked for a large corporation for two out of the 21 years I've been working. I'll never do that again. Benefits may be better at a larger company but salaries are about the same. Even so, don't complain that you can't live off of 100K. They are purposefully making lifestyle choices that the median household making 70K a year can't make.

> Even so, don't complain that you can't live off of 100K.

I agree!

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#157

Post by abalashov »

harryh wrote: post #112
ErikVandeWater wrote: post #26

What do people think about federal taxes (mostly) not being adjusted for cost of living? It serves as a disincentive for moving to the cities, but is that a good thing or a bad thing?

It's a good thing. Living is a high COL city is a luxury. One shouldn't get a tax break because of their particular luxury purchases.

Without taking a position on the original COL-adjusted tax question:

Living in a high-cost city isn't necessarily a luxury. Many people who do would prefer not to, but cities concentrate economic opportunities and that is why people migrate to them. This is why urbanisation is a byproduct of economic development pretty much everywhere.

Case in point: I lived in Atlanta for ten years and recently moved back to Athens, a small university town about an hour and some change east. There's no question that it's much cheaper to live here. But if I wanted an actual job in my field, I'd pretty much have to live in Atlanta - that's why I moved there in the first place.

I'm fortunate enough to be self-employed and to no longer care, as the vast majority of my customers are out of state. But make no mistake, there are vanishingly few tech job opportunities here - and this is a fairly educated college town.

And as we know, IT is fairly democratic in the degree to which it can be done remotely. But if you specialise in finance, entertainment, fashion, big law, aerospace, or a variety of other areas, there are certain places you more or less have to be. The American economy is eminently decentralised compared to that of most countries, but still - the cities have the lion's share of white collar, professional middle-income jobs.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#158

Post by Y7ZCQtNo39 »

scarface74 wrote: post #122
notyourday wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A take-away I had from Trump's election was that there still is a lot of economic struggle in the interior of the US. Nobody seems to be interested in improving the situation, and very few of these communities have the means and/or the willingness to move towards greener pastures. Is there anything that can be done to improve the situation? I work in a typical liberal as hell company in a very expensive city. The l…

I didn't realize how outright prejudice I was when it came to the stereotypical Trump true believer until after this election. It just never crossed my mind. I'm African American grew up middle class but I saw and interacted with plenty of poorer minorities but never poorer Whites - I went to a predominantly white private school, but by definition if they were at private school, they weren't poor. Went into tech and…

Hillary Clinton had Donald Trump beat by millions in the popular vote. I suspected it was more or less the same conservative base, with Democratic voters less enthusiastic in rural/suburban America.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#159

Post by Tiksi »

nunez wrote: post #131
scarface74 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is really no reason for an American to have a unaffordable student loan. They could easily go to a state school instead of a private college and save thousands.

That’s not the full equation. There are a lot of jobs out there that you straight up cannot get out of college without going somewhere “prestigious.” That translates into YEARS worth of lost income and a completely different/lower earning career trajectory. Yes, some folks manage to get into FAANG out of state school, but that isn’t the norm. It’s damn near impossible to get into investment banking or management cons…

I mean, isn't that the only equation? If your income covers it, by definition not unaffordable. But there's people who get degrees that don't give a surefire way to pay back the tuition who go to those schools too.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#160

Post by Tiksi »

abalashov wrote: post #121
scarface74 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is really no reason for an American to have a unaffordable student loan. They could easily go to a state school instead of a private college and save thousands.

I don't know that it's quite that simple; for one, tuition dominates college cost discussions while actual costs consist in large part of living expenses, i.e. room, board, food, misc. Second, there are some impressively expensive state schools out there, and not all have especially affordable in-state tuition, particularly not to those of working class background. Still, I agree with the general idea you're reaching…

I often hear people refer to tuition + room and board as just tuition, especially in the context of student loans. And "money paid to the school" is ~= tuition, even if it's not itemized that way.
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