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Living on $100k a Year

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Re: Living on $100k a Year

#161

Post by Tiksi »

rayiner wrote: post #105
vostok wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American, I incur the below costs: * $18,000/year 401k contribution (similar to pension, but I take on the market risk) * $5,500/year IRA contribution (similar to pension, but I take on the market risk) * $200,000 total in tuition per child at my alma mater. * Health insurance costs. This can easily be $12,000/year or more for a family. None of these are included in the tax amounts that we pay. This is also not…

German social security is roughly similar to ours. So if you want to live comfortably in retirement, you have to put extra money away there too. As for health insurance: employers cover on average 71% of insurance premiums for families; at the $100k mark, it's probably significantly higher than that. Finally, as for tuition--you get cheap tuition in Germany because: (1) people making 30,000 Euros are getting taxed a…

> If we taxed our middle class what Germany taxes its middle class, we could afford cheap tuition too.

While I'm in favor of free/cheap education, this made me think of a convincing argument for the student loan / US system. Those who benefit from the education are "taxed" for it in the form of loan payments for a few years, those who don't benefit (directly) from the education are not.

I guess ideally you could balance the benefit to society vs the benefit to the individual getting the education and subsidize it proportionally. But that's obviously not practical so we should probably push closer to the society end of the margin of error.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#162

Post by vostok »

Tiksi wrote: post #161
rayiner wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

German social security is roughly similar to ours. So if you want to live comfortably in retirement, you have to put extra money away there too. As for health insurance: employers cover on average 71% of insurance premiums for families; at the $100k mark, it's probably significantly higher than that. Finally, as for tuition--you get cheap tuition in Germany because: (1) people making 30,000 Euros are getting taxed a…

> If we taxed our middle class what Germany taxes its middle class, we could afford cheap tuition too. While I'm in favor of free/cheap education, this made me think of a convincing argument for the student loan / US system. Those who benefit from the education are "taxed" for it in the form of loan payments for a few years, those who don't benefit (directly) from the education are not. I guess ideally you could bala…

I agree that it's not so simple.

> Those who benefit from the education are "taxed" for it in the form of loan payments for a few years, those who don't benefit (directly) from the education are not.

Not only that, but the benefits of free/cheap education largely accrue to the middle and upper classes whereas the lower class also has significantly higher taxes under the European system.

I'm most familiar with the UK where universities like Oxford, Cambridge, LSE, Imperial, etc. are all overwhelmingly middle class. I'm sure the pattern is repeated in Europe as well.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#163

Post by Yetanfou »

notyourday wrote: post #108
pjc50 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What evidence is there that protectionism and further raising of the immigration barrier would actually solve any of these problems?

I'm going to presume that your family has a combined income of 100k or more. Lets engage in a very simple intellectual exercise: remove all immigration restrictions and all protections that we have. Do you believe that a) your family in a short term would be better off/not different/the worse off? b) your family in a long term would be better off/not different worse off?

Sweden is a good example of what happens in scenario b). The effects are immediate:

- shortage of housing

- ballooning social security budgets

- extreme long waiting times to get health care service

- a marked increase in crime, especially in certain categories (sex crimes, robbery, arson)

and long-lasting:

- taxes need to increase across the board with ~2% (in a country already burdened with close to the highest taxes in the world)

- costs for state pensions stand to double in the coming 20-30 years

- the real estate market will need to adjust to the new situation (oversupply in the high priced sector, a shortage in the low and medium price sectors)

- the labour market does not fit the education level of the new population. Available jobs require higher education levels than most immigrants have or can reach leading to high unemployment among immigrants. The extensive social security system and the related high taxation level takes away incentives - and in some cases actually presents negative incentives [1] - to go from state benefits to paid employment.

The situation in Sweden is made worse by the fact that the country officially does not mandate nor stimulate assimilation of immigrants into Swedish society while the native Swedish (and assimilated migrant) population do expect immigrants to assimilate to a large extent, leading to increased segregation [2].

[1] It is fully possible in Sweden to end up with a lower spendable income when moving from state benefits to paid employment, mostly due to the fact that those on state benefits often get extra benefits for specific purposes (e.g. housing costs).

[1] Sweden does not have a single monolithic constitution, instead relying on four fundamental laws (the Instrument of Government (Swedish: Regeringsformen), the Freedom of the Press Act (Swedish: Tryckfrihetsförordningen), the Fundamental Law on Freedom of Expression (Swedish: Yttrandefrihetsgrundlagen) and the Act of Succession (Swedish: Successionsordningen)). An 1974 amendment to the Instrument of Government act states that immigrants can choose to keep and strengthen their ethnic and cultural identity instead of assimilating into Swedish culture.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#164

Post by Tiksi »

vostok wrote: post #162
Tiksi wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we taxed our middle class what Germany taxes its middle class, we could afford cheap tuition too. While I'm in favor of free/cheap education, this made me think of a convincing argument for the student loan / US system. Those who benefit from the education are "taxed" for it in the form of loan payments for a few years, those who don't benefit (directly) from the education are not. I guess ideally you could bala…

I agree that it's not so simple. > Those who benefit from the education are "taxed" for it in the form of loan payments for a few years, those who don't benefit (directly) from the education are not. Not only that, but the benefits of free/cheap education largely accrue to the middle and upper classes whereas the lower class also has significantly higher taxes under the European system. I'm most familiar with the UK…

>the lower class also has significantly higher taxes

This could be fixed by increasing the taxes on the middle class and up, leaving the lower class taxes the same.

>are all overwhelmingly middle class.

There are likely factors other than cost for people from lower classes to going to university at a lower rate, but it's the opportunity to do so that's important and cost is often the biggest impediment to it.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#165

Post by vostok »

Tiksi wrote: post #164
vostok wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that it's not so simple. > Those who benefit from the education are "taxed" for it in the form of loan payments for a few years, those who don't benefit (directly) from the education are not. Not only that, but the benefits of free/cheap education largely accrue to the middle and upper classes whereas the lower class also has significantly higher taxes under the European system. I'm most familiar with the UK…

>the lower class also has significantly higher taxes This could be fixed by increasing the taxes on the middle class and up, leaving the lower class taxes the same. >are all overwhelmingly middle class. There are likely factors other than cost for people from lower classes to going to university at a lower rate, but it's the opportunity to do so that's important and cost is often the biggest impediment to it.

Yeah I definitely agree with that solution.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#166

Post by twelve40 »

incadenza wrote: post #28

I don't mean to sound unsympathetic, but it would be nice to hear what is eating into their income so much. My thought pattern here is that if you can't manage on $100,000 a year then you'll have the same problem at $200,000 a year, so on and so forth.

in the Bay Area 100k pre-tax per family is close to poverty level. Unless you inherited/lucked out with a house, or settled for a perpetual rental, you will have to choose between shit school for your kids, with used condoms on the playground (I know because I lived in those places) or a 1.5 hour one-way daily commute. You can try to blame the 100k people for not moving to cheaper states, but who is going to do most of the work?

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#167

Post by scarface74 »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #153
scarface74 wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 sup…

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

It's farm labor - how much can working conditions improve while you are actually doing your job? If I had a choice between making minimum wage and getting government assistance and doing back breaking labor at $20 an hour, I'm not sure that I wouldn't take the minimum wage job and make the commensurate lifestyle choices - roommates, public transportation instead of a car, or if I were so inclined being a part of the underground economy.

How many unemployed people are physically capable of doing that kind of work?

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#168

Post by notyourday »

Y7ZCQtNo39 wrote: post #158
scarface74 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In the rules of the NFL team that has the ball longest is not the team that wins the game - team that scores does. Those are the rules.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#169

Post by scarface74 »

notyourday wrote: post #168
Y7ZCQtNo39 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In the rules of the NFL team that has the ball longest is not the team that wins the game - team that scores does. Those are the rules.

I'm not sure that it's a bad thing that the electoral college is used for deciding the presidential election and that the senate isn't representational of the population. Even considering that "my side" loss twice because of it.

The needs of the least populous states - trump country -have been ignored in the national conversation for too long by both parties. Trump was just paying lip service to their needs and is actively selling them out. But no one else was even paying lip service.

I'm not part of Trump's core demographics - both a minority and part of the "liberal tech elite" but a lot of his policies will help me a lot more than they will help people who voted for him.

Yeah I'm ignoring the so called "moral majority", there is no hope for them. Hopefully changing demographics will continue to make them even less relevant.

Re: Living on $100k a Year

#170

Post by uoaei »

libertyEQ wrote: post #154
killercup wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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€ ?

If you're accepted, you only pay "administrative fees" per semester. Covering textbooks, food, housing are on you though there are numerous stipends you can apply for and get.

This applies not just to German citizens but to anyone who studies in Germany. The stipend sources may be slightly different where you come from though.

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