Half of California:
(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
this post was submitted on 25 Jun 2025
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Half by land, much more by population. California’s basic cost of living is insane. $150k would be “barely scraping by in a studio apartment” within 100 miles of any major city.
With the exception of places like Anzo Borrego, but there's a reason for that. Horrible summers and winters.
I just need a dwelling and a guarantee of food to live comfortably. If I didn't have to pay for that I wouldn't need $150k/year. 🤷♂️
I don't nees to make more, everything else needs to cost less. 😠
My wife and I make about $100k/yr combined. I can absolutely confirm that 50% more money will go directly into making our lives more comfortable.
The other way to read this data is that 75% (a sizable majority) of people feel they can be comfortable on less than $150k. I also suspect this strongly correlates to location. Someone living in Washington, DC is going to need a lot more to feel comfortable than someone living in Bumblefuck, MO.
This title is so dumb. Just say 26% of Americans.
Yay just twice my salary.
Why is the cost of living so incredibly high in the US?
It cannot be because of consumer goods. Because both Europe and the US have similar prices for those since they are made by international companies.
It cannot be food, the US is a big exporter of food. And those exports go to countries with lower costs of living.
It cannot be vacations. You could "just" fly to Europe and have european vacation prices.
Is it just housing and healthcare?
1 in 4 sounds more than ~25% but it’s 25% that’s a minority that feel this way, it’s not a reflection of most of our realities. Yes the cost of living is too high but ~75% don’t feel we need $150,000 to be comfortable
That's fair. Although I need to point out that the title literally says "more than 1 in 4" which makes it kinda funny.
Well, it would be incredibly naive to omit or not factor in all the tax-raping. You make $150K, good for you, but you don't get to keep that. Using my state, I Googled how much money is stolen when you earn $150K...they steal $45,442. Leaving you with $104,558. How generous of them. 🙄
So the average person wants to make $150K annually SO THEY CAN KEEP just slightly over $100K. Then yes, the health care & the bills & the savings & the spending. It can chew through $100K quickly enough.
Ignoring all the taxation is theft bullshit, my original question is how is america so expensive that living wages are considered 8x of the highest minimum wages of europe (Less than 20k).
America has lower taxes than any European country. So that cannot be the answer.
oh fun, an actual "taxation is theft" person. i'm assuming you don't drive?
On one hand, it’s reasonable for Americans to be upset with their taxes because they pay so much and get so little in return. On the other hand, you never see these people complaining about how so much their taxes go to corporate handouts and plunder instead of useful things like socialized health care, child care, housing, etc. instead it becomes all about them personally. It’s very telling. The US is a land of mentally ill sycophants.
I drive more than you, and I see the point you're trying to make but it doesn't work in my state.
Wow I can't believe how little you understand about what taxes are and how they work. The US has some of the lowest tax rates compared to its peers.
Those are pretty low taxes
That's a large portion of it yes. Don't forget that 150k salary is before taxes. The cost of food has sky rocketed lately. Don't forget transportation. If you live in a big city you might take a bus or Metro, but for most Americans there isn't a good network so add gas, car insurance, and possibly a car payment if you don't own. And if you have kids get ready for child care expenses, unless you have a stay at home parent... But then you only have one income. Rent, utilities, little glasses for Timmy, cell phone bills and those TV subscriptions you're slowly sailing the high seas on as they nickel and dime you. It all adds up.
Europeans also buy little glasses for Timmy and such. I don't think the price of those kind of things is much different. Same for utilities, phone and TV. The one I'm most uncertain about is utilities, but I believe electricity at least is usually cheaper in america.
The car one is fair. Although it's true that in Europe there's also tons of people on cars, public transit is at least a valid option, unlike in much of the US.
Taxes is not though. Taxes in america are usually way lower than in Europe.
So transportation+healthcare are the only expenses that are clearly more expensive in america. Housing being highly dependant on location is hard to compare nation-based. And it's also the biggest component. I'd be curious to see the actual "living wage" difference between two places, one Europeans and another American with similar housing prices.
There are cost of living calculators that give very basic averages of areas. I can tell when I lived in NC I paid about 30$ for car insurance. But when I lived in Detroit MI I payed about 300$. Monthly. That was about 7-8 years ago. Apartments in my small little town in PA are going for about 1500-1800$ for a 1 bedroom apartment. For healthcare I pay about 200$ a week. That's for a family of 3.
Housing is expensive in the UK as well isn't it? Most times I hear prices they seem pretty comparable. Just like the US there is also a large variation by location of course, cities completely unaffordable and towns just very expensive.
Around me is ~65m² bungalows, £225-275k in a town quite a long way from London, along the south coast. London prices scare me so I try and pretend nothing exists within the M25.
Yeah, sounds about right if you want to be able to be comfortable at home and have money for maybe a modest vacation once a year.
I make way less, but it would be nice to be able to afford to travel at least once a year. Not worry about car repairs setting me back etc etc.
Don't forget any shot at a reasonable retirement too
I’m planning to die to reduce my spend.
That is, most literally, my plan. Not going to suicide, but either the environment or shit politics will take me out before I'm too elderly.
And I'm not being snarky. No healthcare and seeing the ecosystem collapse has done me in. And for the young, you haven't seen the shit I've seen. Our systems are racing towards a cliff. You'd be even madder if you had lived my young life and seen where we're at now.
I'm either going to die in the water riots or I'll be shot dead by a Google Amazon compliance assistance team for using an adblocker.
Yeah, this hits home all right. I'm Gen-X, and while I always got by OK on a very low income even here in Seattle, it was entirely due to have a very modest lifestyle and the sheer luck of that rarest of Seattle unicorns, reasonable rent.
The stars aligned, and over the course of only a few years I've suddenly moved into a very comfortable 6 figure salary, and oh holy jebus words cannot express how much stress just…evaporates…when you've got enough to cover all expenses and easily sock away some money too.
Of course, that was promptly replaced by a new stress, the realization that I might just possibly thread the needle and end up with a comfortable retirement—not rich mind you, just not in penury—but I now had to save, save, save, save, save.
Work affords me access to both a 403B and a 457B, which has helped immensely in my quest to get savings built up appropriate for my age bracket, but all that anxiety is back now that I've got a retirement fund that was on track, but now the orange twitiot is doing his damndest to wreck our economy, likely for good. I'm just waiting to watch everything I've invested go up in smoke. It's nerve-wracking, but hey, at least I'm Gen-X and know exactly what it's like to live with existential dread. After a childhood fearing nuclear holocaust at any moment, this new anxiety is practically a cakewalk!
Oh, who am I kidding? It still sucks.
Fuck.
Just want to say, to a fellow slacker, I get you. OTOH, my nerves aren't too wrecked yet. Like you, I know how to be poor, but fuck me, I didn't expect an environmental and political holocaust to drop on my old ass.
Who cares what people "feel"? It has nothing to do with "feelings". Just calculate how much it actually costs to live comfortably, and you'll find that $150k works.
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wow, what afucking shithole of an economic system, huh?
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