re: One-Third of Americans Making $250,000 Live Paycheck-to-Paycheck

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grocery $3k

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What are y'all eating??

We spend 1.5k a month on groceries AND fuel, which includes 1 Costco run a month and 1-2 HEB runs a week, and I am very liberal with our HEB spend.

Not an MD but in that top income bracket. Many people spend money like water -- nice home, nice cars, nice boat, etc. Money goes quick when you're dropping 10k/month just on your house and toys. That doesn't even include food, vacations, discretionary spending, miscellaneous expenses, and the cost to raise kids.

I’d say physicians are one of the few groups I could forgive making this much money and struggling. They start off at a much later stage in life making money compared to most and probably had to get comfortable living in debt during the run up. They should still be financially stable/sound by the end of their thirties if they play their cards right, though.

For everyone else it boggles my mind that they could pull down that kind of dough and not be AT LEAST stable. I could see having a house note of 30-50k a year, 10-20k of vehicle notes, 20-30k of daycare/private school, and then let’s say you spent 30k more on all other insurance/utilities/food/gas. That’s at most 130k in after tax dollars for a very luxurious lifestyle. You would probably still have some money left over for a few small trips/dinner dates and could downsize the house/cars a bit if you wanted to do even more.

People shouldn’t be struggling to get by at these incomes. They put themselves in bad situations and have no one to blame but themselves.

Agreed. I'm just trying to stuff the money somewhere to make sense of this mindset. Even if your "house poor" you should be getting some equity in the house. Car notes are probably the biggest culprit outside of "hobbies". That and people who earn that high being so busy they eat out for every meal.

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We need a new thread of how to get to 250k/ year.

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Own a business or sales. Working a salaried job to make that much takes a long time if you're in the right field.

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I’ve got a good friend who will soon be a full time radiologist and I’m cautious of how he’s about to manage his finances. He’s had a decade+ of school and is about to go from making an average living to a top percentile income overnight. Psychologically, I can imagine it will sort of feel like the lottery hit but it’s a dangerous period financially. The habits established now can become difficult to break.

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I recommend to these folks to make it automatic. Have retirement, savings, investments, HSA, student loans , etc taken out before they even look at the check. Then, budget from there.

Take the mortgage offers they are going to throw at him and cut it in half or a third.

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Not sure about 3K for grocery, but if they are maxing out their 401Ks that's another 3.3K per month add in student loans, car notes, car insurance and gas

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If you are saving 40k a year, not living paycheck to paycheck (except by choice).

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Posted on 6/4/22 at 6:13 am to Tigerbiscuits
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What are y'all eating??

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I'll take "What are Tigerbiscuits?" for $1000, Alex.

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