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Comment by frgtpsswrdlame | Hacker News Reader

>when I was in college

Show me one person in this country with two kids who makes $14/hr and doesn't feel like they're struggling. College is easy, I survived on <$9/hr in college but you don't see me pretending that what is supportive of a college lifestyle and what is supportive of normal people with normal lives are the same thing.

>Had I lived more rural in an area where entry level homes are <200k and not 600k+, that would of gone much farther.

It would've gone a bit further but certainly not 'much.'

>That being said, as an avid hiker, I spend a significant chunk of my time in places best labeled as "Nowhere, really".

Somehow I think even you realize that using 'I hike' as a proxy for 'I have familiarity with rural areas' is pretty lame.

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People who make 100k per year feel like they are struggling. Their feelings about their finances place the company under no obligation to pay them more.

I know a lot of people back home, in rural Maine, who have a two-income household where each makes $15/hour, and they get by alright with a house and a couple of kids.

Of course, a decent house in that area runs $80-100k, whereas the same house in the area I live outside of Boston would cost $400k, and you couldn't buy a property with an equivalent amount of land attached at any price in the Bay area.

Yeah but that's my point. They each make $15/hr and they're 'alright.' A few of the other commenters who have chimed in here also match what my experience has been, mainly that $15/hr in rural areas isn't bad but it's not really good either. It allows you to get into the bottom end of the middle class but that's about it. It's certainly not 'kingly' and usually doesn't provide the sort of safety net people need to really feel comfortable either.

So should we be subsidizing everyone so they "live like kings"?

My son is making about $30K a year ($2000 a month) and I helped him do his budget so I know what his expenses are:

Rent - $600

Car note - $300

Car Insurance - $250

Utilities - $350

That leaves him about $500 a month for "everything else".

Yes that puts him on the edge and thanks to the ACA he's still covered under our insurance until he turns 26 and if he needs a car repair we help him.

Two conclusions:

I think we should have universal health care as a nation.

If we had better mass transit, people wouldn't need cars and it would make finding a job easier.

According to the gross up calculator at psycheckcity.com he would need to make around $16.50/hour or $34000 a year to have enough cushion for things that happen. Strangely enough, that was also the salary I needed 20 years ago before I could make it on my own without asking my parents for help. I made that my first year out of college as a computer operator.

This is in metro Atlanta not podunk nowhere USA.

why are you assuming that there is only one income?

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