Hacker News Reader

Comment by bob33212 | Hacker News Reader

Humans naturally anchor to their social network. If those people grew up in rural West Virginia with coal miner family income they would tell you that 250k/year is wealthy.

You have to actively resist this anchoring behavior. You have to remind yourself that just because your neighbor has a 50k car, it doesn't mean that your 10k car is not a good fit for you.

View on HN

I came from a poor area. I used to think 80k/yr was rich.

Time passed, I got work in Silicon valley with a wife and kids. Living there I think 500k would be middle class. Not even upper middle class.

Perspectives change as you are exposed

80k/yr CAN be rich, it all depends on location. 80k/yr would be poverty in the valley, most of that money going to just having shelter.

80th percentile household income in Santa Clara County is $200k/yr [0]. The linked dataset doesn't go any higher, but I suspect 500k/year is 95th percentile or above, which puts you in the upper class. Even in the Bay, $500k/yr is the "own two homes and a few Porches" level.

[0] http://www.vitalsigns.mtc.ca.gov/income

If you are single maybe.

I think of a middle class man being what my old man was. Single income, wife stayed home and he provided for everyone. 4 kids.

Good luck having 2 homes and some porsches with only 500k in the valley supporting a wife and kids

A $2.5m mortgage would cost you around $13k a month, Porsche lease less than $1k a month. You've got about $15k a month left in take home pay what in the world are you going to spend that on and still feel middle class?

Just to follow up here.

500k/yr is around 41k a month. Figure you are going to be paying about 40% in taxes or 16,400 a month in taxes you get 24600 left

Considering you just spent 14k on a house and car you get 10,600k left. Groceries for a family in the bay runs around 2k a month so now you are down to 8k a month. Wife needs a car plus you need insurance gas and maintenance. Parking runs what $45 / day or 1350... lunches run around 30/day or 900... you haven't paid for clothes or extra curricular activities ( karate lessons 1k / month )

Family is not cheap, Family in the bay is hella expensive

Are these karate lessons taught by Bruce Lee reincarnate? Because that is the only way anyone is paying $1000 month.

plenty of people support a family on $60k/yr so take the remaining 440k minus taxes and buy two porsches outright. You should be able to save enough for a down-payment on each house given a year of saving.

No one supports a family on 60k a year. Healthcare alone for a family runs 20k/yr plus simply for insurance

You typically get free insurance when you have a job paying 500k/yr...

Its not free. CFO is very aware of your total cost and its starting to show up on W2's.

that's besides that point? When you quote 500k/yr salary that typically includes perks like insurance. But are we really quibbling about $20k in expenses on a 500k salary? Even if I grant you 80k/yr to run your family that still leaves more than enough for your two porsches.

500k/yr is definitely, at least, upper middle in the bay area.

I grew up with an engineer's family income, and 250k still seems pretty wealthy. That puts you in the top 5% of US earners.

I own a Jeep. That thing keeps increasing in value massively on a yearly basis...

/just add up everything I spend on it...

I know you mean well, but people tend to want to fit in with their milieu.

Milieu is made of people. You can improve your milieu by being a leader, not a follower.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com