modern-day Babylon, indeed.

GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

Only a socialist would have two kids they can't afford to raise. You farking commie.

It's a solid chunk of money for one earner. If the other earner is working state-employee style work, that's around 110k per year. Yeah, sounds about right.

0Icky0: Two of the best years of my life I was earning $7,000 a year.

Small house, garden, scooter, near the beach, and hundreds of shfemale Thai university students.

Oooooh yeah.

FTFY

Happiness is just a pleasant thought being dwelt upon.
It isn't a dollar sign, it has a far broader scope. There are people making around 75k that are unhappy as hell.
I read a article a while back that some people decided to drop out of the fast pace cut throat rat race, retire early, live off their investments, buy a 100k or less house in a rural easy going peaceful area and take the time to enjoy life doing their hobbies. They claim to be far happier than they when they were pulling big bucks in a high pressure job.

My parents never gave a dime to me or my sister my sister or I. She paid her way and I never bothered. We're both just fine.

No comment other than I am just enjoying watching Gary have his ass handed to him on this.

Majick Thise: You could triple my pay and I still would not have 75K a year

don't feel bad.. the missues made about $6K last year. Not even enough for groceries.

/serious

tbyte: bhcompy: 75k buys happiness in Douglas County CO(where the median household income is something like 75k and they have great schools and ridiculously low housing prices), but it doesn't buy enough Prozac to even attempt to be happy in So Cal

I'd be happy with 75,000 in So Cal.

Individual? Sure. Household? Not a chance

upright_apes_r_us: Happiness is just a pleasant thought being dwelt upon.
It isn't a dollar sign, it has a far broader scope. There are people making around 75k that are unhappy as hell.
I read a article a while back that some people decided to drop out of the fast pace cut throat rat race, retire early, live off their investments, buy a 100k or less house in a rural easy going peaceful area and take the time to enjoy life doing their hobbies. They claim to be far happier than they when they were pulling big bucks in a high pressure job.

Well yeah, that's the mainstream goal. Make big bucks in the rat race, then retire and live the easy life doing hobbies and such. That's what millions of people do.

tbyte: upright_apes_r_us: Happiness is just a pleasant thought being dwelt upon.
It isn't a dollar sign, it has a far broader scope. There are people making around 75k that are unhappy as hell.
I read a article a while back that some people decided to drop out of the fast pace cut throat rat race, retire early, live off their investments, buy a 100k or less house in a rural easy going peaceful area and take the time to enjoy life doing their hobbies. They claim to be far happier than they when they were pulling big bucks in a high pressure job.

Well yeah, that's the mainstream goal. Make big bucks in the rat race, then retire and live the easy life doing hobbies and such. That's what millions of people do.

The trick is to do it at about 35. It works better if your hobbies include making little stacks of money into bigger stacks of money.

I'm still working on it.

Well them Im just a miserable fark then.

So then doctors and lawyers don't need to make more than 75k a year. Sounds fine to me. Who am I to keep them from being "happy".

This is why I need a new job. College educated and hard working... I don't even make a third of that. Granted I live in a location with a low cost of living... but that doesn't make my student loan or car payments any less.

Hell considering I don't have a family to support or anything... I'd be perfectly happy with half of that. 37.5k? Here? More than enough.

Since my new salary will be 2k/year above that, this makes me happy.

/now if I can just get that $700/month boat-anchor from around my neck.

The money/happiness thing is supposedly logarithmic. Which makes sense, if you give my food stamp eating ass $5k, it's a life changing amount. But someone making $100k is a nice convenience but a fleeting thing.

takes 6 figures, methinks.

FTA

"Social scientists and psychologists have long grappled with how to measure happiness," said James Maddux, a psychology professor at George Mason University, "flaccid or fully erect."

I bet they're surveying people who by and large do not have six-figure student debt hanging around their necks.

I won't be truly happy until all my debt is paid off, and with the direction salaries are going, I predict that to be around the year 2189.

Let's just say that I have a number in mind and I haven't hit it yet.

stiletto_the_wise: I bet they're surveying people who by and large do not have six-figure student debt hanging around their necks.

I won't be truly happy until all my debt is paid off, and with the direction salaries are going, I predict that to be around the year 2189.

community college is your friend, or at least your future spawn's friend

What is sad is that between car loans, mortgages, and credit card debt, people often unintentionally reduce their wealth by huge proportions. Instead of creating wealth it gets thrown away as interest to stuff someone else's pocket. Then the rest is often squabbled on overpriced luxury items and trinkets.

One of the reasons the resession is hitting us so hard is because people were living either just at, or above their means with little to no safety net. Americans in general are compulsive, wasteful, and lack general financial sense.

If I were making $75k a year or more, I'd be making plans to retire at age 50.

unalivezombie: If I were making $75k a year or more, I'd be making plans to retire at age 50.

In what third world mud hut?

wee: Down side? shiattier produce and wine isn't as cheap. It's hotter a couple months out of the year. Even trade.

And you live in Arizona.

GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

How about teaching your snowflakes some responsibility and making them pay their own way. My dad was rich and all I got was health insurance and some graduation money.

Lots of people whose parents make less than that go to college... You farking liberals think your kids deserve handouts.

stiletto_the_wise: unalivezombie: If I were making $75k a year or more, I'd be making plans to retire at age 50.

In what third world mud hut?

Um, yeah. I'm single, young, and debt free. If I had a $75k income I could save between $20k-$30k a year easy. Then there is the wonder of compound interest.

GaryPDX:
Yea, but you have to qualify for it. Which means stellar GPA. Not very many kids leave High school with a 4.0. That's the bottom of the barrel for these schools.

Depends on the high school.

There are some where a lower gpa is entirely acceptable to admissions officers from MIT/Cal/Caltech/etc.

lilplatinum: GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

How about teaching your snowflakes some responsibility and making them pay their own way. My dad was rich and all I got was health insurance and some graduation money.

Lots of people whose parents make less than that go to college... You farking liberals think your kids deserve handouts.


You just called one of the most obnoxious and open right-wing trolls a farking liberal. You may as well go call Rush Limbaugh a Marxist.

$40,000 a year would do it for me

unalivezombie: lilplatinum: GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

How about teaching your snowflakes some responsibility and making them pay their own way. My dad was rich and all I got was health insurance and some graduation money.

Lots of people whose parents make less than that go to college... You farking liberals think your kids deserve handouts.


You just called one of the most obnoxious and open right-wing trolls a farking liberal. You may as well go call Rush Limbaugh a Marxist.

Jim_Callahan: There are some where a lower gpa is entirely acceptable to admissions officers from MIT/Cal/Caltech/etc.

Also, you know, every kid doesn't deserve to go to MIT.

lilplatinum: unalivezombie: lilplatinum: GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

How about teaching your snowflakes some responsibility and making them pay their own way. My dad was rich and all I got was health insurance and some graduation money.

Lots of people whose parents make less than that go to college... You farking liberals think your kids deserve handouts.


You just called one of the most obnoxious and open right-wing trolls a farking liberal. You may as well go call Rush Limbaugh a Marxist.


I would like to invoke Poe's law. Thankyouverymuch.

$75K = NOK462K is very close to the average income here in Noggie-land. That would probably mean that the average Noggie is happy. :-)

GaryPDX: Sliding Carp: GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

On the front page of MIT's website at http://www.mit.edu -

"100% of MIT tuition is covered by scholarships and grants for families of undergraduates earning $75,000 or less."

Harvard is similar, and I believe most of the Ivy League is as well.

Yea, but you have to qualify for it. Which means stellar GPA. Not very many kids leave High school with a 4.0. That's the bottom of the barrel for these schools.

Not exactly. The Ivy League schools offer no merit based scholarships. None. However, you need good academic qualifications to be accepted in the program. All Ivy League scholarships are need based. Anyone you know that speaks of their full Ivy League scholarships with pride were simply poor. At MIT, poor is apparently 75K.

I would have you plebians know I have a 7-figure income so all of this is completely irrelevant to me.

/'course there is a decimal point involved..

What this article doesn't do is compare happiness at the back-end of the participants lives.

i.e. of course earning more than 75k has its drawbacks such as extra stress, hours etc., but a major reason for putting-up with the downside of a plus-75k income is in order to make enough money to retire (i) early; and (ii) in style.

Ask the same question to the same two people when the 70k guy is still working hard at 70, and the guy who worked very hard has been retired and engaging in varied pursuites free from the man for 20 years. That's the reason the plus 75ers do it, in order to get an early and leisurely exit.

No offence by the way to those of you who work hard, but don't make good coin, it's just a way of saying that there are motivations - in any given occupation - for going that extra mile for more coin (and not just to waste it on hookers and blow).

Sid_6.7 rohar: Damn, if you could have only have told him before procreation we could have headed off a disaster.

We could have prevented at least two disasters if we kept GaryPDX from reproducing entirely.


Surely the intervention shd have been a generation earlier

/just kidding Gary, you're not that bad

RobertBruce: Part of a parents job is paying for college. Be prepared for it or don't breed.

Well my dad had to pay his own way and ended up okay, and I ended up making it to my masters on my own dime. But hey, if your kids are useless, then I suppose you can coddle them. Have fun paying their rent at 30 too.

unalivezombie: You just called one of the most obnoxious and open right-wing trolls a farking liberal. You may as well go call Rush Limbaugh a Marxist.

lilplatinum: www.neg9.com

*shakes fist*

blackminded: GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

I believe the proper Fiscal Conservative™ response is: "Then don't have kids you can't afford, you broke piece of shiat."

/did I do it right?

no ... it's more like, you have 18 years to save, not to mention they can work for it too (when able).

is that before or after taxes?

Getting $25k/yr and living in one of the nicer neighborhoods in the bay area. It's not so bad, but it'd always be nice to have more.

/single and not paying rent these days helps. :)

I make that, but I'm considered a "part-time" worker, so I don't get any benefits. My husband can make close to twice 75K/yr., but he's working on his own business, which means my job is paying pretty much all of the bills.

Between daycare costs (we have 2) and health care costs, we need to be on a pretty strict budget.

Back when I was single and making about $60K/yr. with benefits, I was buying whatever I wanted, traveling everywhere, and saving $25K a year. I'd say I was pretty happy then, and also feeling financially secure. Maybe the article meant to say $75K (with benefits) per person...

15 times?

lilplatinum: GaryPDX: Yea right. Try to put 2 children through college on 75k a year. Good luck.

How about teaching your snowflakes some responsibility and making them pay their own way. My dad was rich and all I got was health insurance and some graduation money.

Lots of people whose parents make less than that go to college... You farking liberals think your kids deserve handouts.

HAHA! Yeah Gary! Take that!

All Latest: $75K = NOK462K is very close to the average income here in Noggie-land. That would probably mean that the average Noggie is happy. :-)

The exchange rate toward the Norwegian Krone - from any currency - is hopelessly skewed. That's because Norwegians export nothing (but oil; gasoline is the only 'reasonably' priced item on Norwegian consumer markets) and aren't interested in tourism. So yeah, the Norwegian average income is high, but it doesn't mean anything.