I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
gimme kitties or give me death
Um... first? Little ol' me?
First one to join Bush's optional plan is a fool!
90K isn't jack shit out here in the bay area.
Exactly. We can afford to rent a 3 bedroom half of a rundown [one tiny cracked tile bathroom, no central heat/air, no dishwasher, rats in the walls and no I am not kidding because they have been keeping me and the cat up at all hours 
] duplex in the uptown/ university area of New Orleans for $1200, but NO WAY can we afford to buy in that same area.
The converse of Atrios argument about housing makes a better point. That is to say, in some areas of the country you could live like a king on 90k a year, but you'd be very, very hard pressed to find jobs that pay 90k in those areas.
We also accept vegetables and livestock.
What a bad point.
A family making $90,000 a year can also afford to move. If they want to live in San Fran, that's a SACRIFICE they have to make. There's no right to live in the highest priced geographic markets, and the choice to live there is completely elective. That said family wants to live in Manhattan or Orange County on $90,000 is not an excuse or a rationale for why it's HARD.
To put it another way, this is like saying that because people making $90,000 can't live in a rich gated community w/ golf course, so that means $90,000 isn't a lot of money per annum. No one would buy that excuse because you don't have to live in a gated community, and there are plenty of other places to live within your ample means. The areas you listed are national gated communities, not being able to live there is NOT comparable with not making enough to support a family.
Regular family-sized houses in Fresno are now pricing in the $200K range. And they go up from there.
Personally I am always stunned when I hear someone casually drop the cost of their house in California. And then you find it is something small and conservative. The same money could afford a hell of an abode here in San Antonio. I was listening to a conversation on a flight one day in which one of the people were talking about how many west coasters are selling their homes in that market and retiring here. Amazing.
...in some areas of the country you could live like a king on 90k a year, but you'd be very, very hard pressed to find jobs that pay 90k in those areas.
BINGO!
Please shove that down "Apophenia's" throat, thank you...
well, they could just move to a third world country. like miami.
Apophenia, what planet are you living on exactly? Because I would love a ticket to this world where one can move solely based on personal choice, irrespective of job and school and other (family, i.e. taking care of elderly relatives, etc.) issues.
New Orleans is where my job is, and in case you haven't noticed, jobs aren't exactly easy to come by these days.
$90,000 + 4 kids in nyc = 3 bedrooms in the outerboroughs and not eating out that much.
the same equation in alabama equals a 3500 square foot mcmansion, a leased bmw and a country club membership...
And by the way, I live in one of the most blue-collar parts of the Bay Area... houses in my neighborhood are selling in the high $300K range and they ain't brand new.
Median home price in Honolulu is up to $565,000. That's up $100,000 in @8 months. 20% down means @ $130,000 cash up front. Hard to save that amount.
$90,000 + 4 kids in nyc = 3 bedrooms in the outerboroughs and not eating out that much.
the same equation in alabama equals a 3500 square foot mcmansion, a leased bmw and a country club membership...
Since you have to halve the salary part of that equation, that's not too helpful...
90K??? My Lord, together we only make about 50K for a family of six and we live in one of the more blue color burbs of Dallas.
And here I was thinking we were middle class...
I do know that we don't qualify for public assistance in any form (not even WIC).
Sheesh. I can't even contemplate making 90K a year between us.
But Atrios, you're right about many aspects of the middle class. And I don't think we qualify, as per savings (none) or cars (crappy) or house (3 bedroom).
How about education and/or skills? Having a master's degree and/or twenty years in the construction trades certainly qualified our family as middle class where we used to live (NE Wyoming).
The DC and VA/MD housing market makes a four bedroom way beyond the reach of a family living on 90,000. I have a tiny three bedroom bungalow built in 51 and it's amazing what I could sell it for. I'm not as convinced as others that the housing bubble will burst. Our world and our country are overpopulated and people have to live somewhere. Many people who work in DC, cabdrivers, waitresses, health technicians, have to live two hours outside the city.
Hard to save that amount.
Palolo lolo
Try impossible to save that amount. On 90K and no help from parents, with average student loan debt? No freaking way.
A family making $90,000 a year can also afford to move.
Sure. Because jobs, health coverage and mortgages are so, lik, totally portable. In fact, what am I even doing here? Why don't I move somewhere cheaper with palm trees? Who's got 90K for me somewhere nice?
Must. Read. Rude Pundit.
Let us say, and why not, that at last night's press "conference," President George W. Bush finished his more obviously prepared remarks by pulling a cute little squirrel monkey out of his jacket and said, "Now, ya'll see this female squirrel monkey, finest squirrel monkey ass in the rainforest. Now ya'll watch me as I fuck the shit out of this squirrel monkey while ya'll ask me questions." And then the Leader of the Free World began to, as he said, fuck the shit of the squirrel monkey, fucking it in its little squirrel monkey vagina, the horrible screams of the squirrel monkey echoing throughout the East Room of the White House.
So then let us say, and, indeed, why not, that reporter after reporter got up and asked questions, like "I wonder what you think, generally, about the role that faith is playing, how it's being used in our political debates right now," and instead of answering, Bush said, "Now, watch, I'm gonna turn this lil' monkey over and fuck her in her cute ol' asshole," followed of course by more fucking and more monkey screams, a little weaker now.
Oh, sure, the reporters would keep trying to ask questions to get real answers because, you know, they have to pretend that way. But the President of the United States had an agenda: to fuck that squirrel monkey in front of the media and the nation...
The place we rent would go for three times as much in the Bay Area, for sale or for rent, and our income would be comparably higher...but we'd be living in the Bay Area.
Not our cup of tea...
It's a family income. Assuming that, like most families, both parents work that's only $45,000/yr each.
And (this should have been obvious) Atrios wasn't talking about $90,000/yr (or $45,000/yr) being hard to find. This discussion isn't about job availability, it's about standard of living. He was saying that once you ALREADY HAD said job it was hard to live in a few areas (mostly CA), using those few areas as examples of $90k being insufficient. The cost of maintaining a middle-class standard of living in CA is atypically high, so neither it or the Manhattans of the US are good examples when making what amounted to a general point about the national SS policy.
This is all assuming that there is no savings going on. 90k/(2 adults + 2 kids) = no real savings in the bank in a lot more places that just SoCal, DC, NYC, etc. I'd say it's true in MOST metro areas. So unless you're talking about a mass exodus to small towns, Atrios is correct.
90k for a family of four in the 21st century in most of America (based on population density, not geography) is not upper middle class. It's just not. You might have the trappings, but not long term.
Are you f***ing kidding me? I make $77,000 in the SF Bay Area. That's just enough for me to live "comfortably" on - by myself. I pay student loans ($650/mo., thank you,) have a roommate to cut rent costs (buying a home is absolutely out of the question,) was lucky enough to find a rent-controlled apartment, drive a 13-year-old car, pay into my 401(k), and have just enough left over to stash a little something into savings and to have a little fun with on weekends. Certainly comfortable. Certainly not lavish. And that's living by myself. I have difficulty imagining a family of 4 living on $90,000 a year here.
I remember a story some time back in the NY Times about homeless people in a certain part of California: they were homeless but well-employed, making $50,000 a year. But they couldn't afford to live anywhere near where they worked. It all depends on where you're at.
My parents were what you would call lower-middle class in the sixties and seventies, my dad made about $6.50 an hour, yet with that salary alone he was able to support a family of five (and still save enough money to buy a house), mostly because the cost of everything was much less than it is today: rent, food, utilities; all a fraction of current costs, yet salaries haven't kept pace. there are still a lot of people making $6.50 an hour who are expected to support themselves and a family with that, and they just can't do it.
Cup O' Joe - Blog Of The Working Man!
Having lived in Orange County through no particular desire of my own (grad school was there, then my job), I can testify that when we had a household income of roughly 90K we could not have afforded to buy a house anywhere near where we lived, and we had nothing like an upper middle class lifestyle. Hell, we couldn't afford a *condo* with my school debt. Gated communities have sweet f-a to do with it.
We're happier in Seattle where the job market blows syphilitic armadillos, but we've had to endure sharp pay cuts and job insecurity to do it. And housing isn't really that much cheaper.
It's so weird, because I just had this conversation with another associate in my office this morning (in response to his reading krugman's column today). he has no kids, bought a few pieces of property before the boom hit new orleans, and is planning on getting married, but has no idea how on earth people with kids manage to make ends meet on the average associate salary here. This is slowly becoming a national dialogue.
On the northern fringe of the SF bay area, I can just afford the mortgage on a two-bedroom house on just over 1/2 that 90k. That's with one child on one income, driving a ten-year old car. Savings? Now that's funny!
It is about balancing the different factors that go to make up quality of life, and also the location requirements for your chosen vocation. I mean, would we really say, for example, that a person who lives in the Bay area in a small apartment in order to be able to work in a specialized job that they love is worse off than the same person living somewhere with cheaper real estate, and therefore a more impressive living space, in a place that didn't satisfy them in a broader way. I have made many sacrifices to do the thing I love, and would never hesitate to do so.
The areas you listed are national gated communities
didn't used to be. i literally got driven out of the town i grew up in. it's called "gentrification". and it's coming to your neighborhood.
my friends down the street recently had their parents staying for a week, buying groceries to try and help out etc. they're from the deep red state south. when they saw the prices on the grocery receipts, they packed all their "helping out" groceries and took them home with 'em.
they're very happy with the low cost of living down there, but they're not happy with anything else. they say that culturally it's like living in a nightmare they can't wake up from.
The cost of maintaining a middle-class standard of living in CA is atypically high, so neither it or the Manhattans of the US are good examples when making what amounted to a general point about the national SS policy.
Yeah, national SS policy should just ignore NY and California, because hardly anyone lives there anyway and they surely won't need SS. Idiot.
Ok, look, I'm sorry people seem to think that real estate fluctuations, appreciations, and the like don't exist. I'm sorry for not acknowledging the right to live wherever one wants and find a perfect high-paying job in said area. I didn't mean to intrude on this utopian vision you guys have.
If you can't afford to live somewhere, you need to get another job there or a job somewhere else more in line with real estate prices. Maybe you options are slightly limited by needing to care for elderly relatives (though you can move them too!), or other such entanglements. Maybe you can't move cross country, but you CAN move outside the metro area.
Basically, until the Revolution, you have no inherent right to live anywhere on any given salary. As such, if you find it too expensive to live in some specific area you don't get to whine about your salary not being high enough to afford that area anymore than I can complain about being priced out of my lunar condo.
Short version: capitalism = tough cookies sometimes, and you need to realize that having $90,000/yr makes those cookies FAR LESS TOUGH than the majority of Americans', uh, cookies.
where i live 90k would do you very nicely.
and that housing bubble is going to pop!
bigtime.
just a matter of time.
a runaway energy market will do it.
I'm in LA - you can't find a house (2 bd, 1500sf) under $600K in my neighborhood. Rent is 2000/mo. Or, if you bought before the bubble (like I did), your mortage is also about 2k/mo. If you're making 90K that leaves you with 63K (less 3K) for property taxes. If you're lucky enough to live in a good neighborhood (like I do) that has a decent public school, that's a savings. Otherwise, a decent private school here is 10-12K.
The question then remains - how do you want to spend you $63K? LA is a two car town. I have one, but my wife and I are lucky enough to work at home... and the kids can walk to school. But, that was a choice I made when I bought in my neighborhood. DPW, Gas, phone - call it 1000/mo. That knocks you down to 51K. Do you want to eat out a couple of times a week and pay $10.50 for a movie. If you do, then your 63K ain't gonna go far. I pay my own insurance and have a ridiculously high deductible for dental (damn kids!).
So, as Atrios says, 90K goes so far in certain cities, but I know countless couples with 2kids that are surving in LA on under 100K. "Surviving" is the operative word. They're not living large. It's hard to living on 90 if you piss money away. Otherwise it can be done.
You know, given the quality (or lack of it) exhibited here, I know one job that's probably easy to get: moronic brownshirt fuck.
Smarter monkeys at a premium, apparently...
Here's the paradox, firsthand.
Our family of three moved from metro Seattle to a small New England college town for my spouses job. The school pays pretty well to attract talent into the boonies.
However, for every penny that my wife gained (about 20%) in her salary, my market value dropped in the hospitality industry.
I took a 33% pay cut even though my move was upward and I have 20 years experience.
I'm not complining. We do pretty well. but those of you who think that $90 in a major city is more than middle-class-comfortable are nuts.
they're very happy with the low cost of living down there, but they're not happy with anything else. they say that culturally it's like living in a nightmare they can't wake up from.
my cost of living is nowhere near NYC or other major metro areas, but insurance (health, auto), taxes, utilities and groceries are higher here (new orleans) than in the non-urban South, plus I get the cultural nightmare too.
where the job market blows syphilitic armadillos
I am SO stealing this.
Frankly, we can't afford to live where we do, but moving would mean not just unemployment, but loss of benefits (the big HI). We're in indentured servitude to whatever job offers basic health benefits because we've got high maintenance kids out the ying yang.
Oh yeah, medical bills and debt. Another reason why we are sucking wind.
Maybe being middle class is overrated. At least our tax return is easy to prepare-no investments to speak of, lots of dependants, mortgage interest breaks.
If you can't afford to live somewhere, you need to get another jo--
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzz...
Basically, until the Revolution, you have no inherent right to live anywhere on any given salary.
Ah, there it is. The criminalization of poverty. Poor? Fuck you. Who said you had a right to exist?
Goes double if you're brown.
Apophenia, you're just flat wrong.
We moved to Portland, Ore., because there were no good jobs in Eureka, Calif. We moved for the jobs.
Now you would suggest we move somewhere else?
Maybe back to Eureka. There are still no good jobs in Eureka, but maybe we could get a cheap house there to fit our cheap wages... But no! Turns out that since we left Eureka, home prices have been climbing. Astronomically. Not because of new jobs or wage hikes in the area, no. But because people are moving there from expensive Southern California with lots of money in their wallets.
What the hell world are you living in?
Apophenia = more dense than lead
...or is that more solid than liquid gas?
Writing from The OC, which used to be called Orange County, California, but now is primarily associated around the world with a trashy Fox show, I gotta go with Atrios here.
At lunch yesterday, I was talking to friends about their kids and their attempts to buy homes. A teacher in South County has 50K saved, an income of 50K per year with second job, summer school, and coaching, and is priced out of the condo market. She has to get married, sez me, with marriage as an economic institution, so they can make 100K per year and afford a home and family. That gets them into a 1400 square foot condo.
I don't understand it either. Part of the problem, I suppose, is how removed these speculations are from real life. Obviously, you can't simply say that people "should" be able to live on $90,000. There are practically as many variables as there are people. If you've got a kid with autism or some other development disorder, for instance, you could lead a fairly pinched life at $120,000.
I suppose one could talk about what an "average" person in an "average" town needs to live...but it takes a certain amount of stubbornness to extrapolate from there to all Americans in all areas, especially at a time when chronic illness and personal debt are both skyrocketing.
Hell, I've got insurance, and ongoing medical expenses still set me back a few thousand a year. I spend about $2600 on gasoline per year, and about another $1000 on bridge tolls...and there are about a million other things that add up to $10-15K before you know it.
I know a professional couple, both in medicine, and both fairly big names in their respective fields. They recently had to scrimp and save to buy a new computer! A lot of it comes down to cash flow...if you're paid erratically (as many medical professionals are), you can find yourselves running up huge amounts of debt...especially if you have a couple of kids, a mortgage, a couple of cars, a long commute...
I'm amazed there's any controvery over this at all. The numbers people have been throwing around are errily similar to mine, and other folks have been saying the same thing. It seems like a lot of people here are in roughly the same boat.
What the hell world are you living in?
lisa | Email | Homepage | 04.29.05 - 7:30 pm | #
Something tells me that "The Grapes of Wrath" is the feel-good movie of the millenium for this assclown.
What the hell world are you living in?
Moronic Brownshirt Fuck Land. Here comes Unka Karl to guide you to your very own machine!
Hecate, are you really saying that we should base national policy on the extremes of wealth? What sense would that make? You're just bullshitting. You know perfectly well that national policies dealing with cost of living increases (such as SS) are based on nat'l averages. You're just upset that I said, basically: "if you can't afford a place you need to move," which is sadly just a truism. The fact that it's generated controversy is surprising. You guys may have really echo chambered yourself into some strange dogma on past threads, I don't know.
We're all Joads, ok. We've got to move to where we can both live and find work. I'm NOT saying this is easy, I am saying until you start assigning housing and executing real estate speculators, it's just gonna work that way.
If you can't afford to live somewhere, you need to get another job there or a job somewhere else more in line with real estate prices.
Again, I ask, where are these easy to find jobs of which you speak? Seriously, I'd love to know.
It's amazing how fast it goes. In the Seattle area, I make $150K. Sounds huge! But, after I bought a creaky old house (with a _lot_ of family help), and chose to put my kid in private school, plus student loan debt, I rarely eat out, never go on vacation, have no cable, no home internet, old clothes, and a reeeallly crappy car. Really, am I above "middle class" just because of the private school? Sure doesn't feel like it.
"Maybe back to Eureka. There are still no good jobs in Eureka, but maybe we could get a cheap house there to fit our cheap wages... But no! Turns out that since we left Eureka, home prices have been climbing. Astronomically. Not because of new jobs or wage hikes in the area, no. But because people are moving there from expensive Southern California with lots of money in their wallets."
I hear if you have California plates driving thru Portland, OR the natives will run you off the road.
A family making $90,000 a year can also afford to move
You are joking, right?
Shit we could have got more house for the money if we moved to one of Seattles suburbs like Renton.
The rub is then our commute is worse.
Time is so precious to my wife and I that we based most of house purchasing decision on where could we afford to live with the best commute not most house for the money.
I figure paying such a large premium will pay off when the Monorail is built (I'll be up the hill from a station).
Futhermore the time aspect is critical. If traffic is good (rare) our commute is 20 minutes (we carpool).
If we lived in the fringe suburbs we would be guaranteed to spend 2 hours per day in the car.
Fuck that.
Oh wait. Apophenia.
Now I remember. Gad. Frogs explode; why can't trolls?
Apophenia,
I was just offered a job in Houston. Doing the same thing I do in Austin.
The job in Houston paid 30k LESS than the same job in Austin.
Your statement does not work.
$90k jobs do not exist everywhere.
The problem is that no matter how much you earn, you always ramp up your lifestyle and expenditures to match. Atrios is right - $90k/yr is not a lot for a homeowner in an expensive real estate metropolis, especially when you have kids.
The only way I'm in the Bay Area is by virtue of having a grandparent who bought a house here when he retired in 1954. By the way, what brought me back down here was a layoff in 2001 and the evaporation of the job market in Portland. As I mentioned on a previous thread, a liveable income in Silicon Valley is 73K year for a family of 4. Yes, it is stone nuts.
I swear, I am not whining, but...
In Orange County, it will cost you $800,000 for a 2000 square foot four bedroom place with a small yard/large patio in a decent neighborhood nowhere near the beach. That would require $150,000+ in cash for down payment, plus a mortgage of over $600,000, with payments of, what, $3500 per month? Plus close to $1000 per month in property taxes and few hundred more for insurance, for approximately $5000 every month in housing payments. That's $60,000 of yearly income AFTER TAXES, just for your house. So, yes, $90,000 annual salary puts you in the way, way, way lower middle class in the OC. But, hey, we've got our own TV show!
Shorter Apophenia:
In a capitalist society, rich and
poor alike have the freedom
to choose whether to
sleep under a bridge at night.
I can't even imagine $90k. I think I would finally get a sailboat though!
hear if you have California plates driving thru Portland, OR the natives will run you off the road.
Nah. There aren't that many natives 'round here, as far as I can tell.
One interesting thing about Apophenia arguments is the blindness to the slow but steady decline of quallity of life for the middle class. Now both parents often need to work for example. He (or she) is an apologists for the very rich and the government sucking all the wealth away from the rest of society. Decaying schools and the rest of the infrastructure remain unnoticed to his or her myopia.
Median house price in Massachussetts is $350K. Median for condos is $265K. That is *median*, not average, and is for the whole state. For northeast MA, where the actual jobs are, median house price is $373K.
That is, approximately, double the national median.
My wife and I paid $440K for a 1100 sf, three BR one and a half bath ranch on an eighth of an acre two years ago. We live in a decent town about 15 miles north of Boston on the coast. We were widely considered to have gotten an excellent deal. We had good cash to put down, so our mortgage is a mere $2500/mo.
We could move, I suppose, but we've lived here for 25 years, raised kids here, have family and friends here. So, we bite the bullet. And, we work our asses off.
Cheers -
Anyone living in a large city can appreciate that $90,000 a year doesn't buy shit. With the average price of a home in NYC being $1 million dollars and the price of renting and home ownership in California through the roof, there's little money left for basic healthcare, gas and food.
S in Mich, HAHA! Look at my example. Yes, Joads. We're all Joads. That's the state of the economy. I never said I LIKED it.
Anyway, back to Dailykos where "reality based" is more than a Orwellian slogan, and dissent is actually tolerated without the invocation of "Brown shirt" or "Uncle Karl." Not a slander against you or Eschaton Atrios! Just, you really need to get Scoop in here so that debates between different opinions can occur instead of anti-dissent pile ons occur. This threaded chat stuff has never produced anything but groupthink dogma reinforcement.
BYE NOW!
i'd rather live in the bronx than the south...
$90,000 + 4 kids in nyc = 3 bedrooms in the outerboroughs and not eating out that much.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Sheet! We lived on Long Island in a modest cape with the railroad in the backyard. We had a 15 yr. mortgage. Our income was 116,000. Daughter no. 1 gets accepted into Johns Hopkins, $32,000 a year, FIASA was 5,000. Second year, daughter no. 2 decides to skip the last year of high school and go to college a year early. Now we're looking at 64,000 in tuition. And we had saved for their education and had a wonderful sister-in-law who was helping. FAISA decides to kick in 7,000 for both of them. So we re-mortgaged. Once we had no equity, FAISA kicked in extra but by then no. 1 transferred to Edinburgh (subsifuckingdized by the Scottish gov't. and free farking health care) and no. 2 transferred to a state school.
Sorry guys, we drove used cars and didn't eat out for farking years. It takes lots of money to live in New York, even in a modest suburb.
...I hear if you have California plates driving thru Portland, OR the natives will run you off the road.
Actually, that's been going on for years. I was there in '81 and got plenty of dirty looks. Of course, it might have been the "Reagan for Shah" sticker on my VW...
Of course, if we, like thos Communists in Europe, had socialized medicine and then good public schools and good public childcare, then people could likely afford to live a middle class lifestyle on 90,000. But somehow, the magic invisible hand of the free markets hasn't provided those things, no matter how much we need them.
Problem is that too many people in this country think they're "Republicans" because they make a little money. 90K is not going to get you any fancy lifestyle in MA, that's for sure. Middle class encompasses a lot of people and a lot of incomes. The policies of Republicans benefit a teeny tiny group of people that most of us will never bump into. That jerk in your neighborhood who drives a brand new SUV and votes Republican? The joke's on him. He has as much business being a republican as the poor immigrant pressing his shirts at Zoots. The real republicans don't live in middle class neighborhoods, or even your typical gated community. They are well insulated from all the riff-raff.
Anyway, back to Dailykos where "reality based" is more th--
Double ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzz...
Of course, trolls are NEVER modded out of existence at Kos! 
I love people who are too stupid to know they're stupid.
Smarter monkeys at a premium, apparently...
dave
always, and whoever posted the rude pundit, thanx. i think that says it all.
fuck'n monkey's in america. it's a great country.
From last night:
"I'm proud of my party. Our party's been the party of ideas."
Yeah, BAD ideas.
.
Commuting to Seattle from Tacoma used to cost me 3 hours a day and about $90/Week in gas and parking.
f ound a job down in the south sound after three years of I-5 hell. (Longest commute was 4.5 hours one-way when there were mudslides by 405.)
Now, in small New England town my commute is 5 minutes. There are benefits to living in the "right" boonies.
That said, I want to go back to the Pac-NorWest really really badly.
Up until the end of the year I was making 65-70k a year but in the past 6 months I went from 50hr weeks to 40hr weeks and my cousin who was staying with me and helping with the bills got his own apartment. Back then I was making ends meet but constantly stressed out about money. Now I'm starting to run out of rope although my tax return has provided a temporary cushion until I go back to 50hr weeks or my girlfriend moves in. I have a mortgage on my home, which I paid 525k with 10% down 2.5 years ago but otherwise have no debt and pay my credit card in full each month. I avoid driving as much as possible and walk or ride my bike.
No I will admit I was stupid and allowed my realtor to sell me too much house (and at the time I thought my best friend would be moving in with me) but compared to what we looked at I wasn't going to get much better for less and I live within a mile of my job.
The crazy thing is that comparable houses in my neighborhood are now listing for 750-850k so I'm quite tempted to get out this summer if the money if I can walk out with 250k in cash. My girlfriend would like to stay at home if we get married and I'd like to enable that, I can guarantee it sure won't happen if we stay in LA but that money would go a long way to a nice house in Oregon or Arizona AND leave me with the funds to start my own business when I get there.
...in some areas of the country you could live like a king on 90k a year, but you'd be very, very hard pressed to find jobs that pay 90k in those areas.
Well, I've never managed 90k a year in Phoenix, but I suppose my last salary was probably the local equivalent. The drawback is that the hidden unemployment rate (and that includes the 7000 'lost' tech jobs that disappeared in '03) here in Phoenix is like 12% - and oddly enough 20-30% of those consist of highly qualified, college plus educated folk like me. We refer to this as an 'adjustment'. Now, with the bubble encroaching on Phoenix, and my house which I bought in 2002 for 225k is now priced around 375-400k, all hell is breaking loose. Move somewhere to find work? Right now Pincher Creek is looking pretty good. Find another job here in Phoenix that comes close to what I was making two years ago?
C'mon. This the the Shrub Administration - exactly the same thing happened with his loathesome father - I just reckon I'll be out of work every time one of the miserable SOB's is in office.
Hmmm pondering about those markets in which the prices rose suddenly in a short period of time. How sustainable are those home values? Or, as I have seen in a much smaller way, will they drop to the floor and many folks who were wedged into paying the high prices suddenly see their ability to recoup what they put into them dissolve away forever. Then people begin walking away from their mortgages.
Trust me, it is one way to kill a good neighborhood. Been through that.
"I love people who are too stupid to know they're stupid."
aaahhh... I dream of achieving that sort of bliss someday.
"A teacher in South County has 50K saved, an income of 50K per year with second job, summer school, and coaching, and is priced out of the condo market"
Well, they could move. For instance, here in a Cleveland suburb you could get a nice 3 br split for about $160,000.
They could move here, but a decent house and get a nice job with Cleveland Schools.
Wait. Check that, Cleveland schools just laid off 500 teachers. Nevermind.
BYE NOW!
Apophenia
Don't let the door hit you on ass on your fuckign way out.
Spinoza, I never said it was a good thing. I never said anything about middle class standards going up. Everything about the current economy sucks. Everything about hyperinflated metro real estate prices sucks. It's ALL BAD. Ok?! That we're all just modern day Joads, well, nothing changed and that's BAD.
My point is only (so stop reading in plutocrat apologies...) that with $90,000 you have enough options, occupational and geographical, that you should be considered lucky and middle-class in any sane nat'l policy such as SS.
Ok, NOW I'll go. That "BYE NOW!" before was a PSYCH OUT! But I expect the accusations that I'm a card carrying Freeper will continue unabated. Oh well. Just try non-reflexivity in your comments, please. The knee jerk, unthinking resorts to calling me a capitalistic nazi aren't effective.
Just because one is making 90k in an expensive area doesn't mean you can pack up and move to a less expensive area and get the same wage. That's why companies all went to the South during the last few decades. To take advantage of lower wages for their help.
150K in Chicago is like 90K in Cleveland. 90K in NY City wouldn't get you cab fare.
We're all Joads
Fuck if I am. I'd rather fight than move. And in case you haven't noticed, there is no promised land functioning like California of yesteryear in which Americans can find their fortune. Perhaps we should follow the jobs to China and India?
Luckily, during our last economic cataclysm, we had FDR. His policies kept shit from getting real weird real quick. Wanna bet your family's security that GWB is as intellectually equpped as FDR?
in Seattle where the job market blows syphilitic armadillos
don't talk like that! i'm filling out applications!! thinking good thoughts! going to the happy place! white light! white light!
WAHHH. Nobody agrees with me so you're all groupthunk!
Recent SF Gate Article: The annual increase in the median home price now tops the region's typical household income.
The numbers say it all: Between February and March, the median price for a single-family house jumped $36,000, or 6.3 percent. Over the last 12 months, it soared $106,000, or 21 percent, hitting $605,000 in March.
what world is this apop. living in?!
and who the fuck is talking about utopia?!
If we lived in the fringe suburbs we would be guaranteed to spend 2 hours per day in the car.
And of course, it's great for the environment when so many people have to commute so far every day. Just another reason the troll's reasoning doesn't work.
It's a family income. Assuming that, like most families, both parents work that's only $45,000/yr each.
Ahem. Two whacking half-baked assumptions there. Parents? Most families?
Arthur! C'mere, lovey, I want to talk to you about your prospects....
You know, if you're gonna throw a hissy fit and yell at the top of your lungs that you're picking up your marbles and going home, please have the common decency to FUCKING DO IT!
That is all...
It really is all relative, isn't it?
I know that I fit into the profile and we are having a hell of time making it. Regular costs continue to rise while our income remains static. The bastard insurance companies and the utilities and energy companies continue to draw greater and greater stakes of our income.
In truth, we are barely making it with a child in college. Michigan State is now up to around 13 K a year. We should have saved, but mostly we were just trying to get by. That is one of the fallacies in the argument for private accounts. Truth is, that we all pretty much live up to our incomes - and a little beyond. Retirement is looming - five years ahead now - and we should be all right; assuming the bastards do not mess with SS.
One year after we sold the house, the kids had finished school, and we owned outright a modest 2 bedroom apartment in Queens, 9/11 happened and Mr. QL got laid off. We were reduced to living on my salary which was just enough to get through, but still no restaurants for us. He has been back at work for almost two years and we save almost all his income. Partly because we are so old and tired who the fuck has the energy to go out after working a full week. I go through Penn Station at the end of the day and just know I only have a few years left of commuting. The SS better fucking be there after all we have paid in. Don't mess with my retirement shitheads. I have fucking earned every minute I can squeeze out.
And all I want to do is stay home and make quilts. Not too fucking much to ask, is it?
Look, I make around $100K per year. I lived for over 25 years in Seattle in one of the apartments in a Triplex, and by 2001 was paying around $4,000 a month mortgage, partially offset by rental income from the other apartments. My wife has a small business which was grossing $100K per year and netting very little (functioned as a tax loss, mostly). The kids are gone. I commuted 50 miles a day round trip.
We did not have a high roller life style - I would rate us as slightly upper class, but struggling to make ends meet. In 2001 we decided to move to the country: shorter commute for me, some acerage, and space for our business. The business has grown, but we are still paying $4,000 a month in mortgage payments, have frittered away what of our 401K didn't get offed by the Stock market crash, got stuck with a bunch of taxes because of the move, and are still struggling to make ends meet. I want to retire but can't afford to without moving to a small apartment or condo and selling our acreage and our business space--because of the mortgages and paying off the tax debt. And without the social security income, I'll never be able to retire. My company pension will just about make the mortgage shortfall. To add insult to injury, one of my tenants is an artist who can't sell his work because of the lousy economy (hey, I thought those rich people who buy art were supposed to have money--but they don't seem to buy art so I guess they don't have money either.) Another Tenant lives off her social security and another one is on Section 8 (about to be cancelled by the Bushies).
It's all very precarious and not getting better.
Short version: capitalism = tough cookies sometimes, and you need to realize that having $90,000/yr makes those cookies FAR LESS TOUGH than the majority of Americans', uh, cookies.
Apophenia
Yeah, that's kind of the point. The lesson here isn't what crybabies we are; it's that if people with marketable professional skills (which describes a lot of folks on Eschaton) are feeling squeezed, what does that say about the rest of the country? It's very pretty to think that we're all hanging out in bathhouses in Tribeca while we complain about the high cost of sushi, but it's not quite that simple. The point is that just about everyone who's not a defense contractor or the son of a politician is worse off today that ten years ago.
We did actually have a broad, fairly stable middle class at one point, to which a much greater number of Americans once belonged than do now. Most sane people see that as a problem. Hell, Milton Friedman sees it as a problem.
" So we re-mortgaged. Once we had no equity, FAISA kicked in extra but by then no. 1 transferred to Edinburgh (subsifuckingdized by the Scottish gov't. and free farking health care) and no. 2 transferred to a state school."
So, you helped your kids and went into hock doing so. Those kids are gonna take ya in now, right?
...who the fuck is talking about utopia?!
Personally, I preferred Todd's solo work...
I love it when people come in here, say really outrageous things like Apophenia just did, and then yell "groupthink!" when they get flamed.
Look, take responsibility for your position. If you are going to say outrageous things, then be prepared to back 'em up.
Don't say it if your only response to people calling you on it is "Oh, you're flaming me because I don't think like you do."
Be a PERSON, fer chrissake.
But I expect the accusations that I'm a card carrying Freeper will continue unabated. Oh well. Just try non-reflexivity in your comments, please. The knee jerk, unthinking resorts to calling me a capitalistic nazi aren't effective.
For the sake of accuracy, I would like it noted that no one in this thread called Apophenia either a freeper or a nazi. Thank you.
Dave:
Totally OT, but you may recall
that I'm on a quest to find the
incredibly rare Bob Clearmountain
remix of the Stones' "Before They
Make Me Run." (I had a promo copy
of it in 78, but its vanished to
I know not where).
With absolutely no success at all
over the years.
Anway, today I the brainstorm to
ask CLearmountain hinself if he
knew somebody with a copy they
might be willing to dupe. So I found
his website and asked him.
He replied back in minutes,
and was very nice, but he said not
only did he not have a copy of it
or know of one, but he didn't even
remember doing the remix.
I think I'm going to my grave
unfulfilled.
the same equation in alabama equals a 3500 square foot mcmansion, a leased bmw and a country club membership...
travy =- 7:17 pm
I find it funny how the trolls all sound alike. It's almost as if they are all channelling the conservative hive mind.. And then they come over here and screech about Orwell and groupthink dogma. I'm sorry dears but you don't impress. Try harder next time. Free will and independent thinking are GOOD things no matter what the Borg Queen has told you.
S in michigan, FDR saved Crapitolism from itself.
Not this time, we are Argentina and will be impovershed in the same brutal manner.
Basically, until the Revolution, you have no inherent right to live anywhere on any given salary
"get thee to a bantustan, kaffir!"
where DOES one have an "inherent right to live" then? is a privilege bought, or born into? which country are we in again?
you may, of course, be absolutely right, in that we don't have any such right until we fucking take that right, but i don't have to fucking pretend i like it in the interim.
"I would like it noted that no one in this thread called Apophenia either a freeper or a nazi."
Undoubtedly someone on AmericBlog just called him a Nazi.
eureka! i'm going to work in the film industry in cleveland! what have i been smoking trying to get by in nyc and california?? wow, i'm saved!
Surfdork is right. We are closely resembling Argentina at the moment. I happen to think we are Rome just before the fall, but I'm too cynical.
Fuck it all...here's Friday Dog-Blogging!
-
trust fund babies like apop like to preach to the rest of us.
reality based here apop.
we are the reality based community.
unlike yourself we also live in the real world.
Speaking of commutes, I'm off to make my 15 minute drive home. See ya later, peeps.
steve simels ...
Do you have an MP3 of "Judy is a Punk" by the Ramones? If so, can you email it to me, please?
Have you had any vino yet? I had mine a bit early tonight.
Oh, and bye now. For real. No "psych out."
Apophenia-
You seem to think that these economic and socio-economic matters are compartmentalized. If you are reading the various posts here concerning how families are trying to survive in this society, you cannot deduce that a 90k salary gives one the "freedom" you envision. You seem to think that famillies can pick up and move willy nilly. It's a very "frontier" and pseudo-libertarian view of how one can live in this society, a thin intellectual gruel of Ayn Rand stirred in with Horace Greeley.
My brother and his family moved from So. Cal to Phoenix (just to be near GWPDA and Arthur hahaha) because his $100,000 salary in LA left them unable to afford their own home. They now have a nice place and the rat race is over as far as comuting and intense competition in his line of work.
I think I'm going to my grave
unfulfilled.
You think you got problems? I still gotta get that CD of "Cahoots" with the long-lost studio version of "Baby Don't do It" which you claimed really wasn't so hot, after all, thus shattering years and years of breathless anticipation...
BTW, whaddaya know about Miles Davis sitting in on sessions for Sly's "There's a Riot Goin' On"? A story I just heard, and that's always been one of my favorite albums, believe it or not...
"i'm going to work in the film industry in cleveland"
Hey Cleveland's booming for film... they shot part of "Stranger Than Paradise" there. In the winter even. The industry's gonna break real soon there. So they say.
I've been hearing the smartest people say we need a new new deal. They're dead right. If we want to avoid the coming calamity.
Belzer -- the genius who called Ann Coulter a "fascist party doll" -- is on "Majority Report."
Rude Pundit is so beautifully rude.
Just curious here-
I'd always considered my family middle class because of our education, skills and economic potentiality. Does the fact that our "potentiality" will likely never be realized in our fields, particularly in this area, imply that we could not consider ourselves middle class?
"Just because one is making 90k in an expensive area doesn't mean you can pack up and move to a less expensive area and get the same wage."
Very true, but it can help. My wife went from Ohio to San Diego and got a huge salary increase, which she used as leverage to get her decent pay to come back to Ohio...but it still wasn't SD money...but a much lower cost of living here, also.
Belzer is another beautifully rude person. He really is rude in such a classy way.
"There's a Riot Goin' On"? A story I just heard, and that's always been one of my favorite albums, believe it or not...
dave
One of mine, too...
30% of wage earners in this country make less than $20,000 a year. the Median income for a four-person family is $65,093. Median Income for 4-person family in California is $67,814, and in NY it's $69,354. Those upper-middle class people who whine that they can't make ends meet on $90,000 a year amuse me.
whiners, get over it. who gives a flying fuck if you can afford a house, you make $20 to $30,000 above the median income. buy an RV, buy a mobile home, rent a condo! the amount of whining by the well-fed, well-clothed, well-insured on these two threads simply amazes me. whiners.
Apophenia has posted one comment at Kos, guess that makes him a regular.
Hey Cleveland's booming for film...
sadly, not for post production or above the line jobs...
...(Clearmountain) replied back in minutes, and was very nice, but he said not only did he not have a copy of it or know of one, but he didn't even remember doing the remix.
Funny, that kinda ties in with something Jon Carroll said in the morning fishwrap today:
...In the Bay Area from 1965 to 1980, we saw an awful lot of con men who used the Revolution as an excuse to get money or prestige or publicity. A lot of them started out as sincere progressives, but then power corrupted and they got weird. The drugs had something to do with it -- if it happened in the '70s, the drugs always had something to do with it...
Apophenia = TS
Sorry to say y'all in the Southwest are living on borrowed time.
Think about Phoenix with NO cheap climate control or water.
Not IF but WHEN.
We in the PNW will be flooded with refugees, not casula moves but refugees looking for water etc.
"Speaking of commutes, I'm off to make my 15 minute drive home. See ya later, peeps."
This was suppossed to make some jealous. I'm working right here. No commute at all.
bwahahahaha!
jdw,
I've heard of your wife's ploy working, but not during the Bush Boom.
Res:
Don't have "Judy is a Punk," but
should be easily downloadable and
I will check on it.
No vino....leaving in about ten
minutes for a low dive with
continuous entertainment and
lots of satanic commie elitists
swilling Chardonnay.
You know the drill.
S in michigan, FDR saved Crapitolism from itself.
Not this time, we are Argentina and will be impovershed in the same brutal manner.
surfdork | Email | Homepage | 04.29.05 - 7:44 pm | #
Quite true. But I submit that facsism and communism - the other offers of that day - were worse.
FDR saved capitalism - capitalism with a human face - almost as a byproduct of squelching fascism and communism in this country. I'm glad of it. But I'm saddened by our slide into crony capitalism, or "crapitalism".
Worse even still, in the current state of affairs, it looks like FDR will be gutted and we're headed toward theocratic fascism. Not good. Maybe, ultimately, FDR was a failure (not because of his policies, but because Americans were too stupid to see that they underpinned our whole endeavor), but it was a good 60-year run, and at least we defeated the Soviet Union. Maybe that was our nation's purpose, and now we have none.
If I had my way, we'd have democratic socialism/non-crony capitalism, based loosely on the Scandinavian model. A boy can dream. But, these days, things are more like a nightmare.
I'm smelling a name stealer....
a thin intellectual gruel of Ayn Rand stirred in with Horace Greeley.
spinoza
ooh, i don't even know who Horace Greely is, but that had to hurt.
blogs are so much more fun than reality tv.
fuck'n monkeys.
Shit. Why can't Janeane just shut up and let Belzer talk? I am tired of her speeches about "emotional maturity."
I make $95K as an engineer. Take home $2400 after taxes every two weeks. Divorce (not my idea) and child support settlement according to California Guidelines is $1200, every two weeks. I do live in Phoenix now. But last settlement was from Alameda.
So I live each month on $2400 for me and my kids (I have them 25% of the time.) Rent is $895 for a small two br apartment. Phone + Utilities = $200. Food is about $400. I live within one mile of my ex's place so I can be with the kids (try living outside of that and asking for custody), yet to have any sort of career in my chosen profession, I need to commute 35 miles each way. So gas is about $150 each month now. Apartment insurance $35. Car insurance $150. Internet is $50 each month. Health insurance is $50 per month (very nice, very very large company).
No cable. Health club though -- $29 per month.
My one "luxury" is a "brand new" four year old Toyota convertible. I drive 70 miles round trip -- so I appreciate what I am told is the Toyota's reliability and low maintenance. $400. Is that a lot for a car? I don't know. In 1982 dollars (when I graduated college), my brand new low end sports car (mazda) was $13K which is greater in 2005 dollars than this Toyota was. Can I get a known reliable car for less than $400 per month? Perhaps. How much less? Don't know. All of that is budgeted.
Everything else is credit cards.
Clothing? Credit card and financing. Toys for kids? Credit card and financing.
So yeah, $95K, modern world, I am definitely living paycheck to paycheck. Nowhere close to buying a house. Nowhere close to taking my kids to disney land. Nowhere close to middle class.
Otter! How ya doin?
...who the fuck is talking about utopia?!
Personally, I preferred Todd's solo work...
dave | Email | Homepage | 04.29.05 - 7:43 pm
ROTFLMFAO, crying, puking
steve simels ... Your West 72nd haunt?
"jdw,
I've heard of your wife's ploy working, but not during the Bush Boom."
Otter...hope you are ok! Did you get my email to your blog email address? We have some common interests.
Otter! How ya doin?
left rev., Jolly Menace
Finer'n frog hair, Rev Gauche! Enjoying life, wife, and babies. Speaking of which, there's Friday Baby Blogging today!
Of course, if we, like thos Communists in Europe, had socialized medicine and then good public schools and good public childcare, then people could likely afford to live a middle class lifestyle on 90,000.
Bing. Ish. Mortgages in London and the SE of England are still beyond the salaray range for most public-sector workers. But there's a decentish public transport network to bring them in from the cheaper suburbs.
Healthcare, in particular, is like concrete boots when it comes to labour mobility. Want to move somewhere cheaper, or where wages are higher? Want to keep your health insurance? You've got to pick one of those two.
crony capitalism, or "crapitalism".
Good one.
far as comuting and intense competition in his line of work.
Yes, well, bigvic, I'm glad for your brother. And certainly, once again, enjoy having to compete with people from all over the country just to be able to find a job and continue to live in my hometown.
Ya know, I don't ever recall trying desperately to push somebody out of work in say, Cleveland. Or Santa Fe or Milwaukee.... My biggest whine is the same old, same old. Somehow, it's as if the rest of the country just figures people already living in Phoenix are tailor's dummies - sort of decorative local color. But not real. Nobody could possibly be an actual -resident-. The same problem in Abq - poor damn place was continuously overrun by people who were convinced the whole place was a set....
Ah me. Fresh new white corn I bought off a truck in Guadalupe today, straight up from the Mexican fields! Nummies....
What S in Mich said.
I happen to think we are Rome just before the fall, but I'm too cynical.
I think Boosh is trying HARD to see that happen. The entire world wants us to fail (well, Poland may be the exception) and he has sold all our treasures out to special intrest in the corporate world. That fucker leaves nothing but destruction in his path.
City in my he-a-a-a-d.
Apophenia,
I hope that your PSYCH OUT, was only temporary.
Oh, and clean sheets
30% of wage earners in this country make less than $20,000 a year. the Median income for a four-person family is $65,093. Median Income for 4-person family in California is $67,814, and in NY it's $69,354. Those upper-middle class people who whine that they can't make ends meet on $90,000 a year amuse me.
whiners, get over it.
Ah, the reification of statistics. So just because someone can calculate a median income, then that means anyone is wrong to argue that living on a wage greater than the median is difficult? So if the median number of deaths from automobile accidents is x, you would chide anyone who asked for fewer deaths? So if the median number of deaths from cancer is x, you would chide anyone who asked for more funding to change the median number of deaths?
we could not consider ourselves middle class?
left rev - you're talking about a different kind of class structure - one more akin to social class - than what is meant economically. There are various ways to differentiate a group of people, as I'm sure you know. I think this is mostly about middle class as in middle-income. However, it is difficult to untangle those threads - money, social standing. They go together usually.
And then there is middle class sensibility - and that is a whole n'other discussion.
jdw
Yeah. We figure to move twice more. Once when we retire and the second time next door to wherever the hell they finally decide to settle down.
Look, in this day and age, a college education is a must. We figured that supplying one was equivalent to making sure they wore their hats in winter. It just went with the territory.
jdw,
I did. As part of my changed attitude, Mrs. O is holding me to reduced times at the computer and more time with family. I'm working on a rod right now that I hope to finish this weekend. I'll send pix when it's done.
steve simels ... Your West 72nd haunt?
Res Ipsa Loquitor | Email | Homepage
Yes, indeedy.Although I lied about
the continuous entertainment.
Excellent jukebox, though.
Mrs Ibraham et al,
I am not sure about the rancor, but I do know that I am in my third year without a wage adjustment. My school district refuses to negotiate in good faith. (The administration has managed to give themselves 8% annual raises) Cost continue to escalate. yeah, maybe I could choose to not help my son with college. But I find this is part of living. Trust me, we are not living high end in anything.
I think I read a figure - please adjust if you remember better - that 10 % of Americans owned 50% of all that there is: this is obscene. I am sorry, I am for raising everyone up and tearing down a few. (Like Koslowski who "forgot" about a $25,000,000 bonus!)
I love people who are too stupid to know they're stupid.
Atrios
Now that cracked me up..
Thanks Atrios been depressed all day. thanks again
buy an RV, buy a mobile home, rent a condo!
would you buy a used car from this man?
To everyone else by way of explanation, jdw and I build fishing rods, me for a hobby, him professionally.
I don't know how some families do it? That $19000 for a family of 4 is the poverty line is very scary. I'm single, rent @ $900/mo, no car, no debt and make $50K with full health and I still don't have any confidence that I can support a family in the manner that my father did just 9.5 miles down the road - and I had 6 siblings and a stay-at-home mother in a comfortable middle-class life.
Otter! Welcome. I hope you are well, and BTW your daughters are absolutely beautiful.
"'m working on a rod right now that I hope to finish this weekend. I'll send pix when it's done."
Very cool, can't wait to see them. If you get a yearning for bamboo, you know who to call. Tight lines.
Thanks, Spinoza. Of course, I agree with you fully.
Mrs. O has just reminded me that it is time for my prescribed 8 min evening walk as I am losing light fast. I should be back for the Cat Blogging thread.
Bye!
I find it funny how the trolls all sound alike. It's almost as if they are all channelling the conservative hive mind.
They are. The Right crams sheer bullshit into these stupid people's heads, until they can repeat it with a fluency that feels to them like intelligence. The problem is, they don't know one iota more than they're told, so when you present them with new facts the only thing they can do is get angry.
lisa: "Nah. There aren't that many natives 'round here [Portland], as far as I can tell."
Ain't that the truth. We can barely afford it any more. When my wife and I bought our house in inner SE Portland 15 years ago, we were just barely able to manage it, given that our combined bookstore salaries came to about half the price of the house: $45K. We make a bit more now -- although I break into the shakes every time someone here starts complaining about having to "make it" on $90K -- but the houses in our neighborhood are averaging $300K according to the latest figures. I doubt we could get a loan these days; certainly nobody who's making the equivalent of what we were 15 years ago would be able to buy anything similar to the rather run-down place we got, unless they moved into Oregon with a large nut from selling a place in California.
Hmm... I live in Orange County with my fiancee, and our household income is right at $90,000...
We rent a 2-bedroom apartment in not the best neighborhood, and I drive a '92 Honda Accord with radiator, brake, and oil pan problems. We have no credit card debt. We are decidedly middle- to lower middle-class.
The cost of living is very high in the OC, just like in L.A. (where we just moved from).
Median Income for 4-person family in California is $67,814, and in NY it's $69,354.
The median income for me and Bill Gates is roughly $54 billion.
Huh. Our combined income for our family of four doesn't exceed 40K/year. We just bought our first (small!) house.
We left the BIG city for Q of L reasons 9 years ago for a college town 2 hours away. We both work for small businesses/non-profits (I work part time at two different jobs). My husband, who works full-time for a small record label, is insured; the kids are taken care of through the state (we pay a small monthly premium). We've been v lucky healthwise but are also somewhat proactive about it, taking vitamins and eating well.
Two cars? With rising fuel costs and us intuiting something bad is going to happen either in terms of resource depletion or climate change (or both), no way. We have one, gifted to us by my father, who had a stroke a few years ago and cannot drive. Our local public transporation is decent and we all have bikes.
I guess my expectations are really low. We don't buy many new clothes (we thrift for them instead), we don't eat out much, we don't have cable teevee, the kids don't go to school, so that cuts out a lot of spending right there. What some folks see as necessities I see as totally unnecessary (and vice versa -- I think local/organic food is a necessity, and I think DSL is a necessity). We might be able to get higher-paying jobs at the university, but why? I would spend less time with my family, my kids would probably have to go to school, we'd be under way too much pressure and wouldn't like our jobs very much. So, for us, it wouldn't work. It wouldn't be worth it.
Choices! Sometimes I wonder why we're doing things what my mother calls "the hard way", but we're happy. It pays off every day.
I like this site.
Finer'n frog hair, Rev Gauche! Enjoying life, wife, and babies.
Amen and halleluah! You got your priorities straight. I'm glad to hear all is well.
Tena, I think you're probably right about their being a different understanding of middle class socially and economically. Most folks just assume that they are too connected to differentiate. I've got more in common with most of the posters here who make two to three times what we do, but we'd never live in the same neighborhood. And my neighbors are great people, we just talk about different things.
I'm of the muddle class, born and bred. We just muddle through and manage to make it. And as such, are very fortunate.
Orange County here, old neighborhood 10 mi. inland, no gated anything - just 3 leaky neighborhood pools we pay $39/mo to an assoc. to apparently not repair. College Park area of Irvine, for locals who'd know or care. 11 yrs ago we got into a repo'd 4 bdm 1800 sq ft for 239K - and we've been fixing it up ever since. This model house is re-selling for north of 600K now. We raised 2 boys, put 'em through college, the youngest just graduated and came home to roost til he finds a job. Our two 90's Nissans are paid for, and our income hovers around 140K, and we're saving as much as we can. the only real vacation we've had was a gift from Mr. Marquez' employer for a job very well done. The house, with savings and a variety of 401-(k)s and a bit of stock is our retirement in another 5 yrs. Or 10. Or whenever. And if the bubble bursts? If the market really craps out? If catastrophic illness happens? Chances are we'll be fighting with the cat for her Fancy Feast.
Ah me. Fresh new white corn I bought off a truck in Guadalupe today, straight up from the Mexican fields! Nummies....
GWPDA, Irate Scholar --7:56 pm
dang i luvs me some fresh, sweet, small-kerneled corn...unsalted butter, a pinch of salt, and just a little red chile powder ...
Sorry about the GD extra posts! Gah!
$25 billion, I mean. So much for that joke.
Of course, the difference between how much CEOs make compared to what workers make has gone through the roof in recent years and is worse in American than in other countries. Hmmm, wonder what that has to do with a declining middle class???????????
Me and my family of 4 live quite fine in Boston on about $50,000. Sure, we don't live in the Back Bay, but ninety G's is a pretty high standard.
Okay, I'm really outta here.
Have fun in my absence as always.
Very true, but it can help. My wife went from Ohio to San Diego and got a huge salary increase, which she used as leverage to get her decent pay to come back to Ohio...but it still wasn't SD money...but a much lower cost of living here, also.
The beauty of that scenario is that when most people do it, they get paid more on returning to a low-cost market even though their skill shaven't changed appreciably. I know several folks who've managed to convince employers that their cost-of-living-adjusted wages in expensive markets is actually indicative of their skill, not their market. So, they make $50K in Peoria, IL, move to L.A. and make $70K for a year, then pop back to Peoria for $75K plus moving expenses...all without increasing their employability; no new certifications, no new education, no notable new projects...they just moved away and moved back and get a fat bonus for it.
Otter, I'm usually in the smart-ass habit of saying all babies are ugly. No more. Can't say that about Sleeping Beauty. Very nice, congratulations.
The median income for me and Bill Gates is roughly $54 billion.
The median income for me and 1/4 of the population is $18,000. your point?
Everyone have a nice evening out there in moonbat land. I'm going to get me some play time with the toddler.
Apophenia's argument is the usual 'free market' bullshit.
He completely ignores the fact...... many areas where property prices increase to such an extent that it stops workers of esential services from living near by.
In London, prices are so high that many sectors like teachers, fireman, nurses etc etc can not afford to live locally. This problem used to be solved by social housing.
But, then Thatcher in the 80s sold off all the decent social housing, to the private sector.
Result, The system is at breaking point.
I do so hope that Apophenia does not have a medical problem in his fantasy world. There may not be anyone around to help him.
The median income for me and 1/4 of the population is $18,000. your point?
Mrs. Ibrahim al-Jaafari
No point at all. A complete non sequitur, just like the troll's original comment.
Hey all, come to Houston. We've got a booming energy trading indus --
we're home to a major airlime that's has jobs to --
we've got the worst air in the country and exploding chemical plants, so you won't have to live here long!
exploding chemical plants
good name for a band
I could probably move somewhere with better wages for my skills than WNC. My wife would then have to requalify for state certification, which would stop her from earning money for a good few months.
My own anecdotal evidence:
We're definitely above the $90k mark, no thanks to my wife's job as a public school teacher. We're thinking of starting a family, so we need bigger digs than my tiny condo.
If I want to stay in my current area of town (where there was just a gang-related stabbing not two blocks away), we're looking at dropping $650k on a 3-bedroom, 1900 sq ft house built in 1979.
San Diego, y'all. Try living here on $90k.
I'm no statistician, that's for sure. but nothing grates me more than middle class people talking about how tough it is to make ends meet. give me a fucking break. poverty grows. 3 out of 10 workers GROSS less than $20K a year, but shouldn't we all shed tears for the poor middle class, squeezed as they are by the housing bubble.
I now shed one crocodile tear for all those households struggling to get by on $90K.
I sympathize about the real estate bubble being stressful but I have to answer the poster who said that if you make $90 K a year "you can only live in the outer boroughs" as though that were some horrible privation.
I have some news for you, the outer boroughs are not the ex-urbs. They are not even the suburbs. I know plenty of people who make less than $90 a year in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens,and New Jersey, and even Newark and who live quite comfortably. Here's some more news. You don't need more than one car if you live in the outer boroughs. You don't even need one car. You don't have to have the wastefully lavish life style, high real estate taxes, and high heating bills of the suburbs.
Eating out? There are places to eat in Brooklyn. the other boroughs and even Manhattan that are not too expensive and are much better than the Olive Garden. I can get a pigs' ear taco down the street from here (granted more exotic than delicious) and fabulous South Indian lentil pancakes in Jackson Heights for relatively pennies. Today at my office we had an office party of genuine southern barbeque takeout -- including but not limited to: pulled beef, barbequed chicken, ribs, creamed spinach, beans with rib ends, mashed potatoes, and sweet potatoes, all from eleventh avenue in Manhattan and all delicious.
I have to agree with Apophenia that it sounds like a lot of people here are poormouthing about having to live on 90 K a year.
as per apop's instructions i am simply going to walk into an employers office and tell him that i need a job that pays more-oh maybe in the 500 to 600k range.
see?! i am simply getting a better paying job! this works!!
Of course, the difference between how much CEOs make compared to what workers make has gone through the roof in recent years and is worse in American than in other countries. Hmmm, wonder what that has to do with a declining middle class???????????
Someone was saying here the other day that the disparity is so great in America now that only Mexico and couple of other places had bigger spreads.
I pull down close to 90K and I can't afford a house. I live in the Bay Area.
Entry level homes, 2 bedroom in not good neighborhoods mind you, start at 450K and extend to as much as 600K (800-1200sq feet). Being laid off from work (tech bubble burst) caused great pains in terms of cost of living, and now we rent a home for more than a mortgage anywhere else in the country, outside of the bigger cities...
You want a 4 br home here, you should expect to pay around 800K to 1 mill. in a good area...
>but ninety G's is a pretty high standard.
Well, I got news for you..20 years ago in Los Angeles, the hubby and I just barely got by making 60K a year.
A couple of years later, we bought a house, and our standard of living changed by going up two notches.
We had nothing fancy, a VW and a Toyota...a rental house in South Pasadena...no major bills, no major debt....but still, not even taking a vacation...we never were able to save much.
Sorry, $90K is not a lot of money folks. I mean it is, it should be, but it isn't if you've paid (or, more to the point, leveraged) two graduate degrees, if you're trying to buy a house, or if you're raising a family.
All three at once? Are you high?
I'm no statistician, that's for sure.
First reasonable statement.
Apophenia could bestow such a boon to posterity by getting neutered. Come on, give the gift!
This is a discussion we never hear in the corporate media. They want us to think we're the only ones who think this way. (Just as they do to liberals.)
But the question is, how rich is America really? Aren't most people barely making it--a fact hidden by easy credit, constant home improvement sales pitches and leased cars? Any data I've seen shows that once you cut out the rich, the average Canadian or even Swede is a lot better off than his American counterpart.
Hecate, this has nothing to do with population growth. America is huge and mostly empty. Massachusetts lost population while home prices skyrocketed. The "supply" here is money. Banks lend money that cannot possibly be repaid, using pre-1929 schemes like interest only loans. Why? Because they can turn around and sell them in the secondary market the same day. They only lose money if they fail to make a bad loan before their competitors do.
"who gives a flying fuck if you can afford a house"
well since the question was "who is middle class", we all do. A central idea of a "middle class" involves home ownership. If your idea of a middle class is a family of 4 making $90k and living in an RV, then I guess we don't have anything more to say to each other.
"well-fed, well-clothed, well-insured .. on these two threads"
um, not sure how you know any of this is true, and in fact as the posts here have shown, one can be *not* "well-fed, well-clothes, well-insured" on $90k. In fact, that is the entire point. for some reason, I think you missed the point.
I'll make the bold argument that "on the subway line" does NOT equal "outer boroughs." Discuss.
Tena, some stats on American inequality (shocking):
http://www.inequality.org/facts.html
Among more-or-less developed nations, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia are the two countries with biggest wealth inequalities. What a coincidence.
dang i luvs me some fresh, sweet, small-kerneled corn...unsalted butter, a pinch of salt, and just a little red chile powder ...
And a little bowl of machaca & green chile. Yes, Woody, we may be poor and stupid out west, too ignorant to withstand the hordes who've determined that we're not making the best use of our homes so it's better we be serve new, better masters, but at least we know good food....
I have a family, two college age kids and live and work in NYC. Personally, I do not believe it is possible to live decently in New York City under such circumstances for less than $300,000/year. (By the way, I make a lot more than that.) The tax system totally fails to adjust for the huge difference in cost of living in big cities. Thus, "wealthy" proffessionals in places like New York are subsidizing fat cat types living elsewhere on $100,000 who are lightly taxed.
Man, the problem is, all of these national news stories and policies are made based on national averages. And people don't experience national averages on a daily basis.
My pals and I in NYC often joke about taking our NYC salaries "somewhere else." But, they're not portable!
How can we define what income equals qhat lifestyle without taking regional costs of living into account?
Why do we let the debate be defined that way? Because, really and practically... a six figure salary in my home state of New Mexico meant and means good, though not necessarily easy living. In New York it means average living.
And, I don't make six figures, even in NYC!
AND... it is true that people here get by on far less than I make. But, that doesn't undercut my argument... it's just another thing that's wrong.
The main point is that whether it is 90K or 30K, we are all going to see a decline in standard of living. In some cases it will be annoying, in others it will be a horrific life searing disaster. We have to fight them, not each other. That is the main point.
Over a mil or ten, and Bush is your boy.
The other day a poster here, who was making a lot of pretty good, progressive points, attacked me for my "smug middle-class-ness", he was pretty heated.
I told him to fuck off and die becaue I was pissed off plenty, and maybe he was some kind of troll, but more likely not. But later I was sad because I hate to see our community -- the liberal progressive community -- tear at each other over our respective economic conditions.
The problem is that we were promised that, if we worked hard and got educated, we'd make lots of money. We do, in fact make lots of money--my parents raised 7 kids on less than half of what we make.
But they didn't save either, and part of our mortgage is their loan for my younger brother's college (bought the house from my dad), and most of my (personal) debt is connected to the fact that they did not help me with college much at all.
Student loan debt is supposed to "good" debt--that is, it increases your future earning potential. I'm not convinced that this has been true for us.
The point is not, boo-hoo, I only make $90K or whatever.
The point is: even $90K doesn't make you rich in this country. Or even all that comfortable.
Americans have no idea *how* rich the real rich are.
Or how poorly this country is doing as a whole.
I have to agree with Apophenia that it sounds like a lot of people here are poormouthing about having to live on 90 K a year.
Harold
I don't really see this as some kind of "poor me" contest. I'm grateful every day for every goddamn thing I have. However, I'm not living what would traditionally be called a middleclass life, mainly because I equate that lifestyle - as most people do - with security.
I don't think that's a terribly hard point to understand. And rather than assuming that people here are "poormouthing," you could assume they're telling the truth, and consider the implications for people who are less fortunate than us.
Speaking for myself, I'd be happy to get taxed a bit more for a few public works programs.
I agree about the outer boroughs, though. I used to live in the Bronx...cheap and spacious.
Hi, Otter!
Are you feeling better? Family okay? We've missed you.
Smallbottle,
You're totally right about scale. Heard on NPR today that some financial honcho from Tyco, on trial for fraud, "forgot" to report a $25 million loan on his taxes. Thers and I had a good laugh about that. "Forgot"?
We go into a blind panic if we lose five bucks in the laundry.
NYMary-
Until Reagan planted the meme for the UC system, anyone could get a college education virtually for free at a state school. Not 5k a year, not 1k a year, maybe 100 dollars a year. Reagan trashed the idea of higher education as something our society's citizens deserve.
Hiya Phila! I see you've been around more. Nice nudibranch!
Otter, hope all is well and healing. Are you going to need angioplasty or anything? Leaves a wicked bruise. But worth it for the young angels.
ba'al
the American "liberal progressive community" once meant, first and foremost, a concern for the economic status and long-term possibilities of the working class. now, it seems, it's all about protecting the perks of the middle class. my, how things have changed since the days of FDR.
just my two cents (or 90k)...
Our household has two adults, two kids.
We make 90k (give or take 10k, depending on whatever)
We live in San Francisco.
We own a 1,500 sq ft home, no yard.
One $15k used car
two tv's, basic cable
one vacation a year.
public school for the kids
cut coupons and buy in bulk at costco
have just enough savings to live perhaps 3 months if lost a job.
small IRA's
i think that pretty much seems middle class to me.
of course we could move to our home state of Utah and if we made 90k, we'd be sitting pretty...
but then no one in Utah is going to pay us 90k a year.
Hey I'm not griping or saying poor me.
I have been without a home, eating ramen and visiting food banks.
I appreciate ALL of the good things I have.
Just saying that I'm far from rich,1 month of missed paychecks away from disaster.
Sounds like I have many peers in the same situation.
Mrs. Ibrahim,
I'm really shocked that you feel that way, seriously. As someone who was raised in the working class (my brothers are circuit board solderers, call center managers, bread guys), and have struggled to reach the middle class, I have not forgotten what it was like to live on $18K. I know most people do. But my difficulties don't make theirs disappear, obviously.
The same things could help us both. We need good schools, safe neighborhoods, nationalized healthcare. That would improve both our lives and those of people making under $20K.
I think the point is: if we're struggling, and Bush is defining "better off" as over $20K, how are most people living? It's a nightmare.
Hell I AM the new white collar working class.
I feel like I am doing fairly well in the DC area on ~$95K in spite of a dysfunctional non-working spouse and a live in still-finding-himself 27 year old. I think the difference is that we built our house ourselves quite a while ago, inspired by a book called something like 'Low cost Energy Efficient Shelter'. We paid for the house as we built it and paid off the land mortgage in 10 years. We were free and clear until about 5 years ago when my husband fell apart and I took out a home equity loan to get the youngest through college. She gratuates Sunday and I estimate I will get the loan paid off in about three years.
Bush has NO clue, he has never gone hungry, gone without health care, worried about paying for school.
Silverspoon Chimperor.
Eat the rich!
Apophenia,
RE:
A family making $90,000 a year can also afford to move. If they want to live in San Fran, that's a SACRIFICE they have to make. There's no right to live in the highest priced geographic markets,
It's not about who has a right to live where. Eighteen years ago, when I decided this was where I wanted to live and moved here (to Berkeley), housing was relatively affordable, but I didn't have a red cent. Since then, I've worked my ass off to acquire the qualifications to make a decent living, that in most other places would allow me to participate in the American Dream. But here, as I watched helplessly from the sidelines, the housing market has appreciated totally beyond my means. In the 18 years I spent trying to get to where I thought I would be able to afford to live here, I have build a large social network. My parents and my wife's parents both live here. My sister and brother-in-law live here. Just about every human being in the whole goddam world about whom I really care lives here. if you had any common sense, you'd understand that it is not entirely ureasonable, now that I have spent half my life and put down such deep roots here, that I should be just a little put out that I now have to choose between leaving everyone I and my wife know and love behind and pissing the better part of my hard-earned money down the rental hole instead of investing it in equity in a house. If you have no emotional connection, as I do, to the place that you live, then I pity you.
All I can say is 90K in NYC will get you nowhere. It's a dead end. Even in the outer boroughs. A little crap house in the Bronx now costs 500K.
This country is turning into Brazil. Without a real people's party, we are out of luck.
Dear Mrs Al-Jazeera,
If we'd taken the billions spent on the Iraq war and invested it in the stock market at 6.5%, or even in T-bills, we'd have taken care of social security through the 25th century.
And with lower prices.
After all, as Apo said, no one has a right to live anywhere. This isn't utopia, and if you don't like the human rights you can always move.
working class? How much do you think an auto worker made, in real terms, 30 years ago...
There was a scene in Roger and Me in which Reagan took a bunch of unemployed auto workers out for pizza. He suggested that they move to the south or the west, and one woman, angry, pointed out that she had a home and kids in school and couldn't just move.
Thanks, Apophenia. Geography is not necessarily a luxury.
Exactly. We can afford to rent a 3 bedroom half of a rundown [one tiny cracked tile bathroom, no central heat/air, no dishwasher, rats in the walls and no I am not kidding because they have been keeping me and the cat up at all hours ] duplex in the uptown/ university area of New Orleans for $1200, but NO WAY can we afford to buy in that same area.
Sorry on this, but you can afford to buy if you choose to live in a different neighborhood. I live in Algiers, still city of New Orleans, seven miles from the CBD, in a beautiful mixed race, safe, friendly, neighborhood of well kept 30 year old homes. They run 150--200K. We bought one last year for 175K on a 95% (fixed rate 30 yr standard) loan. Our mortgage payment is $1100 for 2200 sq ft 4 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath house with a two car garage, central air, central heat, new appliances and everything else you would expect. I know it is great to live in midtown but don't gripe because you choose to live there.
That was supposed to be "lower oil prices." Hard to type with one hand in your pants.
--Al
NYMary,
I understand the problems of kids, cars, mortgaes, student loans. seriously, I do.
maybe it's the concept of "middle class" that is problematic. I guess I have seen too many folks struggling to get by on half of the proverbial $90K, and see little support from the "liberal progressive community" we hear so much about. Medicaid and Medicare cuts. Welfare Reform. decreases in per-pupil spending. increases in basic necessities. etc. and that was the Clintonista's. but now that the Thugs have set their sights on that big fat kitty we call the SS Trust Fund, and the middle class might be getting the same treatment the working class has been getting for the last 25 years, listen to thew howls.
sorry if the unionist in me is rubbing folks the wrong way, but for those of us making half of the proverbial number, all the anecdotes, no matter how truthful, ring hollow to my ears.
Surfdork,
That's the real problem--the rich pols in Congress don't understand what the average geezer in the US of A has to go through to survive.
The Chimp has NOOOOOOO conception of what it means to get up and go to work everyday. The a-hole has never had a real job in his entire life.
Jesus. I made $12,000 last year and I can't imagine a world in which I couldn't survive on 90K.
Granted, you have to live where the jobs are. But I wonder how many "wants" are now categorized as necessities - for example, cell phones. I'm on the road a lot and drive a 10-year-old car; I feel a lot more comfortable having a cell phone, but 10 years ago, it wasn't even an issue.
This is by far the most interesting thread I've ever read.
Bush really fucked up big time by getting this conversation started.
Turns out even the folks making 90K are fucked. So where DO we draw the line in the sand mr. bush?
He has also started a war between that generations that is sure to thrill, i.e."everyone born after 1950 is OK."
Well that's just fucking great for us ASS END BABY BOOMERS, the forgotten decade of the 70's. I mean it just ain't fair - waaaaa...
we were too young to get to join ya'll at Woodstock and the Fillmore West but we also aren't the Cool X or Y generation.
But born after 1950, we get our social security cut while we have to work until 75 to support the true boomers and our children support us all. Waaaaa poor little baby erin.
But seriously, he has really screwed up by starting this conversation among we good old regular Americans, eh?
blerb,
Amen, brother (sister?)!
We build lives. In places. And we enter professions expecting to make a living, investing time and often incurring debt for that life. To be told at the end of the line that it's not good enough--that's just mean.
Oops, meant "everyone born before 1950"
too much vino
Well, since no one bit, in 1976 average base hourly wage for a big three auto workers provided you with about $50K per year in today's money. Plus overtime, of course.
Yea,
Ray gun/Thatcher ……………..they have a lot to answer for.
This is also one of the reasons there is such a disconnect between the media and the people. The likes of Judy or Cokie, or Wolf have no idea about the average wage, and trying to live off it.
That is what makes all their talk on taxes and SS so much bullshit.
Susie,
"Surviving" on 90,000K is not the issue. It's about whether 90K is enough to make you "well off" or even "upper middle class" in parts of the country.
Right, Atrios. But those were the days in which one parent customariy stayed home. How was that possible?
Mrs. Al Jafeeri,
RE: now shed one crocodile tear for all those households struggling to get by on $90K.
You say 3 in 10 workers gross under $20,000 and so I shouldn't be bitter about the fact that I can't buy a house now. Well, I've got news for you. I have spent the better part of my adult life being one of those workers. From the ages of 19 to 25, I endured some real hardship working multiple low-wage jobs, was almost out on the street a couple of times, and can honestly say that I was not unacquainted with the concept of hunger. I worked my fucking ass off to get my PhD, again making next to no money, so that I could supposedly both make a decent living and do something useful for the world later. I am almost forty years old now, after having lived near the poverty line and having busted my ass royally for eighteen years. I FUCKING DESERVE TO BE ABLE TO BUY A HOUSE NOW, GODDAMMIT! And the fact that I can't do that now, so that I can actually put my money into something of value that I can sell later and then send my kids to a good college, instead of just pissing it away, is NOT FAIR. Okay? The point in this country is supposed to be that if you're poor and you work really, really hard, you can get the good things in life. As it turns out, that is a LIE.
Well, since no one bit, in 1976 average base hourly wage for a big three auto workers provided you with about $50K per year in today's money. Plus overtime, of course.
so Ibrahim and I are firmly in the working class then. two Master's degree's and we belong to a union that forces the state to provide us with healthcare. sounds right. cuz the union makes us strong.
Oh, and I hope the folks who are saying that living in town is a luxury are noting that public transportation funds are being slashed everywhere. Sometimes living in an urban area is a tradeoff for driving 50 miles (my personal commute). With gas at $2.35, that's a significant issue.
Yes Atrios,
and in the 50s it was 'what's good for GM is good for America'
But if GM puts it's factories in Mexico or China, it no longer is that great for American Joe.
Definitely the best thread ever.
I'm with Apophenia. Fuck the coasts. They totally suck ass.
I'm moving to Lawrence Kansas in three months. Houses there have land and everything you need for 200 K. I say everyone move to the midwest and change America from within.
I've been living in Boston for 10 years. It can go pound sand in my humble opinion.
Join me in Kansas, save a but load of cash, and love Evolution all at the same time.
Westward whoa mothafuckasssssss !
I've always argued that unless the Dems really, seriously bring back the bubbas and the working class grunts with a spirited, full-throated economic populism (instead of this wimpy yuppie social liberalism crap), the Pugs will continue to win with their wedge issues. I hate to say this but we need a William Jennings Bryan....preferably without all that Xtian baggage. But you get the drift.
working class? How much do you think an auto worker made, in real terms, 30 years ago...
Atrios | Email | Homepage | 04.29.05 - 8:49 pm | #
--------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
The mill workers in my red county town all made great money, much more than the teachers. All had boats, RV's etc. Hell, I made $7.25 an hour in 1980 pulling green chain in the summer. Big big bucks for an entry wage.
Families survived on one income. Nothing too fancy, but leave it to beaver all the same.
Bush has blown it.
Getting this conversation started is a populist's dream.
We bought one last year for 175K on a 95% (fixed rate 30 yr standard) loan.
--Freder
It used to be that the standard loan for 30 years was 80% not 95%, though now the 97%, 103%, and interest only loans are really catching on. Is that a good thing or a sign of housing markets in which "the American dream of homeownership" is increasingly unreachable and one's kids won't do better than oneself?
I own now, but I grew up in a rent-controlled apartment in NYC, and I have long thought that as a nation we overvalue homeownership, overlooking its social and economic costs.
Mrs. Ibrahim,
You're right. In my profession, we mostly *are* unionized, though it hasn't done us much good. I have a doctorate (and its accompanying debt) and recently interviewed for a job starting at $29K.
Oh,
did I forget to say that I'm an academic ?
That shit's portable, unlike most things, so I'm a bit out of the reality loop.
blerb
social mobility is the Big Lie of late period American capitalism.
but I feel your pain. I lived in my car during the first semester I spent at UC Irvine, and have worked many many many low wage jobs (including teaching college kids how to write, the worst, trust me) and your wail is both unfortunate and sadly too true. my condolences.
nymary,
interviewd for an adjunct position, 4/4 teaching load. $23K a year.
rather paint houses.
I read the comments with interest. My wife and I together earn about 110K. It is SoCal so our house payment is about 2K a month. We have two pre-2000 vehicles. Our son recently graduated from college and we have twin daughter in college. No financial help because of our income. If it wasn't for the home equity we would be mightily in debt. I don't know what everyone thinks is a middle class lifestyle but we live pretty modestly. I think other parents have a similar story.
BronxVoter
That is very interesting.
Because SS is really the first big issue that Bush has gone away from the culture war bullshit.
This is bread and butter issues, and The New Right has nothing for the average Joe
RESULT...... His base hate is plan, and so does most of the country. If they are not fighting the cultural war they have nothing.
So atrios is $7.50 in 1980 comparable to your quiz #?
I'm thinkin lumber mill workers have similar union wages as auto?
Another dumb question as I read all of this.
By what age should that person have attained in working up to that 90K?
Or even the 20k?
bloomer,
In what field is academia portable?
Sally,
Oh definitely. I mean how long can the Pugs subsist on these wedge cultural issues. One day people are gonna wake up and realize that they are getting screwed. It's just the reich wing is so good at playing misdirection, people don't know who the real enemy is.
EkCentrik,
I should think by the time you hit 40, you should be able to buy.
At a 30-year mortgage, you'll be making house payments until the day you stop working. Best not to plan on house payments with your (nonextistent) social security.
(I'm 38, by the way.)
That family of four would have a much harder time trying to live on $18,000. There are a lot more people trying to live on less than half of $90,000 than are trying to scrounge by at the higher figure.
It does matter to some extent on where they live but having ninety thousand does afford choices real poor people don't have.
But since the president has declared that those making $20,000 are upper class, who can complain?
Living on 50,000 in upstate NY with a hub and two sins, guess what? Living in a trailer!
Ha, ha! Sons I mean!
well, maybe two sins, too, ro.
Where in upstate?
According to the Los Angeles Times, less than 20% of L. A. residents have sufficient annual incomes to qualify for the median priced home in the area, which was, at last glance, ca. $450K, (You want a second bathroom for that? Maybe, maybe not.)with the required minimum annual income figure being over $100K. Monthly rentals in reasonably acceptable family friendly and safe neighborhoods is upwards of $2K per month.
According to a recent UCSB study, the projected median price of homes in the central California coastal county of San Luis Obispo will be $714K by 2007.
And then there is the City by the Bay which is the most expensive of all.
$90K is an inadequate amount unless you are living in north,south,east,or west bumblef**k.
Frightening... move to Syracuse, NY. Electrical engineers (Lockheed) are being sought after. Environmental scientists, not so much.
So, I'm looking at a position in midtown manhattan that pays 42k a year and going from my 2 bed apartment - with heat and hotwater - ($550/month) towards paying $1500 to share a 5th floor walkup. Or a job in Alexandria, VA with the EPA, not the cheapest place on earth either. I'm scared to death of the property prices in any of those areas.
But the point is that me, a single, no kid havin' college grad, is trying to figure out how he'll afford to live on $42/year - I can't imagine how people are surviving on $20/k WITH kids.
If I could get a gig in Syracuse, I'd be set - golf is downright cheap here, too.
I can attest to what Atrios writes about those who make an "upper middle-income" salary having to scrape a bit. Here are my numbers:
Annual Salary: $71,000
Avg Monthly Take-Home: approx. $3800.00
(two months, it's $1900.00 more)
- $600 Charitable Contribution
- $200 Student Loans
- $250 Utilities.
- $1800 Mortgage (5 yr. ARM, %5.375)
- $350 HELOC pmt. (debt consolidation)
- $240 Gas (approx. $60/week)
- $133 HOA
That comes out to $3573 per month in expenses. The rest goes towards food, clothing, house upkeep, fun, etc. FYI, Here's how my mortgage breaks down:
Location: Alhambra, California
Type: Townhouse
1st Mtg Amt: approx. $317,000
2nd Mtg Amt: approx. $43,000
Value: $375,000
Sq. Ft.: 1080
Yr. Built: 1994
The value is circa September 2004. I don't know what housing prices will do, but quite frankly I'm trying to pay off as much principal on the HELOC as quickly as possible so I don't get stuck with an asset that can't cover my debts. That's playing it pretty close to the line, and I don't have much for savings (a 401k, but that's not exactly liquid) nor much cash to save although I do try. If anyone knows of computer programming jobs in, say, Texas (where land is cheap) that pay a comprable salary, I'd be game. The problem is here in Cali being a programmer is pretty nice; I've never been out of work longer than a couple of weeks. I'm afraid that even though it'd be cheaper to live someplace else, the bottom line wouldn't change much because salaries and job prospects are poorer around the country than in California.
NYMary,
Genetics/Biology.
There is a University in every state.
I'm going to University of Kansas.
ChrisS,
Check Lockheed in Owego, NY, too. Just got a big helipopter contract, and even cheaper than the 'Cuse.
Living in the SF Bay Area is not an act of self-indulgence for me. Mr. Sisi is not able to leave either his mother (with Alzheimer's) or his studio. The work he does is extremely specialized. He is an artist. Even if he found a teaching position (unlikely) he would make about 25K a year-- full time. The only way we could move is if *I* somehow managed to land an extremely high-powered job. I am an accountant, which makes me a city person. If I despise the exurbanites who drive 3 hours a day to achieve "white flight" (and I do) how could I respect myself for driving 3 hours a day to have a cheap and "authentic" country lifestyle?
I dislike driving, and it's wasteful. Living in a city with transit is my way of sparing the planet.
If we were to move to say, Western Arkansas, we would have a difficult time finding employment. Perhaps we could sell pies. At least until word gets out that we're Jewish atheists, and that I'm Asian.
bloomer,
Yes, if you're willing to adjunct, you can choose. The tenure track (the only way to get benefits, usually, or the kind of security we've been talking about) is trickier.
my point was, "the working class" doesn't refer to the poorest of the poor, and never has. Many people today who have squishy seeming white collar jobs are working at below the working class wage of yesterday. One could get a house in a detroit suburb for only about 100K today's dollars...twice the income of a single breadwinner. We're talking about areas where home prices are 4 and 5 and 6 and more times median incomes. yes, I'm comparing apples and oranges to some extent. But, the point was the "working class" had it pretty good.
Today's issue of the LA Times lists 15 single family homes available in Los Angeles City for under $300,000. of course you would have to live near, or even next to, heaven forbid, non-Caucasians. and we members of the "liberal progressive community" can't have that now, can we?
Well, since no one bit, in 1976 average base hourly wage for a big three auto workers provided you with about $50K per year in today's money. Plus overtime, of course.
And that went a long way in Michigan. They could afford stay at home wives, RV's to travel in, and summer/retirement homes in the UP on that money.
SEATTLE
Expensive like SF. No shit.
NYMary good evening.
I agree with what you said on the home purchase. However, I was focusing on the earning power. When should a person(s) be making that supposed 90K.
Check Lockheed in Owego, NY, too.
Well, the thing is that I'm not an engineer, just a lowly env. scientist. And really, thing that kills me is that I want to get rid of my car - living in upstate and rural areas requires an automobile. NYC, DC, Boston, etc. have the public transportation, but the housing market around T-stations (for example) is outrageous and full of people bitching about not having a place to park!
Our population centers and cities are massively inefficient and, with peak oil, are going to undergo a massive shift over the next 2 decades. It could get somewhat painful in addition to the stagnant wages in this country. I'm rambling, but it really does all tie into together.
NYMary,
Well, my wife is going for the tenure thing. I'll be postdocing for a while before I jump on that bandwagon.
But science is easier than other fields, in terms of pay. My postdoc position pays 36 K and will last forever if I want.
home owner,
maybe you should sell that Alhambra townhouse and buy the 3bd/1ba at 2255 Whittier. at $259K it sounds like a real steal. or maybe the one at 1511 N. Herbert Ave, or maybe the 3bd/1ba house going for $295K at 818 N. Record Avenue. sell the townhouse, buy the house, pocket a few hundred thousand and get that plasma they advertise at Best Buy.
outer borroughs = 45+ minutes on the train. maybe longer...
(family > 4) + nyc + (income < 90K) = poor planning.
Atrios,
What do economist recommend one spend on a house? One year's income? More?
According to a few onnline mortgage eligibility calculators, someone earning 90K wouldn't qualify for a mortgage for a 300K house...
White collar-blue collar doesn't mean anything. Lots of blue collar jobs, construction for example, can pay more than even a lot of management jobs. And the suckers who have management jobs can be forced to work two or more times as many hours for less work. I wouldn't hold a management job with a lot of companies even at twice the pay.
Oh, yes, and by the way:
8 million people - New York
10 million - So Cal high end areas
5 million - No Cal high end areas
3 million - Chicago
1.5 million - Seattle
0.5 million - Boston
___________
28 million
There are other areas as well.
So let's say it's at least 10% of the US where $90K won't cut it. These are "blue" areas, of course, so Bush Inc. don't give a rat's ass about us.
Atrios, you couldn't be more a part of the system that's crushing the world. The same for Kos and Drum. It's all so silly.
I know you guys mean well, and I applaud your work, don't know what we'd do without you, read you every day, etc. etc. -- but you're all blind as frogs in batter. Me too, of course.
Be well, bro'.
True. 2255 Whittier has the advantage of being a stone's throw from the intersections of the 60/5/10/ and 101 freeways. pray for double-paned windows.
Many people today who have squishy seeming white collar jobs are working at below the working class wage of yesterday
You don't think that the wage stagnation of those not in the positions of power has anything to do with knocking the highest tax brackets from 90% to 36%, do you?
I decided against going to law school because the amount of student loan debt would outweigh any increases in salary - and I would get to work 70 a week. Thanks, but no.
bloomer,
36K is salary at tenure in the humanities. My postdoc paid 18K.
travy,
poor planning = life, for most people.
Personally, I couldn't wait to pay down the debt before having kids; I got my doctorate at 29, which is actually relatively respectable. The tenure-track job didn't appear, despite my best efforts, so we decided to make a life without it. So we did. Personally rewarding, economically, a nightmare.
oh, not a recommendation, but 1/3 income as mortage payment/rent is a sort of rule of thumb...
Farr,
How so ? I'm curious.
J
Middle class is a big category, and we need to pull on the same rope. We cannot make progress if people making 20K resent the people making 90K and vice versa. We're all paupers compared to the truly rich people running the country. Divide and conquer is their strategy.
True. 2255 Whittier has the advantage of being a stone's throw from the intersections of the 60/5/10/ and 101 freeways. pray for double-paned windows.
true. double-paned windows for the whole house, new central air, new paint job and carpentry upgrades, figure @ $40K. if "home owner" sells his Alhambra townhouse and pockets $200K shouldn't be a real problem. there is the whole non-Caucasian issue to deal with, and as a decade-long resident of the City of Angels I understand how touchy some members of the liberal-progressive community are about living in the central core, or in the districts where the working people struggle to make ends meet on $18K. alas.
I'd rather live among "non-caucasians," Mrs. I, than among the poor white trash who currently surround us. (True: next door neighbor has two refrigerators and one abandoned car in the yard.)
By the way, I know there are more people than that living in CA (North and South) but I just roughly cut the numbers in half to eliminate the people living in places like, say, Fresno. Or Weed.
Well, atrios is right.
I'm a 70's leave it to beaver child.
Boring ass end boomer.
Families could survive on one income. No extras, but still that three bedroom ranch.
I'm going to University of Kansas.
bloomer -- 9:28 pm
A Fable:
Once upon a time there was a rabbit who was admitted to Grad school. The rabbit toiled, and sweated, and graded papers, and made coffee, and dilligently did all the duties of a Grad Student...
In the fullness of time, the rabbit took her degree. Celebrating her success in a clearing with a bottle of nice Chardonnay, the rabbit attracted th attention of a hunting bobcat, who stalked, and sprang, caught the rabbit. Then, when the cat had the rabbit in her very jaws, the rabbit screamed:
"DON'T YOU EVEN WANNA READ MY FUCKING DISSERTATION BEFORE YOU EAT ME?"
Taken aback, the bobcat paused and asked: "What's your field?"
The rabbit answered, and the bobcat, intrigued, restored the rabbit ot the ground. "Do you have a copy around?" the cat asked. Affirmative, indicated the Rabbit, gesturing toward the door of her warren.
So, the bobcat entered the door of the warren.
Pandemonium!
Squalls, screams, the crashing of furniture, and then an eery silence. After a minute or so, the door opened, and the skeleton of the bobcat sailed back out through the door.
The rabbit resumed her frolic. Celebrating her success in a clearing with a bottle of nice Chardonnay, the rabbit attracted th attention of a hunting wolf, who stalked, and sprang, caught the rabbit. Then, when the wolf had the rabbit in her very jaws, the rabbit screamed:
"DON'T YOU EVEN WANNA READ MY FUCKING DISSERTATION BEFORE YOU EAT ME?"
Taken aback, the wolf paused and asked: "What's your field?"
The rabbit answered, and the wolf, intrigued, restored the rabbit ot the ground. "Do you have a copy around?" the wolf asked. Affirmative, indicated the Rabbit, gesturing toward the door of her warren.
So, the wolf entered the door of the warren.
Pandemonium!
Squalls, screams, the crashing of furniture, and then an eery silence. After a minute or so, the door opened, and the skeleton of the wolf sailed back out through the door.
The rabbit resumed her frolic. Celebrating her success in a clearing with a bottle of nice Chardonnay, the rabbit attracted th attention of a hunting man, who stalked, and sprang, caught the rabbit. Then, when the man had the rabbit in her very jaws, the rabbit screamed:
"DON'T YOU EVEN WANNA READ MY FUCKING DISSERTATION BEFORE YOU EAT ME?"
Taken aback, the man paused and asked: "What's your field?"
The rabbit answered, and the man, intrigued, restored the rabbit ot the ground. "Do you have a copy around?" the man asked. Affirmative, indicated the Rabbit, gesturing toward the door of her warren.
So, the man entered the door of the warren.
Pandemonium!
Squalls, screams, the crashing of furniture, and then an eery silence. After a minute or so, the door opened, and the skeleton of the man sailed back out through the door.
The door of the warren then opened, and out crawled an enormous lion, who thanked the rabbit for lunch and then left...
Moral:
It doesn't matter at all what you write about; the most important thing is who is your advisor."
someone earning 90K wouldn't qualify for a mortgage for a 300K house...
Thus the 'interest only' loan.
The 'affordability' issue is one that is of great concern here in Phoenix, and within City management. Thus, the City itself or in partnership with lenders makes monies available for City workers - for people who're prepared to live in districts that are more in town than suburb, and for rehab and infill properties. We even marked the occasion last month when the average cost of a house exceeded the affordability index. Justifiably, it's regarded as a vital issue in the longterm growth and stability of the city.
Atrios said:
'True. 2255 Whittier has the advantage of being a stone's throw from the intersections of the 60/5/10/ and 101 freeways. pray for double-paned windows.'
It'd be nice if it were that easy; I co-owned a place before the one I own currently and sold my half to get the down-payment money. At the time, I was living in South Central and looking to possibly buy there. Instead, I was convinced by my former co-owner to invest in a condo in Pasadena ($165k) in 2000. Needless to say it's now appraised at $380k and so I made enough off that to make a down payment. A couple of refinancings later (for debt consolidation and whatnot) and here I am. There are some problems with the property that I need to fix before I sell again, and due to the fun terms you get with some HELOCs and AMRs these days (i.e., pay a penalty if you sell within two years, etc.) it wouldn't make sense for me to sell and move down: I have $370,000 in debt, a property that's maybe worth $385,000 and $10,000 won't cut it for a down payment on anything worth owning. I view the house as my main investment, and I'm looking to it as the thing that keeps the ship afloat. Hopefully in a couple of years I'll have a business degree and a better-paying job. At that time, sure, it'd make sense to sell. But right now the numbers just don't work out unless I'm going for something really cheap.
er, I meant $15,000 and not $10,000. Still not much of a down payment unless you're buying a car.
True, NYMary. Where I used to live, my black neighbors and I used to commiserate about the trashy white folks living next door. Parked their cars on the front lawn, and ran the washer drain hose out the window into the back yard.
We're all paupers compared to the truly rich people running the country. Divide and conquer is their strategy.
Marley | Email | Homepage | 04.29.05 - 9:45 pm | #
Exactly.
And getting atrios to share such details and have this conversation is NOT going to advance the strategy.
nymary,
no dearth of abandoned cars or refrigerator hillbilly's in the Islamic Republic of Florida. we were fortunate enough to buy a house (in a working class, racially mixed neighborhood) before the bubble began down here, and have seen it double in value in 5 years.
how did we do it on working class wages? didn't eat out for 2 years. biked to work rather than drive. cut off cable tv, and used free dialup to the U. scrimped and saved and took out a 95% fixed loan, then refinanced when the rates dropped.
having lived in Venice, 5 blocks from the beach, I felt hyper-lucky. "How can you live in crack town?" all my liberal-progressive pals used to ask. "Non-Caucasians don't frighten me" was my stock answer.
GWDPA,
Same here in Portland.
This week all the local tv media piled on to this subject for some reason.
Both AZ and OR suffer from the values in CA because they sell and move here.
Of course, those of us lucky ones that got into the market earlier are benefiting greatly from the influx and californicating.
WoodyGuthriesGuitar,
My advisor was describe to me as a teddy bear with claws when I was interviewing.
These numbers seem incredibly low, we live in a one bedroom appartment in London and own one five year old car. Our income exceeds your definition of middle class several times over (even in a bad year and by more than an order of magnititude in good ones). We are by no stretch of the imagination upper midle-class and are probably best described as petty bourouis. I doubt that American incomes are lower than British or that the average poster on this blog is below median wage. Any explanation?
I live in an "average" sort of city, Tacoma WA, pop. 200,000. We live in $350K house that would cost 2x to 3x that in OC or SF for the same quality neighborhood.
I used to commute to a really well paying job in Seattle, but calculated that the real cost of the commute (all in, $700+/mo: gas, parking, maint., depreciation) and the cost of the commute on me & my family was just too high.
So, after dicking around for a couple of years doing projects and not making any money, I found a job with a national consulting firm where I can work out of my house here in Tacoma, but enjoy big city wages. I have to travel a bit to other cities every few weeks, but it's a small price to pay.
I consider myself extremely fortunate. This is a rare deal. And just hope I can keep the deal alive for 10 more years.
Mrs. I,
Oh, I know from Florida. When we were there, in South Miami, we were on the "white" side of a "black" street (and for all you non-Floridians, yes, the boundaries are that precise). Our kid went to a historically black school which, in 1998, was just getting A/C, 25 years after mandatory desegregation. They offered swimming lessons as a matter of public safety (there being lots of pools in FL, though not many in our neighborhood), but they were given in a 12'round, 4'deep pool set up--wait for it--in the school cafeteria (they had to take lunch in shifts during swimming lessons). None of this was why we moved--we're from NY and missed our families terribly--but I have to say, I don't miss it much.
...Grrr... (can't do math today). $317,000 + $43,000 = $360,000. So, that's my current debt load, secured by my property. That brings us to $25,000, which you may be able to squeeze into a down payment on a $250,000 property, but you're still looking at a second to cover the rest. Oh, and if I were to sell my property today I'd have to pay capital gains tax on the sale receipts as well as a good $6,000 or $7,000 in ARM/HELOC sale penalties so that extra $10,000 still doesn't make much difference.
ErinPDX,
And I absolutely agree with your generational analysis. Fucked from both ends.
I'm living in a 1000 sq ft artist's loft in E. Somerville, Mass, just across the Charles from Boston, down the street from a Waste Management substation and very much in the body-shop-and-razor-wire zone. Our place was just appraised at $450,000. And condo appraisals run considerably below houses. Not as bad as San Francisco, but definitely in the running.
NYMary
Indeed
And think about what our kids face.
I'm sure we all know honorable old style republicans.
How can they live with these deficits and do this to our kids, let alone us, THEIR KIDS!
Home Owner,
Of course you must keep it.
Better than the stock market anyway and at least you have a roof over your head.
According to a recent UCSB study, the projected median price of homes in the central California coastal county of San Luis Obispo will be $714K by 2007.
And having lived in SLO for many years, I can promise you that less than 1% of the folks who live there would make enough to buy those homes. It's retirees from Orange County squeezing the residents there out of affordable housing.
I'm in the Bay Area, and I can attest $90,000 not only doesnt cut it for a 4 bedroom, it doesn't cut it for a 2 bedroom.
I live in the upper midwest, NOT in Minneapolis/St.Paul or St. Cloud areas, but in what is termed "Greater Minnesota." In my area good middle-class houses start at around $150,000 where just 15 years ago they were $80-$90,000.
If anything like this increase has occured elsewhere (and it likely has) then I can definitely see what Atrios is getting at. It's becoming harder and harder for even the "upper" middle class to tread water. Almost everyone is slowly sinking.
But science is easier than other fields, in terms of pay. My postdoc position pays 36 K and will last forever if I want.
bloomer
The problem is of course, you have to live in Lawrence, Kansas.
Actually, you don't. You could instead live in Atchison, Kansas, which is actually kind of an interesting place - Kansas, but not much. The horrors that I experienced in Leavenworth I'm convinced I could have mitigated if somebody had told me about Atchison.
But still, cher - and my dearest NYMary, the sadness in my heart reading about your hopes for a life in academia. Woody is of course absolutely correct in his morality play - my advisor was incredibly powerful within the UC system - but there were exactly six places in all of the United States where British Empire was taught, and the only way to obtain one of the places was to put a hit out on the one already there. The year I took my doctorate was the first time that employment within my field fell below 90% - it went to 50% that year and never recovered.
I wish all of you the best of luck in holding fast to your dreams - but just as my high school guidance counsellor always insisted - make sure you have a backup position. (He sent me to school to become a fingerprint analyst! Good enough for me. Then they computerised that.... )
Don't forget about Atchison tho.
I'm in the Bay Area, and I can attest $90,000 not only doesnt cut it for a 4 bedroom, it doesn't cut it for a 2 bedroom.
given that one shouldn't pay more than 1/4 of your income on rent, let's ballpark thta at $2,000 a month, $24K a year on rent. Today's SF Chronicle has 400 units that fall within that description, all within SF.
We have two children, one grown, one entering college, and we bought a house in a mixed race neighborhood in the high crime "outer boroughs." before the boom. We have one car.
We regard the 45 min commute to midtown as the joy of our lives since it means an hour and a half day of uninterrupted reading on the subway. If you are a bookworm you get a lot of serious reading accomplished in that time.
The difference between now and, say, thirty or forty years ago, is that there is a sense now that things are getting far worse not better. The middle class is getting squeezed and the social contract is in tatters. Though this has been happening since the eighties.
Our son makes more than both of us together, but he has much less security and no benefits and hence probably feels poorer than we did.
As for us, we will never leave the city, but our youthful dreams of a vacation home have just about evaporated because of the real estate bubble.
Mimiru said:
'If anything like this increase has occured elsewhere (and it likely has) then I can definitely see what Atrios is getting at'
The property I co-owned in Pasadena has increased in value over 100% in four years. The average year-on-year house price increase in my neck of the woods has been somewhere in the neighborhood of 25% -- _that_, to me, is the unsustainable part of the housing bubble. Prices may stagnate, but I don't see them increasing 25% year-to-year forever.
This is NOT about "poor me." It's about fairness. I work hard. My friends work hard. A lot of people I don't know, frankly, work even harder.
But, you know... my wife and I got into a situation recently... she was the executive assistant to a prick. We were ot together, after work, having a nice glass of wine and her boss called her and BITCHED HER OUT because, through no fault of her own, some theatre tickets for his friends THAT HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH BUSINESS didn't come through. And she just had to quit. It was innapropriate. He was able to call her, on her cell, on her time, and be a jerk over his own bruised ego? Why? Because he's rich and we're not? She quit the next day and then, despite his begging her to stay, sucked it up and stayed another month to train her replacement. She stood up for herself but was responsible about it.
Still, we're the ones who are screwed, he's not.
How the hell is that right? Why the hell don't we ever have political conversations about the rich screwing the not-rich (have to say it that way, we're NOT poor, I won't pose) in America?
And, I damned well know that people have it way worse than me and that some people CAN'T quit over something like that. But isn't THAT wrong?
Like I said, it's not about "woe is me" it's about the fact that this kind of thing should NEVER happen. It's 2005 dammit!
Of course, those of us lucky ones that got into the market earlier are benefiting greatly from the influx and californicating.
ErinPDX -- 9:58 pm
Scene: Santa Fe, Fiestas, 1970. The annual (but soon to be eliminated) Saturday Noon Hysterical/Historical Parade--right after the annual Pet Parade and blessing of the Animals by the ArchBishop...
Serious entries, like the local mounted patrol guys decked out in such period wear as they had, on suitably caparissoned steeds, capered throught the streets between the ranks of marching kazoo bands and the staff of the Golden Temple pushing a brass bed, swarming with turbanned beauties, and trucks hauling as strange an assemblage of poltical ribaldry as was available to the common tongue at the time.
Among them the float of "The New Mexico Undevelopment Commission"...Swathed in signs that read: "Don't Californicate New Mexico!"--1970, mind you--or "Texas: Lubbock or Leave It", and with the blue-grass contingent from Family Lotus playing "If You Ain't Got The Do-Re-Mi" the faculty and staff of El Independiente made their opiinions known to the assembled burghers, visitors, and the ArchBishop from the bed of a '54 Chevy 2-ton flatbed...
several of us there then are here no longer...
good folks...
.
Married with a wife who stays home with our autistic child. Health benefits don't fully cover speech and OT. I make make 105,000 a year, live in a three bedroom house that cost slightly over 200K, drive a 10-year-old Volvo. I'm not starving, but I don't spend much (if anything) on luxuries and I don't have much to fall back on.
This is just my story. I have no idea how people who make less get by.
>"Non-Caucasians don't frighten me" was my stock answer.
Yeah, well. So what? I have in a multiracial building in Downtown LA, my non-white neighbors wouldn't live in Oakwood either.
I'm in the Bay Area, and I can attest $90,000 not only doesnt cut it for a 4 bedroom, it doesn't cut it for a 2 bedroom.
The cost of housing is ridiculous here in the Bay Area. You see alot of condos going up in the city, and even those are high priced.
Today's issue of the LA Times lists 15 single family homes available in Los Angeles City for under $300,000. of course you would have to live near, or even next to, heaven forbid, non-Caucasians. and we members of the "liberal progressive community" can't have that now, can we?
And I'm calling *bullshit* on that. There are plenty of "non caucasian only" neighborhoods (I live in one) where a 2-3 bd/1ba house will run you 600K+. It's about how crummy of a neighborhood you want to live in or how many hours you want to commute each day.
We paid under $300K for our 1500 sq ft. home 8 years ago (at the bottom of the most recent LA real estate trough). It would probably sell for over $700K today, and we wouldn't be able to come close to affording it.
With gas prices what they are, I'm really glad we decided on a smaller house in the West LA are vs. a bigger place in the valley with a 2-3 hour daily commute. The one thing that keeps us slaving away in LA is having a child with multiple disabilities. We could probably move to a small town somewhere and pay a lot less for a house and work at minimum wage jobs, but would the services he needs be available? That the $640K question.
This is almost like discussing salaries at work
Here in downtown Boston, 90K cuts it for two adults. Minus taxes takes us down to 66 K and then minus rent, 24K for 800 square feet 1 bedroom, takes us down to 42K and then another 6K for utilities, leaves 36. No car, no insurance, no gas, no parking at $280 monthly rate. Able to sock away $1500 a month on loosing mutual funds in IRAs/403b But then, not many extras and few vacations.
Were we to have our children back, we'd be out in the streetcar suburbs eating franks and beans, but still couldn't afford a house.
As to why we're here, a lot of reasons. Primarily jobs, but also the city itself and not having to have a car. Both wife and myself are so specialized, we could not find jobs in non-urban areas.
BTW, I'm fond of telling this story:
When my Dad and Mom married in 1954, he had just finished up his stint in the Air Force. He got $900 when he was discharged, was able to put $500 down on a new house (priced at $9000) and the rest in the bank. Times have certainly changed.
>And I'm calling *bullshit* on that. There are plenty of "non caucasian only" neighborhoods (I live in one) where a 2-3 bd/1ba house will run you 600K+. It's about how crummy of a neighborhood you want to live in or how many hours you want to commute each day.
I have friends who bought a 700 square foot house in Altadena which is in an integrated neighborhood...on a postage stamp lot which they paid over 400K for two years ago.
I live in Kansas. In a small town just west of the KC metro area.
No children, my wife and I make right at 80K plus a year.
We're in the wrong professions, newspapers and social services.
Uppermiddle class people I know -- lawyers, engineers, fucking publishers, cousins in marketing -- pull down 100K. . The average size of a home being built in the still unincorportated areas of KC's whilte flight nexus, Johnson County, Kansas, is nearly 4000 square feet. Within the former rural towns being overran by the ever-expanding suburban bubble, homes are more modest but usually start at 250K.
The new residents protect their property value by getting on planning commissions and forbidding more affordable homes. Teachers, policemen, and yes journalists, have a choice, live in a dump or commute.
Yeah, well. So what? I have in a multiracial building in Downtown LA, my non-white neighbors wouldn't live in Oakwood either.
boogie boarding is so much easier when you can walk to the waves after work. every day.
and take the bus to work, and you are there in 25 minutes.
...Btw, I'd say my neighborhood in Alhambra is pretty mixed as well. Heck, most neighborhoods in California are mixed (maybe less so in San Marino, which is immediately north of me). My neighbor is from Indonesia, the other folks who live in our complex are from China and eastern Europe (not sure of the country). All my neighbors span the spectrum from various Central and South American to Asian to African American to various mixtures of all of those. I will say that, it being Alhambra, the majority of the people I see on the street and around town are Asian. I'd consider myself a minority (I'm white) in the area for sure.
Downtown LA is nowhere hear "walking to the waves to boogie board". What the heck are you talking about?
This is just my story. I have no idea how people who make less get by.
Random "Upper Class" Worker -10:24 pm
my brother and his sweet wife had a child who was seriously effected by a late-term pathology that disturbed his cognitive processes. He spoke not a word til he was 3. They had great insurance: both are teachers in California public schools. next week my nephew will be 16, a pretty normal 16, who gets good grades and has a black belt in something or another...good kid
>Downtown LA is nowhere hear "walking to the waves to boogie board". What the heck are you talking about?
Our friend who thinks it is really cool to live in one of the most notoriously dangerous neighbors in all of Los Angeles thinks it is cool to live there....and people who won't are racists.
sorry bad proofing.
To apophenia, Ms. al-Jaffari, et al.
Personally, I'm not whining. My wife and I do well. We both work our asses off, between us we have about 50 years of experience in our respective careers, and we both are fairly successful professionals. My wife holds patents, and has had here work profiled on page 1 of the WSJ. We like what we do, we have no complaints. Good for us.
The point here is this:
My old man bought our family home for about 1.2 times his annual salary. My wife and I bought our home for about 3 times our annual salary.
We could move, but guess what? Our salaries would go down. We'd be in the same boat.
When I was a kid, a guy could work as a damn janitor and be able to buy a house, have his wife stay home with the kids, send his kids to a decent school, and maybe even send them to a pretty good college without taking on half a lifetime of debt.
Those days are over.
I'm not moving. I'll work my ass off and stay where I am. My choice. But, I'm not interested in your jabber about how all I need to do is move to make life better.
Cheers -
" ''Now,'' Gates says, ''I would rather be a genius born in China than an average guy born in Poughkeepsie.''
How about the spawn of a Seattle lawyer, shitstick?
Let me try that again....
Oakwood is in Venice, and it one of the most notorious neighborhoods in all of Los Angeles.
(I used to live near by...and have been familiar with the neighborhood since the sixties)
I live downtown in a nice market rate highrise where most of my neighbors aren't white.
None of my black neighbors would consider living in Oakwood. Why? Because they don't have to anymore.
" ''Now,'' Gates says, ''I would rather be a genius born in China than an average guy born in Poughkeepsie.''
How about the spawn of a Seattle lawyer, shitstick?
WoodyGuthriesGuitar(aka...) |
===
Thank you Woody!!! And don't forget the university regent mother, and the connections up his ass.
>Thank you Woody!!! And don't forget the university regent mother, and the connections up his ass.
Not to mention all the work the people who actually developed CP/M did before he adapted it to PCDOS.
The "middle-class", comfortable lifestyle is looking increasingly unsustainable (fiscally, environmentaly, etc). How is that NOT coming up in this conversation?
Hmmmmm
because we are all pseudo liberals
damned if we'll give up hbo and even our 25MPG autos
Ack, that was me.
Frast. 90K? They justdon't understand. I CA you couldn't buy an outhouse, if you could find one.
I do own my own home 50 miles from San Francisco where I work and thank God for that. If I didn't, I think that I wouldn't have been able to make it. I do make $90,000 a year now--but being sick for about 6 months almost sent my family and I under. If the rent were due, I wouln't have been able to pay it. Not with insurance and all the other "necessary" items. Bush's ownership scam is just that--a scam.
Hm.
The felix's have never had quite enough household income to buy a house in our relatively nice urban neighborhood in Central California. So we rent. That means we aren't building equity, but it also allows us a certain amount of freedom that we wouldn't have otherwise.
Housing price inflation is extraordinary -- given the fact that no one's income is really going up around here, while interest rates have been creeping upwards, forcing higher monthly payments, meaning that, right now, not more than 7% of the local residents can afford a median price home. So who IS buying and forcing prices up?
We're finding some interesting things: speculators and real estate syndicates are doing a lot of the buying of new homes. Expats from the Bay Area -- who were lucky enough to cash out their houses there -- have bought both new and extisting houses with the proceeds. Some commute (a horrendous 2-3 sometimes as long as 5 hours each way) but many don't; they work from home or they are retired. Locals who sell their houses to the Bay Area expats tend to move farther and farther away, into the mountains or off to Idaho.
Employment is rising around here, but household income isn't; in fact, for a while, there was a distinct downturn. And those who rely on government pay have faced a pretty wretched circumstance: no net increase in salary for year after year, sometimes leaving a net decrease when health insurance premium payments go up again. Those who work for the State face the worst of it -- actual cuts in pay.
The private sector isn't really doing or offering much better. $90,000 is a modestly high income in our area (median is around $46,000), but it doesn't get you much -- certainly not security. It's not nearly enough to buy a median priced home ($479,000); yet I know a lot of people who are living relatively well on that median income of $46,000 -- or less, a lot less. They're living relatively well, but not securely.
And that's the issue, isn't it? That somehow there should be a point at which you do feel reasonably secure in a reasonably modest middle-class lifestyle such as was typical of Americans in the 1950's and early 60's?
Realistically, in California, that kind of lifestyle would require an income well over $200,000 today. It isn't happening for most people.
--felix
well, all I can is: 1) don't have kids 2) rent and let the owner take the various hits that WILL happen.
I'm about to sell my place after living here for under a year. I'll make a nice profit, but if I wait much longer I won't, so time is of the essence for those wishing to cash in the equity, if you have any.
Home ownership is a scam. Renters come out ahead. Sure they don't get the tax break, but that's not all that big a deal (I got $800 back. BFD), and when something breaks it doesn't cost you anything to fix it. The "American Dream" is a fucking nightmare.
I made over $100,000 last year in Los Angeles and I absolutely can't buy a house that's anywhere near the city. If I'm lucky I'll be able to get a condo. Atrios is exactly right on this.
wait a minute all,
I am now just reading this post and all
of the comments. So, I appologise for
a late entry. BUT, I would like to point
out that you are using $90K as
some kind of number representative of
the middle class. I point out that as
late as a decade or so ago, the middle
class meant middle (mean) income. Today
the mean income in this country is about
$45K. Try using that number in your
calculus.
Dave
90k would be a lower middle class income for a family of 4 in Atlanta. My wife and I do pretty well and can afford to live in the city. All of my friends who have kids live way, way out in the suburbs where their real estate dollar goes much farther. I have a 55 year old 3br/1ba house. Out in Republican land we could have had a new 5br/3ba mini-mansion for what we paid. Let them have their 1-2 hour drive to work. We love our 15-20 minute commute.
I think the big confusion coming into these comments is that some people are using 90k as median income and others are using 90k as median household income (i.e., with two working adults).
In reality, it is the single mom making 30k or less trying to find a place for her 2 kids and herself for less than 60% of her salary.
The middle class is definitely suffering and shrinking, but the poor, and young, are really getting shafted. But hey, when you set salaries, it's always good for the guy setting the salary.
We could sell our Bay area working class house, take about $350,000 in profit after paying off our mortgage, buy an equivalent house for cash in Greensboro, NC, where I went to high school, and have about $225,000 left over. With that nest egg we could work at the book store, send the kids to public school, and survive.
BUT I'd have to live in Greensboro.
Now, there are many good qualities to G'boro and other NC towns, but in the end, it's a red state, and I'm an Arab American feminist polytheist married to a California Jew. We could survive Greensboro but we wouldn't be truly happy.
Many things are out of balance about life in the Bay area, but I'm just glad we're here. I'm not a freak here, I'm just normal.
And yes, we send the kids to public school (in Oakland!!), we make a little more than $90k, and our lifestyle is not luxurious. It looks middle middle class - and our neighborhood is still working middle class, although you'd have to earn about $130K a year now to afford to buy here. But many of the residents are long timers so we have a good balance of blue-collar and white collar folks.
Not even the thought of a free and clear house plus $250K nest egg would tempt me back to North Carolina. Life would have to become completely untenable here (and if it did, we couldn't sell our house for all that kind of money). We're sticking it out.
Not to mention that my parents and his mom are twenty minutes away- they offer free babysitting now, and in fifteen years we'll be senior-sitting them. Don't want to leave this arrangement.
BTW, my parents bought a townhouse here a couple of years ago. It hurt them to pay so much money for a property that is so much less space and quality than what they had in NC. But they are awfully glad to be here - the weather, the social and political climate, the grandkids. Since September 11 and the Iraq war, they just don't want to be back in the red state stew, listening to bigots and rednecks spout venom. Y'all can keep your mansions on the golf course.
hell, my wife and I make that much, we don't live in the cities you mentioned, and we even find it hard to make do with a mortgage, two cars and one baby daughter. granted, i try as hard as possible to put away $400 IRA/investments each much, but even minus that I don't see how the Average American Family (who we consider ourselves to be) even manages.
Hey! I'm back! Glad to see I was such a hit! Anyway, to the person who claimed "Apophenia" had one comment on Dkos, I don't post there under this name, and so some jackass registered with it and posted once, oh well...
And what Atrios has posted on this thread I completely agree with. He WAS comparing apples to oranges (as he said), but it's ALSO clear that the (good) apples will shift to the (bad) oranges in the near term, and soon people will be priced out of most real estate markets. Boo! And the economics, how things have changed for the worst, how the cost of living has gone up while real wages have gone down, true true true: it's bad. I'm sorry I characterized complaining about this fact of capitalism as whining, because of course we should all be upset about it. But it won't change as long as we're capitalist, and the present alternatives to capitalism aren't too great either...
The point is mainly that a job paying $90k a year is a really damn good one, and that amount of yearly cash gives you an opportunity to move to a better real estate market. If you cannot afford to live somewhere on $90k a year then you're gonna need to move if you wish to maintain what is typically considered a middle class lifestyle. Otherwise you're going to need to make sacrifices...
all i know is im part of a family of 5, in NJ (one of the highest costs of living in the country) and we make it by on about $95,000 pretty comfortably. Were not driving Beamers but we just remodeled the kitchen and were adding a deck. And me and my brother are in college (though the costs of that are significantly reduced thanks to Fin Aid).
None of my black neighbors would consider living in Oakwood. Why? Because they don't have to anymore.
nor do I. when I was a renter there the prime attraction was the surf. Venice has many affordable rentals when I lived there, all proximate to the surf. on the peninsula, on the blvd, in oakwood, near Rose, all over.
the median household income for a family of four in Cali is $20K less than $90K. and yet millions of Los Angeleno's somehow managed to survive on less than $65K last year. go figure.
Anybody remember that the MEDIAN income for an American household not so long ago was $40,000?
$90,000 a year, for 1-4 people in the same household is generous indeed. If you can't afford a 4 bedroom house, then buy a 3 bedroom house and make the two kids still each get a room.
I grew up sharing a room with my brother until we each left home. My parents had another room for themselves. We felt we were well off, and compared to most of the other people in our school district, we were.
If you can't put 4 people in 2 bedrooms because 2 of the kids are siblings of different sexes, then buy a 3 bedroom and mom and dad get to share a room. Is this a hardship????
You still get two cars, providing you can put gas in them by next spring (at $4 to $5 a gallon, some say), and a/c, cable, computer with broadband, recreation room with entertainment center, etc., etc.
Generous lifestyle, indeed, especially considering that so many other human beings die every day for lack of food and water.
*snif* *snif*
INFLATION
.
Discussing what it cost folks to buy their houses 10 years ago is really meaningless - we're talking about today.
In DC, you couldn't afford to buy a 2 BR hourse near the city (< 30 min) for less than 250k.
You go an hour out in all directions and you *might* start finding some places - condos - or 20-year old houses, but the Atlanta-ization of DC is on - prices downtown are blowing *up* because of it, too. Low 300's for a new, small 1 BR condo downtown. Within a mile walk of any metro and you're looking at a cool million for any 2 BR house.
Condos a 45 minutes metro from downtown have waiting lines - selling out within a day or two of opening - come deposit check in hand, else you're just wasting everybody's time. You want to see the condo first? OK - be my guest, but it might not be there when you come back!
I don't see this housing shortage going away - how could it? The U.S. population is blowing up - the Republicans are in power, which means more and more people are going to be foreclosing and renting, unemployment will remain high, thus keeping downward pressure on wages, folks will continue losing jobs, shufflnig between part-time jobs, outsourcing means high-paying jobs keep going away - healthcare costs keep skyrocketing making it tough to impossible for people to save for down-payments. People are paying half their salaries towards rent. The house buying craze isn't new ownership - it's investors buying up 10 condos at a time - real estate agents flipping properties left and right, holding some for rental income.
Plus, DC has a rockin war-time economy if you're white. Lots of defense, security, surveillance, IT-type work. Just more upward pressure on DC local housing market.
There are still some bargains if you want to buy in the hood and wait it out - a pretty good bet considering what Mayor Williams has been doing to the city...
Here's an example of differences in housing in Canada and why you can't make assumptions about what costs are.
My girlfriends parents live in a perfectly habitable 2 story, 3 bedroom (4 with the mostly-finished basement) home in a small city in Eastern Canada. The house was built in the 1940s but is still totally sound and recently refinished. The last estimate they had on its value (plus the quarter acre of land its on? About $20,000 Canadian.
Meanwhile, where I live in the high Arctic, $20,000 will barely get you an enclosed, uninsulated garage. The last house I saw up here for sale was a two bedroom matchbox built in the 1950s that has to have the inside gutted before too long, windows and doors replaced and so on. And of course, no lawn or outside amenities. Asking price? $225,000. And odds are, someone will buy it.
$90,000K per year? My fiance and I are pulling in over $110,000, have no debts to speak of, and having troubles making ends meet in SD. Sure we could move to a more affordable region of the country: but where else could I make the kind of money I'm making as a photographer? Catch 22 really- the money's a nice draw (as well as the weather) but I was better off in ohio making less than half what I do now. Insanity.
Could the housing market bubble pleas pop already so I could afford a two bedroom townhouse instead of blowing all my money on a crappy two bedroom apartment? Thank you.
Yes, yes. I don't really mean for all those mortgaged to the hilts people I know to go through bankruptcy and foreclosure. Just frustrated is all.
Okay. Venice is a wonderful place to live. The little section (a couple of blocks) called Oakwood has a deservedly bad reputation, although this may be changing.
But most of Venice has been gentrified for over 20 years now and it is a fantastic and beautiful and safe place to live.
*Just don't want people to paint all of Venice with a broad brush. I feel it's being slightly maligned on this thread.
I live in Detroit and my wife stays home with our 2 year old son. I work in the automotive supply industry and I am an IT worker. I make around $80k gross and we have very few 'extras' (a couple of cell phones and basic cable tv) one newer car which is almost paid for and one beater long since paid for. Able to save a little for retirement in the 401k but the day to day can be very tight. Buying a small home (1200 sq ft. ranch) and have decided to pay it off as early as possible now, since all other "investment" vehicles seem to be a dead end. Seems to me even in cities like Detroit, $80k-$90k seems like middle-middle class.
The markets where you can live an upper-middle class lifestyle on $90 thousand (big house, good schools, etc) are the markets where it is harder to FIND a job that PAYS $90 thousand.
Someone upthread said:
"Generous lifestyle, indeed, especially considering that so many other human beings die every day for lack of food and water"
True, and I count myself very blessed and/or lucky to be where I am. That still does not negate the fact that the astronomic rise in cost of living in places where it's desireable to live makes living in those places more expensive. It's no secret to me why, for instance, Orange County has become so expensive -- it's the economy. O.C. had some of the best job creation numbers last year (it seems that Santa Ana, Anaheim, and Irvine are the mortgage industry capitals of the universe), and Los Angeles wasn't too far behind. I'm from a small-ish town further inland in a state that has a not-so-robust economy. And while it's cheaper to live there, the jobs just aren't materializing like they do here in California. Whenever I go back I look around -- there's no traffic (my ad-hoc gauge of commerce), not a lot is happening. The job boards don't look so hot either. I wonder sometimes if we're getting alot of folks fleeing bad economic conditions elsewhere in the U.S. Whatever it is, I feel like it was set in motion big time around 2000 and that a number of people have moved around since then. Layoffs? Maybe folks who got cut at the end of the tech boom readjusting to reality, who knows. I don't think it will go on forever, though, and I wonder what will trigger the implosion (frankly, my bet's on a natural disaster -- the Republicans will repeal the two-term limit for Presidents and we'll have Bush yet again....).
Note to the fella upthread who said he was not going to attend law school because of the tuition loan burden and the long hours of work in the profession- I have been a lawyer in a big city for 30 years. I started out with a salary of $19,000 per year, which was more than some of my law professors made at the time. I make over $750,000 per year now.
They are building new condos near my run-down apts. The starting prices, for a two br CONDO, are $625,000. I live near the AIRPORT outside of DC in VA. The frickin airport.
If you don't make over 120k, you can't purchase new in this area. My parent's asbestos covered 1920's era Arlington house is now worth over 800k. HAHHAHHA. I mean....who can really afford that?! Please, tell me.
My husband and I make under 90k together and have to spend 1300+ for rent each month. There are no gates and I think there was an MS-13 machette attack down the street not too long ago.
We are all feeling the squeeze, one way or the other. It is time the Dems in power take a good look around at what is happening to everyone not privy to a Hilton trust fund. Unions would be wise to stand up making some more noise about this...aspiring politicians would be smart to start shouting LOUDLY about how badly WE ARE ALL GETTING SCREWED.
What if you were born and raised in New York City, say? Born to working class parents whose apartment ran them $40/mnth? That's my legacy. Rents for 2 bedrooms went from $40 in the 50's to $110 by the 60's to $230 in the 1970's. . . Through the 1980's I was paying merely $300/month for a 2 bedroom apartment in Park Slope, Brooklyn a block from the park and living on 25K. All things felt pricey at the time. Today I reside on the other desolate side of Prospect Park in an $160K 2 BR co-op and make 90K, live alone but live hand to mouth. I enjoy myself but not exactly like Nicole and Dick Diver, who all things being equal, would be considered upper middle class by today's standards. Yet they lived like Donald Trump lives today. Ok so they're all really fictional. . . Can't get by on 90K, hey? Well it's like Parkinson's law really . . . only substitute money for work.
$65K, Single, Minneapolis. I rent, drive a used car, live paycheck to paycheck and save nothing. I could never afford a family.
The $1,100 a month student loans are the main reason, I guess. So much for opportunity.
Note to the fella upthread who said he was not going to attend law school because of the tuition loan burden and the long hours of work in the profession- I have been a lawyer in a big city for 30 years. I started out with a salary of $19,000 per year, which was more than some of my law professors made at the time. I make over $750,000 per year now.
Willie
$750,000 a year practicing law? What in the world are you doing?
I started out with a salary of $19,000 per year, which was more than some of my law professors made at the time. I make over $750,000 per year now.
Which is fine and good, but I still don't want to work 70 hours a week and strap on the golden handcuffs and seriously, my wages with a BS and and MPA are just as good to start as those of a lower tier one graduate - without the whole selling of the one's soul to satan.
I'm a just a small-town redneck from upstate NY... It's funny, sometimes, about what I think is normal and others think is "less than ideal." Like a 30-50 year old house. Hell I grew up in a house that, when we renovated part of it, we pulled out nails that were forged well before the civil war.
Wage stagnation and housing cost explosions are absolutely wrecking the modern american middle class, the backbone of our economy. The middle class used to be made up of the working class - upper middle (college educated professionals). Now working class is poor and the middle class is shifting its weight to the lower middle class. But I guess as long as bonus day on wall street is still good, then fuck 'em.
To the person upthread who lives on the other side of prospect park... that Dick and Nicole Diver comment made me very happy. But... they weren't fictional! They were based on Fitz's friends in Paris, the Murphys. BEcause, that kind of living used to be possible.
"But one of the most widely discussed alternatives is still on the table: imposing Social Security taxes on earnings above $90,000 a year, the current ceiling on income subject to payroll taxes.
That one change would affect 6 percent of all workers, the very highest earners, but actuarial experts estimate that it would raise almost enough money to eliminate the projected shortfall without needing to cut benefits at all."
http://tinyurl.com/a7sjg
Mr. Raya and I made a household income of 90K and change (gross) last year. Two incomes, no kids, living in a low-income, predominantly Dominican area of North Manhattan (aka "ghetto") best known for its thriving crack trade and the city's failing-est public school. Even here, where housing is "dirt cheap" by NYC standards, we pay $1800/month in rent, plus utilities etc. We don't own *anything* -- real estate, fancy electronics (beyond our 2 laptops), or nice furniture -- and we certainly can't spare the cash for cable TV or Tivo or anything of that sort. The contents of the apt. are a mixture of (a) Ikea's cheapest; (b) leftovers from my student days, like the stereo, tv and futon, all of which are 10 to 20 years old; and (c) stuff I pulled out of the trash (chairs, kitchen items). Yes: we make over 90K, with no kids, and our ghetto apt. IS FURNISHED WITH TRASH.
We get hit really hard by federal taxes thanks to being so well-paid, but we lack the wiggle room in our expenses to actually pay the taxes without hurting. A lot. We have health insurance, but no dental, and Mr Raya just had a root canal, which wiped out literally ALL of our savings. Every last cent. As of this writing, I have $8 in my bank account and about $1000 in credit card debt.
Sure, we have the middle class mentality that is the legacy of an American college education, but the lifestyle: not so much. We are still one paycheck away from seriously deep shit.
We live in a 50-yr-old 1325 sq. ft. home in what used to be a blue-collar neighborhood in San Jose, CA. The recently sold houses within a block of us (and they're all pretty much the same as ours) have sold for an average of about $600K - below the median for the county at this time.
The advantage is that I have a commute of less than 10 miles. The alternative is moving out to one of the "bedroom" communities to the east, where you can still get a house like ours for about $350K - but you have to spend about 3 hrs./day commuting, plus the climate is much less temperate so you spend a lot more money heating and cooling your home.
What's interesting is that wages for the "better" high tech jobs around here have actually fallen in the past 4 years by 20% or more, while housing continues to go up thanks to whatever Mr. Greenspan is smoking. Across the street from us are two young families who bought the houses on interest-only ARMs. They're very nice people, raising very nice kids, and I'll miss them when the boom goes bust.
$90,000 doesn't make you rich, at least here in the NYC burbs. My mortgage, before property taxes, takes about 40 percent of my takehome pay; property taxes, which I pay separately, exceed $7,000 a year (and the school district portion is about to go up more 8 percent again, just as it did last year).
add in the highest utility costs in the country, a state income tax and an 8.75 sales tax, utter lack of public transportation within the 'burb and believe me, you're not left with a lot.
Here's another indication of the real costs here in the 'burbs: a very fancy and expensive 5th-through high school prep school whose tuition easily equals a midrange college tuition has a policy of granting a number of "scholarships" to worthy students who can't afford the tuition.
Do you know who qualifies? Anyone with an income UP TO $200,000 a year. When I my relatives in Ohio, who can't believe closing costs on homes can run to the tens of thousands of dollars here, this detail, they thought I was lying about this too.
Apophenia is a disingenuous moron, IMHO.
I live in one of those areas of the country that everyone else is coming to - Raleigh, NC. One of those places Apophenia evidently believes a disenchanted New Yorker could move to with his two elderly parents, two kids and wife and find a job that pays enough to pay for all of them.
Guess what?
$90k ain't rich here either. The mean household income in Wake County in 2003? $86,100. http://www.raleigh-wake.org/
demo...mographics.html
I figure that income, after taxes, leaves you with about $67,000 to spend. Average home price here in 2002? $212,567. http://
townhall.townofchapelhill...20Context03.pdf
Good luck taking care of mom and dad on that income. College tuition? Pshaw.
So yeah, $90,000 is a good income. You can live off it just fine, and a hell of a lot better than most people do, but, Apophenia, it is not wealthy, and any proposed program which takes taxes from that income and then slashes the benefits those taxes were supposed to provide when that income ceases? Unfair.
I suppose I could move someplace less expensive in turn, such as Selma, Alabama or Ames, Iowa. Got a $90k job there for me?
Try 275 thousand+ for a 1,100 sq ft 2/2 in a 30 year old ex-retirement community in southeast florida.
These aren't rich neighborhoods, these houses sold for 120k four years ago.
Not everyone can just move elsewhere, maybe you havbe elderly family that you take care of nearby. maybe you have a job that is location specific, like a yacht worker, or fisherman, or wildlife officer, agricultural worker, etc...
DrFrank, I never said $90k was wealthy, that I remember. I only said that while certain markets require more than $90k to live in, that salary allows the family to move somewhere else. If they choose not to, well, sacrifices must be made.
I also didn't express support for Bush's plan.
Who's being disingenuous?
I'm surprised by the number of people in comments below who have signalled that they think it's ludicrous that a family of four can find it hard to live on $90,000.
Rich repugs, of course, who wouldn't know what the real world is like.
In the DC area where I am, 90k for a SINGLE individual (me) is middle class.
I shudder to think what it would be for a family of four ... but no way in hell is it UPPER middle class.
And there's no way a family with a 90k income could afford a nice house in a good neighborhood.
I think 90k in NYC is not without hardships for a couple with no kids. Of course, I'm talking 90K before taxes. If my wife and I actually got to keep 80 or 90k, we'd probably be all right. But rent is still half my take home pay. There's something wrong.
And for Apophenia -- it doesn't give you enough money to just move. Salaries aren't portable. And all jobs aren't available in all places.
Now, you could argue that it'd be lateral if you moved -- less salary but cost of living would be lower in certain places. But, that's not true either. Credit card bills aren't reduced when you move. A car payment doesn't go down when you move. And if you're a city person who doesn't have a car, then you'll have to add a car payment and car insurance as new bills when you go elsewhere. There simply is no "moving" solution, in most cases.
The median home price in the San Francisco Bay Area is over $500,000. That's for a small house. I live in a CONDO which costs more than that. My dad bought his house, the place I grew up in, for $35,000 in 1967.
There are a lot of folks who say, "if you don't like it, move." But my entire family lives here. My wife's family lives here. This is our support network... we babysit each other's kids, we have family meals together. And I work in a business that only exists in metropolitan areas. moving simply is not an option.
Today's issue of the LA Times lists 15 single family homes available in Los Angeles City for under $300,000. of course you would have to live near, or even next to, heaven forbid, non-Caucasians. and we members of the "liberal progressive community" can't have that now, can we?
Mrs. Ibrahim al-Jaafari
You know what? Bite me.
I've lived in a lot of "mixed" neighborhoods, and as others here have commented, I prefer it. But violent neighborhoods are a whole other story. Apropos of that, I am a long-time Venice resident, currently living in Oakwood. And guess what? You can't buy a house in Oakwood for under $600k! This in spite of the fact that we have had a half-dozen shootings in the last two months, and the LA Times doesn't say a word about it!
Jesus. Right. I'll go buy one of those houses you mentioned that are under 300K and drive two hours to work every day. That's just great for the environment and for any kind of family life or quality of life, period.
Yeah, sure, I could be living in utter poverty in Somalia or China or whatever. The human condition pretty much sucks. But what the hell is your problem?
Like I said, bite me.
I live in Connecticut, where a family of 4 making $70K per year is firmly in the "working poor" class.
My husband and I really lucked out with our house, though. We bought in 1999, just before the housing market went through the roof. We got our 3 BR home for $125,000 (it was built - beautifully, with maple hardwood floors throughout, fireplace, real craftsmanship - in 1920).
Houses in our neighborhood are now selling for more than $300,000.
I live in New Jersey, in a suburban area. I work in financial services, so I work a lot with homeowners and potential homeowners looking for property financing.
A one bedroom condo in my area currently goes for around 180K. You can't get into a crackhouse around here for under a quarter of a million dollars. I had someone sitting at my desk the other day looking to get a 450K mortgage with an 8K down payment, and my computer actually laughed at him - it ran a search for mortgage offers under those parameters and found nothing.
I could get a one bedroom apartment near where I attend college (in New Brunswick, NJ) for around a thousand a month. If you're making 30K a year, a thousand a month is about half of your monthly income. How is anyone supposed to pay that in rent? And this for the pleasure of living in a town that has at least two serial rapists on the loose, where my campus email inbox gets probably eight to ten alerts about campus rapes from the university police per school year. No, thank you.
I don't know how anyone is supposed to be able to afford to live anymore.
For a Democratic site this is a remarkably Republican conversation.
For more laughs:
http://thehousingbubble.blogspot.com
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