DC incomes not as high as claimed by DCUM posters

[Anonymous]

Look for yourself.

https://dqydj.com/income-by-state/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2RhSZec-buoxaP5mJgpRxBXxIEEqxLYRtZnsjIr1EfhpOegktt__8e8FE_aem_AcOc8i68QQgbaGnMBf-Ps79icoEMiYg1T4h6E_Sff_nubP7NRZavL0Xg0R3Ado0K0-D9vYWwWngEoYoTLq5S_CYD

[Anonymous]

Yes. A good number of people using total compensation instead of salary in these posts. That said, you are probably dealing with people in that nexus of top 5% between NoVa, DC, and Maryland instead of just DC.

[Anonymous]

There's self-selection. If you're a 25 year old high school graduate, you're not posting here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. A good number of people using total compensation instead of salary in these posts. That said, you are probably dealing with people in that nexus of top 5% between NoVa, DC, and Maryland instead of just DC.

Why wouldn't they use total compensation? At the Sr. Director/VP level and up nearly 1/3 to 1/2 of compensation is variable income (bonuses, stock), but it is income nonetheless.

[Anonymous]

I’m trying to wrap my head around Kansas having the highest top 1% income in the country and that figure being $1M…. Is that gross income of farms where the COGS is 950k generating net income of 50k?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. A good number of people using total compensation instead of salary in these posts. That said, you are probably dealing with people in that nexus of top 5% between NoVa, DC, and Maryland instead of just DC.

Why wouldn't they use total compensation? At the Sr. Director/VP level and up nearly 1/3 to 1/2 of compensation is variable income (bonuses, stock), but it is income nonetheless.

+1 I'd use the compensation you are taxed on for income tax purposes, and for us, significantly less than half of that is base salary.

[Anonymous]

This isn't very useful, it needs to be by zip code

[Anonymous]

The data for this comes from ACS, which asks about more than base salary.

[Anonymous]

Having a PhD and having friends with PhDs, MDs, and JDs, the HHIs I see on here match my lived experience of my friends’ incomes. So in DCUM you’re looking at a highly selected sample of wealthy people with degrees working high powered jobs in the DC area

[Anonymous]

Go back to the ACS PUMD and line it up with DCUM demographics.

Total HH Income
Married Heterosexual
Employed

In DC that gets you a median income of 230,000 and a mean of 282,750

Now add in homeowner

In DC that gets you a median income of 277,320 and a mean of 332,143

These all seem to line up with the modal person here in in a family with 200-300K/year in household income.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes. A good number of people using total compensation instead of salary in these posts. That said, you are probably dealing with people in that nexus of top 5% between NoVa, DC, and Maryland instead of just DC.

Why wouldn't they use total compensation? At the Sr. Director/VP level and up nearly 1/3 to 1/2 of compensation is variable income (bonuses, stock), but it is income nonetheless.

+1 I'd use the compensation you are taxed on for income tax purposes, and for us, significantly less than half of that is base salary.

+1

Our job salaries are <1/5th of our total annual income.

[Anonymous]

There's both selection effect (people who read this are richer than average, and of those, the richer ones are more likely to post) and some lying. But I think it's more selection. I can see why some people would lie in real life, but what's the motivation to lie on an anonymous site?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m trying to wrap my head around Kansas having the highest top 1% income in the country and that figure being $1M…. Is that gross income of farms where the COGS is 950k generating net income of 50k?

It's obviously garbage data from a small sample.

[Anonymous]

What?! People are not as wealthy as they claim here? Next thing you are going to tell me that not everyone is as beautiful as they say they are in their posts!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Look for yourself.

https://dqydj.com/income-by-state/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2RhSZec-buoxaP5mJgpRxBXxIEEqxLYRtZnsjIr1EfhpOegktt__8e8FE_aem_AcOc8i68QQgbaGnMBf-Ps79icoEMiYg1T4h6E_Sff_nubP7NRZavL0Xg0R3Ado0K0-D9vYWwWngEoYoTLq5S_CYD

You're th only person making claims about how high DC incomes are. Why are you do insecure that you need to attack a strawman?