Reply to At what HHI did you stop feeling middle class?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]125.  You all are scary wealthy  and not middle class. [/quote]

I definitely felt middle class when we made $110k.

Expenses:  
Taxes:  $12k
Insurance:  $5k
Retirement: $12k
Rent: $12k
Utilities (including cell phones):  $5k
Student loans:  $5k
Childcare for 2 kids: $25k
Cars: $6k
Vacation: $2k
Charity: $2k
Food: $8k
Gas: $8k
Total:  $104,000

That meant that we had about $500/month for the four of us for everything else we needed to buy from band-aids and baby bottles to car and home repairs to furniture and clothes.  I'm not saying that we were dirt poor or anything.  We were saving for retirement.  Our kids were in a good daycare, and we had everything we needed.  We had lived in Appalachia prior to that and had friends who were truly poor.

But we were definitely still middle class.

[/quote]

To show our breakdown at a higher income.

Income: $305k
Expenses:  
Taxes:  $77k (state, fed, social security, medicare)
Heath (premiums + OOP):  $8k
Car/Home Insurance:  $6k
Retirement/Savings: $125k
Mortgage/Tax: $27k (3bd, 2bath, 1300 sq ft)
Utilities (including cell,internet):  $5k
Student loans:  $0k (paid off at age 30)
Childcare for 1 kid: $26k
Cars: $6k is probably average yearly cost, but we bought in cash and share a single car
Vacation: $6k.  Usually is more like $10k, but COVID...
Charity: $6k
Food: $12k
Gas: $1.5k (artificially low this year due to covid)
Remaining stuff: $5.5k (house stuff, repairs, clothes/shoes, gifts, etc.)

Key thing is that if we needed to, we could reduce savings to cover increases in spending in areas we wanted, or go down to single income.  We have a lot of flexibility that middle class families don't.  One example is high food spending, that would be a place I could reduce, but it just isn't worth the mental load to try to do it, so I just make the choice not to for now.[/quote]

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