Over half of Americans claim they're nowhere near achieving their definition of financial freedom, with 36% saying they have less than $1,000 in their savings accounts.
This is so infuriatingly disingenuous that I’m having trouble putting into words an intelligent response.
I would need to triple my income to approach 6 figures. Making that much money may not fundamentally change the way I live my life but it would almost entirely remove my primary stressors. I could afford actual healthcare, I wouldn’t have to worry about whether or not my landlord is going to raise my rent to a point where I can no longer afford my home. I could actually save money so that if/when something happens to me I’m not completely fucked over night
I get it because I’ve been there too. Recently, actually.
When your financial needs are not being met it feels like you’re drowning and the stress of that can be debilitating. When you’re not sure whether you’ll survive another month it can feel like everything is about to fall apart.
What I’m talking about is the difference between once you reach that stage of no longer feeling desperate (let’s say, the low-income cutoff) and reaching higher salaries ($60k, 70k, 80k, etc).
In my personal experience, once I reached a state of of no longer being desperate about money $60k, the income increases I’ve made since then have not in any way significantly changed my life or my happiness or my sense of financial freedom. I still feel tied to a desk, enslaved to my debt repayments, obliged to continue working 5 days a week, every week, until I die.
Is it nice to no longer live in a state of stress and poverty? Of course. Is it vastly different from how I’m living now? Not really. I could lose my job and be back there in a few months. I could become disabled and be back there. So I do feel some gratitude that, for now, it’s a bit better than what it could be or has been.
One other important thing to note: I’m not American, so I don’t have stress about health care. If I get sick, everything’s going to be peachy.
I get what you’re saying. The money from $60k to $100k just goes into the things you should be able to afford at $60k.
At $100k you can afford to contribute to your 401k, start a small contribution towards your children’s college fund, pay random bills, afford a Toyota Camry instead of a Corolla, moderate vacations, etc.
I had the same experience and it was humbling. But you also slowly forget exactly how tough it was looking at your bank account and knowing there was a bill not getting paid that month.
You’d only be able to afford it for a little while until literally every industry raised prices overnight, jacking up inflation to the degree that normal people once again would struggle to put food on the table.
We need price control laws and high minimum wage laws to boost up the common man’s buying power so that can’t happen.
This is so infuriatingly disingenuous that I’m having trouble putting into words an intelligent response.
I would need to triple my income to approach 6 figures. Making that much money may not fundamentally change the way I live my life but it would almost entirely remove my primary stressors. I could afford actual healthcare, I wouldn’t have to worry about whether or not my landlord is going to raise my rent to a point where I can no longer afford my home. I could actually save money so that if/when something happens to me I’m not completely fucked over night
I get it because I’ve been there too. Recently, actually.
When your financial needs are not being met it feels like you’re drowning and the stress of that can be debilitating. When you’re not sure whether you’ll survive another month it can feel like everything is about to fall apart.
What I’m talking about is the difference between once you reach that stage of no longer feeling desperate (let’s say, the low-income cutoff) and reaching higher salaries ($60k, 70k, 80k, etc).
In my personal experience, once I reached a state of of no longer being desperate about money $60k, the income increases I’ve made since then have not in any way significantly changed my life or my happiness or my sense of financial freedom. I still feel tied to a desk, enslaved to my debt repayments, obliged to continue working 5 days a week, every week, until I die.
Is it nice to no longer live in a state of stress and poverty? Of course. Is it vastly different from how I’m living now? Not really. I could lose my job and be back there in a few months. I could become disabled and be back there. So I do feel some gratitude that, for now, it’s a bit better than what it could be or has been.
One other important thing to note: I’m not American, so I don’t have stress about health care. If I get sick, everything’s going to be peachy.
I get what you’re saying. The money from $60k to $100k just goes into the things you should be able to afford at $60k.
At $100k you can afford to contribute to your 401k, start a small contribution towards your children’s college fund, pay random bills, afford a Toyota Camry instead of a Corolla, moderate vacations, etc.
I had the same experience and it was humbling. But you also slowly forget exactly how tough it was looking at your bank account and knowing there was a bill not getting paid that month.
You’d only be able to afford it for a little while until literally every industry raised prices overnight, jacking up inflation to the degree that normal people once again would struggle to put food on the table.
We need price control laws and high minimum wage laws to boost up the common man’s buying power so that can’t happen.
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