According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median weekly earnings for the 112.7 million full-time and salary workers is $877 for the 3rd quarter of 2018. That works out to be $45,604 per year. That sounds pretty good, right? When income taxes, insurance, and other deductions are taken out, that number can shrink really fast. As much as 30% of your pay can be taken out. That leaves you with about $32,000 for the rest of the year. Divide that by 12 and your take home pay per month is only $2,600. Can you pay for all your expenses on that much per month?
The point here is don’t be average. Decide on purpose to achieve and earn more. How much more is up to you, but you should start with a goal of $80,000.
Why $80,000?
Science!!!
There is actually research on how much money it takes to make you happy. According to actual scientific research the optimum salary is $60-$70K but that satiation occurs at $95K. Once you have too much money, it starts to make you unhappy? I don’t know who these morons are, but apparently the data says so.
So, research tells us that we are good with $80,000. Does it matter where we live? Other research says yes. The state with the highest median salary is Maryland. They also included the District of Columbia as a separate “state” because of the high salary calculation. Both of these areas have a median salary of $75,000. But, everything there is expensive so in reality your money only seems like $69K. That’s a huge difference. On the lower end is Mississippi with a median of $40K, but its cheap to live there so that $40K seems more like $47K. This matters to your bottom line because if you want to live in high tax, high cost of living areas, be ready to adjust your income goals to pay for it. On the other hand, if you want to live in the lower cost areas, you may be disappointed because the high paying jobs are just not there. This is due to industry, economy, and population.
The point here is know the cost of living in your area and adjust accordingly.
Now that you know how much to make and where you live affects that amount, what do you do? Determine your reality and create a dream. Do some skills inventory and create your hedgehog sheet. Then search for jobs in high salary earning industries. Take action and make this happen. You can make changes in your life to make you happy. Knowing actual research is out there to justify your greedy little self, you can freely go about finding a high paying job and be happy.
(Awesome photo credit below)
Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash