How Far Does A $100,000 Wage Actually Go In 2024?

Sarah Mitchell is a advertising and marketing director in McAllen, Texas. On her beneficiant $100,000 annual wage, one may be inclined to suppose that she lives luxuriously and may afford greater than mere day-to-day requirements.

However Mitchell has found, like so many different high-earning professionals, that the glamour and enchantment of a $100,000 wage will not be what it was. As soon as thought of the golden benchmark of profession and job success, high-earners are realizing that the wage comes with a excessive price ticket to pay—particularly in fashionable U.S. cities and states reminiscent of Los Angeles, California, or in New York Metropolis.

“A typical month-to-month funds, allotted to requirements like mortgage, utilities, groceries, healthcare, and private bills, leaves little room for important financial savings or luxurious expenditures,” says Mitchell, relating her expertise.

“The first downside of this wage scale is its lowering buying energy. $100,000 is not adequate to ensure a cushty life-style with out monetary pressure,” she says. “Primarily based on my evaluation and present residing bills, one would wish a wage north of $215,000 to keep up the identical way of life {that a} $100,000 wage might have beforehand afforded.”

(This interview and others associated under are edited for size and readability.)

Why Is $100,000 Not Sufficient?

The high-paying jobs board for roles that pay greater than $100,000 a yr, Ladders, explains:

“As inflation rocketed, wage objective posts moved. The as soon as gold commonplace $100,000 wage shifted. In keeping with the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator, to match the shopping for energy of a $100,000 job one technology in the past in 1994, you’d must earn greater than $215,000 right this moment.”

Though inflation was feverishly excessive final yr and reached a tipping level at which it cooled in June 2024, customers are nonetheless left to deal with the aftermath and a few costs have remained too excessive to be lined by a daily “excessive” wage.

What would have been greater than sufficient to cowl month-to-month bills along with placing apart cash for a wet day, financial savings, investments, and retirement, in addition to luxurious or one-time purchases, is now simply sufficient to get by and survive.

Jeff Mains, founder and CEO of Champion Management Group—additionally primarily based in Texas like Mitchell, commented, “If you happen to’d instructed me a decade in the past that $100,000 wouldn’t really feel like sufficient, I most likely wouldn’t have believed it. However in right this moment’s financial system, that determine feels nearer to $50,000 than a six-figure sum. For me, the actual drawback isn’t simply inflation; it’s how life-style inflation has crept into our on a regular basis bills.

“In Texas, the place I’m primarily based, housing costs have shot up, property taxes aren’t any joke, and even necessities like groceries are taking greater bites out of the funds. My typical month-to-month funds runs effectively over $7,000 if you consider mortgage, utilities, insurance coverage, and primary household wants, and that doesn’t go away a lot room for the surprising.”

It seems that there are a number of components that affect how a lot one is ready to actually earn after making $100,000. These components embody:

• Creeping bills that appear to look out of nowhere
• Your metropolis and state
• Rising taxes

Bennett Heyn, Ohio-born advertising and marketing enterprise analyst at Adobe, makes near $110,000 a yr. He labored his approach up the ladder from being an intern, and initially thought that such a wage as he makes presently can be his dream wage—in his personal phrases, it will be “insane” to make that a lot cash.

Nevertheless, residing in California made him understand that half of his wage was simply fleeting away. “After California taxes & deductions like 401k and insurance coverage, I really solely earned $50k,” Heyn says. “$50,000 will not be sufficient to dwell within the Bay Space as a result of I’ve to pay $2,800 in hire and about $100-200 in groceries per week, $200-300 for going out to eat per week, parking tickets, and different bills.”

However Heyn has found an answer: facet hustles.

Enter: Work-From-House Aspect Hustles

“I’ve taken on a bunch of facet hustles to make sufficient revenue the place I can freely exit to dinner and journey,” Heyn says.

His present monetary ambition? To be able together with his facet hustle profession that he’s capable of make $200,000 or extra. The enterprise analyst from Ohio is already effectively on his approach in the direction of reaching his objective, having made practically $100,000 from his facet hustles in actual property investing and search engine optimisation providers alone.

Mitchell, the advertising and marketing director quoted earlier on this story, boosts her revenue by way of partaking in facet hustles reminiscent of freelance advertising and marketing consulting and delivering digital advertising and marketing workshops, which she says additionally enhances her skilled expertise.

How To Begin A Aspect Hustle To Make Cash From House In 2024

Listed here are some steps you’ll be able to take so that you just too, can complement and enhance the revenue out of your job with a work-from-home facet hustle:

1. Assess your monetary and profession targets.
2. Establish what you might be obsessed with.
3. Make a listing of what expertise you excel in.
4. Start to hone current expertise and study new high-income expertise.
5. Conduct in depth analysis in your goal market and the trade—together with your freelance competitors.
6. Craft your distinctive voice and private branding.
7. Be persistent and affected person with the journey.
8. Repeatedly study, enhance, and upskill to maintain your talent set sharp.
9. Spend money on your self and in your facet hustle.
10. Carve out time to your facet hustle amongst different commitments so it receives the dedication and a spotlight it deserves.

Fairly quickly, you may discover that you just will not want to fret about being restricted by your $100,000 a yr wage. Though the ever-changing goalpost for salaries could be discouraging, it is a aid to know that your arms should not tied. By following the above steps, you’ll be able to obtain final monetary independence and freedom.