Real Cost of Living: $150,000 Minimum

Weird. Most people i know here in brooklyn live just fine on a salary of 100 or less.
Only egomaniacs need 330k per year to live middle class.

There's a huge difference between feeling "secure" and living a "middle class lifestyle".

First of all, "feeling" secure is highly subjective. Some people don't "feel" secure unless they have six (or seven) figures in the bank. Others feel secure with just two weeks' worth of paychecks in the bank.

And whoever said the middle class ever felt financially "secure" anyway? Or at least as secure as the "rich" guy down the street with the four-bedroom house, Cadillac and Lincoln in the garage, inground pool in the backyard, and half a million in the bank?

"Weird. Most people i know here in brooklyn live just fine on a salary of 100 or less.
Only egomaniacs need 330k per year to live middle class."

Indeed.

Somewhere along the line society determined that Food Channel-style kitchens (granite countertops, Viking appliances, etc.), three-car garages, Mercedes and Land Rovers in said garages, annual Disneyworld vacations for the kids AND Club Med (or Canyon Ranch) vacations for Mom and Dad, full-time household "help" for Mom ("nanny"/maid/etc.), weekly mani/pedi and spa treatments for Mom, private school tuitions for the kids, blah blah blah were absolute must-haves for the "middle class".

Hard to feel secure in the U.S. without universal health insurance. Any serious health issue will drain savings fast.

Add to nyc10023's comment, hard to feel secure with high unemployment and very few secure jobs remaining.

the real 1% feel very secure. with job security, unbelievable (if fraudulent) pensions, and free health care for life.
it's not who you think.
http://www.thedailycrux.com/content/10061/Taxes

IDK, I have some 1% clients who don't feel financially secure and never will, and I have some clients who make less than $150K who don't worry about money all that much.

A lot depends on what your fiscal circumstances were growing up. I think people get imprinted with attitudes towards money pretty early.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

Excellent link midtowner

Total BS link midtowner

(now if that article contained CREDIBLE and VERIFIABLE facts regarding the actual benefit provisions or the salary structures for specific public sector employers it would have some credibility. Instead it's a bunch of completely unsubstantiated anecdotal bs - "I talked with a retired New York City toll taker who makade $70,000/year...he bragged that he will now get a pension of $120,000 a year.." TOTAL bull crap. Show me the actual pension formula from an MTA source that yields a pension nealry twice average pay. Doesnt exist. This is made up nonsense to fire up the moronic Fox News base)

Cool they found a male identical twin for Rachel Maddow on MSNBC.

Registered independent. Fabricated anecdotes without citation are what Rush spews (apparently into your eagerly gaping mouth). Reread the article - it's propoganda not reporting. And if you cant see that, you're a fricken moron.

ah, yes, I remember this stuff about how the MTA employees are the truly wealthy and privileged and we're all the underclass supporting their excesses ...... oh, no, I'm confusing it with stevejhx's rant against public school teachers -- and yet, somehow the people who are most indignant that MTA workers or public school teachers have pension benefits and lots of vacation days cannot see the wisdom of applying for those very jobs they covet -- oops, correction, they're righteously indignant that anyone would dare to suggest such a simple solution to the green with envy problem they profess to have

I like this article. I totally agree with the conclusions.The rate if disability amongst cops, firefighters, MTA ,Amtrack etc..is staggering. It rings of systemic fraud.
I hate fox news. I never vote.
Applying to be a teacher,MTA worker,cop, etc would be insulting to my ego (sorry , no offense).
The whole point though is the systemic fraud. It's perfectly fine to make a few millions/year if you deserve it.Not if it is the result of bets for which you booked the premiums (like writing derivative contract) and society at large needs to bailout your insolvent (as a result) institution.
It is similar to raking in salaries completely out of proportion of your skills (70k for a toll worker? 100k for a cop?) with extraordinary benefits (100k/year for life requires an equivalent portfolio of 2 mil).
Similar psychopathic behavior.And no prosecution for these 2 very similar classes of crooks.

midtowner, are you going to not vote for John Liu?

City pensions are not paid for by the city, they are paid for out of city workers wages. If you don't put a % of your wages into it, you don't get a pension. Also a pension is based on years of service, abuot 1.5% of your salary for each year. So if you work for 50 years, you get 75% of your salary. The reason you could in the past boost this amount past your actual yearly salary is the simple fact that it takes overtime into account. Pension is based on highest 3 years of salary, so if you are retiring at 65, from age 62 you take every single little bit of OT you can get. A pension is kind of like the lottery, if one worker pays into it for 40 years and dies 1 year after retirement, that's that. Another worker could pay in for 20 years, take the 30% of annual salary and live another 50 years.

- Abuse of disability benefits? - absolutely in some areas - has been documented e.g. LIRR scandal. But is it a systemic issue with all puplic sector employees - I haven't read that anywhere.

- Excessive pensions? - maybe - certainly public sector pensions can exceed private sector for many comparable jobs and in fact the DB plan is becoming a dinosaur in many private sector industries. But dont argue from one or two outlier anecdotes. And MOST public sector db plans are CONTRIBUTORY.

- excessive salaries? - hardly - average cop salary in NYC %57,000 (google the job on indeed.com); average nyc teacher salary $70,000.

Now next to the price of 2br/2ba on the UWS, there's more babbling, bitching and moaning on this board about schools and the challenge of educating moppets in NYC. and I'm sure anyone who has engeged in that discussion cant possibly have a problem with the notion of paying the individuals repsonsible for the success/failure in life of their precious little ones A WHOLE $70,000 A YEAR?

oh and huntersburg

your comment jogged my memory on something I've been meaning to do...and just took care of it... contributed a big honkin chunk of cash to Obama campaign AND another big honkin chunk of cash to Elizabeth Warren campaign. Thanks for the reminder :-)

sadly liz seems to have slipped behind scotty--he played the superpac-man challenge very well; despite that his money is all big donor, and that he has twice that of liz

i have given to liz also, and would be very disappointed if she loses--she's great--there's simply no dirt on her, and her stated mission is unarguable

West34, thanks for contributing to the economy and the advertising and media industry of which NYC is a major beneficiary. Personally, I don't bother. I'll leave it up to the billionaires.

But Elizabeth Warren ... why should anyone be so worried? Remember Al Franken, that horrible extreme liberal? He can't even get air time these days, I have to watch reruns of Stuart Smalley. Who by the way looks a little bit like Elizabeth Warren: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DIETlxquzY

Obama ... he'll win. And the Senate will shift to the Republicans.

identical twins:
http://www.google.com/imgres?q=rachel+maddow+chris+hayes+twins&um=1&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&biw=1229&bih=648&tbm=isch&tbnid=syJSLsuoMtgZfM:&imgrefurl=http://www.mediaite.com/tv/acorn-holed-chris-hayes-calls-out-newt-gingrichs-voter-fraud-hypocrisy/&docid=Gk2iYFChAfboeM&imgurl=http://www.mediaite.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/ging.jpg&w=450&h=325&ei=0ipaT7zYFsH50gGZ_MjADw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=109&vpy=56&dur=267&hovh=191&hovw=264&tx=161&ty=86&sig=105912419867248935726&page=1&tbnh=137&tbnw=166&start=0&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0

http://www.google.com/imgres?q=rachel+maddow+chris+hayes+twins&um=1&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&biw=1229&bih=648&tbm=isch&tbnid=eB-2G95oGDkJVM:&imgrefurl=http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowldc/tag/rachel-maddow/page/2&docid=nOnoCQnzOs9G3M&imgurl=http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowldc/files/2011/08/large.jpg&w=464&h=290&ei=0ipaT7zYFsH50gGZ_MjADw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=281&vpy=218&dur=1352&hovh=177&hovw=284&tx=204&ty=127&sig=105912419867248935726&page=1&tbnh=148&tbnw=210&start=0&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0

> Show me the actual pension formula from an MTA source that yields a pension nealry twice average pay

Simple... 70% of the last 3 years pay... pumped up with overtime.

That's not the formula exactly.

It's 70% of the AVERAGE of the last three years, not 70% of the TOTAL of the last three years.

I didn't find somewhereelse's post confusing. Why did you?

I am a liberal democrat, and although I agree Fox News exagerates the problem, there IS a problem with out of control public pensions.

I realize it's someone's job to run these calculations and then someone else's job to then argue about them, but wouldnt the most rudimentary way to ballpark the income nesessary to live somewhere comfortably be to take the average rent and multiply it by 3.3333333? since 30% of monthly income is the traditionally accepted housing budget? except for Matt who is a purist at 25%.

Are you sure the pension formula for MTA isn't average of three "best" years?

People get to their highest salary, then do as much as OT as possible in their last three years?

Why not just exclude overtime from pension formula calculations?

"but wouldnt the most rudimentary way to ballpark the income nesessary to live somewhere comfortably be to take the average rent and multiply it by 3.3333333? since 30% of monthly income is the traditionally accepted housing budget?"

"Average" rent -- where?

In the Bronx? Brooklyn Heights? Williamsburg? TriBeCa? Washington Heights?

front_porch: "...people get imprinted with attitudes towards money pretty early."

Totally agree with that. Parents should really keep that in mind.

location of your choice, Matt. different nabes require different incomes to live comfortably.

My point is, lucille, when you're talking about a government agency, whose metric do you use to compute the retirement benefit?

Should the MTA, for instance, average out TriBeCa rents for its pensions, or Bronx rents? How do you decide, and who makes the decision?

" Totally agree with that. Parents should really keep that in mind"

as a general observation, those most irresponsible with money and exhibiting pronounced conspicuous consumption tendencies,more often than not did not grow up with any. their parents tought them to devote their talents and energy to making it, not the wisest and most beneficial ways if spending it. they learn that one the hard way and on their own, their parents have little influence on their attitude towards money except perhaps the indirect lesson that the financial reward of their hard work entitles them to the full scope of material rewards it affords.

my comment pertained to the original topic of this thread. I don't know anything about union pensions.

Bond007:
Manicure and pedicure in Manhattan: $65.
Brooklyn:$25

Haircut and full highlights in Manhattan: $200
Brooklyn:$80
These are for the nicest salons -- not "specials", available every day.

That's my metric.

Truth, have you looked into offers from Groupon?

@lucillebluth

u mean 30% of post-tax income right?

otherwise someone with a rent of $2,500 making $100k a year or ~$8,333 pre tax and $5,500 or so post-tax

is spending almost 50% of income on rent
that's what the bar usually is for renting a place, ie 40x monthly rent

but that's definitely not comfortable. in fact both mortgage and rental requirements in this country are really low bars for comfort.

i think everyone keeps reverting to income as determining comfort. i would suggest it is more the percentage u save and assets saved relative to your age, income, and stability of your income. if u can save 30% of ur income, at any level u will live with comfort psychologically. if u save less than 10% than i can't imagine being comfortable even making $2 million a year (unless u have a lot of wealth) b/c even a slight decrease in income will force u to downsize ur life, which is really the deap-seated anxiety everyone has

huntersburg: Groupon offers discount for "special" services for things like hair and nail salons. One time intro discount.
I'm talking about every day prices. For srevices we use weekly/monthly.

Also: dry cleaning $3.25 per piece (except dresses and coats).
Pizza $2 a slice.
Most other things are less than Manhattan.
100k is enough.