Yay, must be nice being single all your life because you'll never be able to afford a family. Some people don't have the ability to get higher than min-wage jobs - ever because they lack the education necessary.
I live in an average city in utah. We rent a home for 1400. That's been our average for the past 4 places we've rented regardless of whether it was in a bigger city or rural. There are many rentals that are double or triple that w/ more room.
We generally try to go for 4-5 bedroom.. which includes a master, 2 kids rooms, and 2 offices for myself and my wife.
On top of that healthcare is about 1000/month. Kids grow fast we need to replace their wardrobe completely every 4-6 months. so say $200/month on clothes for two boys.
We're already at $2600/month. Add about $1000 for groceries (formula is $250 a month!). That's $3600. Add gas to get around town maybe $250/month. So $3800. Shouldn't people have some leisure? You said you lived a luxurious life, did you own a car? Go to social events? Go to movies ? how much per month was alotted for 'luxury'....I'd like to take the kids to Disney land that'd cost about $3000 or more.. so to budget that we'd need to break out maybe $300 per month into savings.
This is in Utah. San Francisco you're looking at a room going for 2x as much as our 5 br house. Cost of living increasing exponentially from there. I don't see how anybody in California exists on their minimum wages....
I'm a developer but I sometimes take crappy clients when jobs are low. Currently my most active client can only afford $25... I feel practically raped as I was used to $50/60 per hour doing laravel+vue, but can't figure out how to keep steady higher paying clientele. Summer left us almost homeless though, so I put out tons of lowball ads just to keep us housed. So now I'm essentially a senior-level developer earning $10 more than minimum wage. Depression and imposter syndrome don't help much with things either. Even for people w/ good skills times get hard in America. Higher minimum wages might make us freelancers be able to charge more, since we can compare our rates w/ low-skill workers.
I live in an average city in utah. We rent a home for 1400. That's been our average for the past 4 places we've rented regardless of whether it was in a bigger city or rural. There are many rentals that are double or triple that w/ more room.
We generally try to go for 4-5 bedroom.. which includes a master, 2 kids rooms, and 2 offices for myself and my wife.
On top of that healthcare is about 1000/month. Kids grow fast we need to replace their wardrobe completely every 4-6 months. so say $200/month on clothes for two boys.
We're already at $2600/month. Add about $1000 for groceries (formula is $250 a month!). That's $3600. Add gas to get around town maybe $250/month. So $3800. Shouldn't people have some leisure? You said you lived a luxurious life, did you own a car? Go to social events? Go to movies ? how much per month was alotted for 'luxury'....I'd like to take the kids to Disney land that'd cost about $3000 or more.. so to budget that we'd need to break out maybe $300 per month into savings.
This is in Utah. San Francisco you're looking at a room going for 2x as much as our 5 br house. Cost of living increasing exponentially from there. I don't see how anybody in California exists on their minimum wages....
I'm a developer but I sometimes take crappy clients when jobs are low. Currently my most active client can only afford $25... I feel practically raped as I was used to $50/60 per hour doing laravel+vue, but can't figure out how to keep steady higher paying clientele. Summer left us almost homeless though, so I put out tons of lowball ads just to keep us housed. So now I'm essentially a senior-level developer earning $10 more than minimum wage. Depression and imposter syndrome don't help much with things either. Even for people w/ good skills times get hard in America. Higher minimum wages might make us freelancers be able to charge more, since we can compare our rates w/ low-skill workers.