Can you live on half a million...

[germdoc]

...in NYC?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/fa...lfmill.html?em

I want to smile but it makes me angry at the same time that people get used to a certain lifestyle that is so...much...compared to the rest of us.

[crokett]

Bah. Half a million? That is a mere pittance! No one could live on so little money.

[SARGE..g-47]

Beyond a shadow of a doubt in my case under my current circumstances.

[430752]

Yeah, read that article too. For those that haven't, the synopsis is that high level bankers in NYC couldn't live off $500K with the moderate apartments, moderate house on the hamptons, moderate private cars, moderate private school tuitions, etc, etc. The use of the word moderate means that the apartments aren't the bare bones $500K apartments (which is pretty bare bones in Manhattan) but not the uber chic $2.5million dollar ones you see in magazines. Could they live off $500K a year, sure. But then they'd be living like a entry level to mid-level exec. The article pointed out that a $50K middle class existence in Houston was equivilent to $125K in Manhattan.

I choked on this too, thinking what's wrong with Brooklyn, Hoboken, or the Village, and why not take subways? But the article points to a valid argument that these are high level banking types, not mid-level types, and thus not exactly the ones to be hoofing it to work or driving a Honda. I don't know where I come down on this. Much of me says what's wrong with a Honda (as a metaphor)? But a good part also recognizes these are the power elite and despite having screwed it up, do you want your governor, president, head of Citibank, president of Ford, etc. to be living in a 3 bedroom split-level in suburbia driving a Chevy while eating at the McDonald's drive thru? Why the heck would any of us aspire to be a wall street type then? How do I tell my daughters to strive and sacrifice in order to be titans of industry?

[Ed62]

I want to smile but it makes me angry at the same time that people get used to a certain lifestyle that is so...much...compared to the rest of us.

My grandson was here yesterday, and we were talking about the poor people. He said "There's United States poor, then there's the rest of the world poor". Makes sense.

Ed

[jziegler]

Could they live off $500K a year, sure. But then they'd be living like a entry level to mid-level exec. The article pointed out that a $50K middle class existence in Houston was equivilent to $125K in Manhattan.

Actually, I really think that many are mid-level execs. I heard about this on the radio, and one commentator said that thousands of people could be affected by this rule. Hundreds at a bank like Citi alone. So these really are mid-level bankers getting paid millions a year.

And in 2000 I lived OK (as a single man just out of college) working in Manhattan on not much over 50k by living in New Jersey and taking the bus/subways. It is possible

Oh, and their yearly mortgage plus co-op fees could more than pay for my house. I really have no sympathy for them.

Jim

[dbhost]

No I couldn't live on half a million in NYC, mostly because you wouldn't catch me in NYC at all... Houston is bad enough, NYC would drive me to the loony bin...

[Knottscott]

$500K in Manhattan for a top exec really isn't that much if they're earning their keep and doing good things for the business, the employees, and the customers. What burns me are the execs of charities that make that, and the execs that get tens of millions to leave after screwing up......actually the even the execs making tens of millions for doing a decent job burns a little too when they're withholding pay raises, benefits, and laying off their workforces. Those are the folks with huge egos and no spines that need to be "enlightened".

[LCHIEN]

Hmm, if pay and bonuses corresponds to performance expected, then we're not offering these guys enough... considering what they've done for the pay they've gotten already. That's a frightening thought!

[germdoc]

I have seen the house where Warren Buffet grew up in Omaha, and according to Wikipedia he "lives in the same house in the central Dundee neighborhood of Omaha that he bought in 1958 for $31,500 and today, it is valued at around $700,000."

I also like his philosophy on inheritance: "I want to give my kids just enough so that they would feel that they could do anything, but not so much that they would feel like doing nothing".

It is my observation that many people who truly earn their wealth do not see wealth as an end to itself, but as a raw material for their goals. And they realize they did not get wealthy by flaunting it but by living frugally. There are exceptions to this rule, of course.

[shoottx]

Well if you make $400,000,

And have all of the following paid for you; your house, house taxes, utilities, phones, food, household help, support staff.

You pay no Social Security taxes, medical bills, or need for retirement planning since your salary is guaranteed for life.

You could afford to live in the big house in Washington DC

The problem I have is a government that has not been successful at running very little trying to dictate the terms of operations to a business community. Either make a loan or don't. Do not add a whole lot of strings or conditions to the loans. And by the way what were the performance standards for the use of the first bailout money sent to the banks?

[herb fellows]

Shoottx, I'm 180 degrees from you.
Let us remember that the government has NO MONEY.

This is MY MONEY they are lending out.

If I'm lending you money, especially considering your recent track record, I have every right to put conditions on that loan.

If I go to a bank for a loan, and they tell me 8% interest and I don't like those terms, I look elsewhere.

Nobody is forcing you to take a loan from me. If you don't want to adhere to the conditions, no loan. Simple as that. Go look elsewhere.

[jackellis]

Nobody is forcing you to take a loan from me.

Well not quite. The first few tens of billions were an offer the receiving banks couldn't refuse.

However back to living on a half million. I'm not sympathetic either. Those folks made choices and tradeoffs that they now have to live with. LOML and I have and we get by on a lot less than a half million, so why shouldn't folks who make more.

However let's not lose sight of the fact that money does the economy no good unless it's getting passed around. When bankers are not spending money on drivers and private schools, the people who provide those services end up hurting, perhaps even worse than their employers.

[shoottx]

Shoottx, I'm 180 degrees from you.
Let us remember that the government has NO MONEY.

This is MY MONEY they are lending out.

If I'm lending you money, especially considering your recent track record, I have every right to put conditions on that loan.

If I go to a bank for a loan, and they tell me 8% interest and I don't like those terms, I look elsewhere.

Nobody is forcing you to take a loan from me. If you don't want to adhere to the conditions, no loan. Simple as that. Go look elsewhere.

I agree if you don't like the terms on the front end don't take the loan! But don't change the terms after the fact! That is what they are doing and that is wrong!

[MilDoc]

Sorry, but when the average CEO earns 500 times what the folks that do the work for company earn, the folks that actually make money for the company, I have a problem. 30 years ago CEOs earned 50-100 times the workers. They are now the new "nobility." Do I feel sorry for them?

Nope. Not at all.