Could you live on a $39,000 salary? - Page 2

On February 23 2010 03:06 StarN wrote:
largely depends on where you live. with property in rates in places like New York I find it would be very hard to support a family of 4 with a 39000$ salary.

On February 23 2010 03:44 Chef wrote:
Does his wife not work?

On February 23 2010 04:04 stack wrote:
can I ask what you guys do for a living?

On February 23 2010 03:20 NonFactor wrote:
I live with my parents.

On February 23 2010 03:06 Hot_Bid wrote:
theres a difference between a guy supporting his family off 39k and you supporting yourself. even living in a really nice city, 39k for a single person is plenty assuming you don't spend a ton of money on luxury items. but for a family, 39k is quite low.

On February 23 2010 04:04 stack wrote:
can I ask what you guys do for a living?

On February 23 2010 04:52 BlackJack wrote:
Here's how to live off $39,000 salary:

1. First thing you should do is supplement your income by writing a book on how to live off $39,000 salary.
2. Avoid buying things you don't need, like stupid books on how to live off $39,000 a year.

I really hope that's the first chapter of the book. You open it and it says "Stop spending all your money everytime someone writes a book." Actually it's perfect because if someone is spending money on his book it's actually the exact same person he needs to help.

Seriously 39k is probably more than enough to live on. The problem is America's definition of "getting by" is different from most people's definition. The average "poor" family as defined by our government typically has cable television, air conditioning, cell phones, their own car, etc.

The reason people have trouble getting by on 40k a year is because our country has a terrible record with saving money. We spend it all on snuggies and shamwows and other useless stuff we don't need. Actually what really costs a lot of money is buying stuff like cell phones and new clothes. You can get a perfectly acceptable pair of pants at a church sale or gargage sale for a buck, no reason to spend $40 for designer jeans that, ironically, are purposefully torn, lol.

On February 23 2010 05:07 BlackJack wrote:
Also I watched a documentary, might have been Guiness World Record related, not sure, about the "world's cheapest man." His "job" is going around dumpster diving and scavenging and he makes about 9k a year off that. He has his own house and family. He does things like reuse paper towels by hanging them out to dry and filling up ketchup bottles with small packs of Mcdonalds ketchup. That's the book I want to read. Not some schmuck that makes a book about living on $39k when there are already probably 50 million people that live on less than 39k.

On February 23 2010 04:37 KOFgokuon wrote:


i'm a grad student, i make ~30k a year and live in cambridge ma