Those must be some pretty ridiculously high taxes

Henry17 and I disagree about a lot, but in this thread I almost completely agree with him...except about the scratch cooking.

Tastes will be different, and if you have more expensive tastes, you're going to spend more on groceries. But you're not comparing equivalent foods: a can of spaghetti-os should be fairly compared to what you'd pay for a package of spaghetti and a sauce made of canned ingredients. You might pay more at the beginning for the spaghetti + canned tomato sauce + tbsp tomato paste + italian seasoning, but your per meal expense would be much less since you'd end up with significantly more meals.

You simply can't say, "well my wild salmon filet encrusted with a lemon-olive oil-fresh dill-panko breadcrumb mixture with a side of orange scented asparagus, a starter course of wild mushroom soup and my bottle of sparkling water costs more than frozen fish sticks and a can of green beans, therefore cooking from scratch costs more."

WAT?

lol? apparently you've never paid taxes or looked at a paycheck and seen the absurd amounts of money that gets taken out

I have, just another lame high taxes joke

IIRC, $65K falls under the 25% bracket, which mean $15-20K. That still leaves $5-10K, so what else is there that he's paying that much on?

I don't know enough about the US but generally there are deductions for stuff like EI and government run pensions that are separate from taxes.

"My net pay, (every 2 weeks) after federal, state, AND city taxes (plus FICA, etc.) are deducted amounts to $1,850, or $3,700 monthly."

^ Huh. Think I'd better get some more coffee and wake myself up here

Still, I find it laughable OP is complaining of it being hard to get by on $65K (or $45K or whatever it is after taxes) when he lives in one of the most expensive cities in America or when he is spending insane amounts of money ($800 on groceries? Really?). Thousands of people get by on plenty less. Come on OP, you can do better than that.

I will definitely agree with this. I think people's perceptions about these things changed quite a bit during the years of very easy credit and rising incomes.

to those who are eating for a month on $300 or so, can you break down an itemized list for me? i'm having trouble seeing how i can a have healthy and high protein (~100-150g a day) on that kind of money and do so in a way where compliance is high (e.g. if i have to spend an hour cooking in the morning, it's not gonna happen because i have to go to work and i'm not waking up at 5 am so i can cook)?

i can put together a grocery list of mac and cheese, hot pockets, rice, pasta, Eggos, bread, bologna, but that's just not gonna cut it unless i want to have gross body composition, low protein intake, and crappier long-term health.

^ Sorry, but I have a feeling there's a lot of vegetarians ITT. [Rimshot]

...No good?

For a gross of $65k

FICA (social security and medicare) 7.65% = 4,972.50

Federal income tax assuming standard deduction and one exemption = 10,106.00

Total Federal = 15,078.50
Take home = 49,921.50

And then there's state and city tax. Both are pretty high.

I make about the same as you and live in the DC Area where cost of living is probably similar to NYC, here are my expenses just as a comparison.

Rent: $1250 (could cut this in half if i cared to get a roommate..have a 2br apt)
Food: $400 (i buy a lot of meat/seafood as well and probably shop at wholefoods sometimes)
Gas: $200
Utilities + Insurance: $300
Total: ~$2150

Usually spend about $300-$500 going out/buying random stuff, so I bank anywhere between 500-1200 a month. While your grocery bill does seem a bit high, I think the main issue is the debt which is unavoidable. Not having a car payment is really nice, I'd get rid of the car of your car if you live in the city. An extra $350 would go a long way.

Getting rid of the car wouldn't be just $350. I don't think the type of car was ever revealed but assuming it isn't a POS it could be used to pay off the debt or at least come close and then he'd have an extra $850/month.

It depends how much he drives and if he really needs it. I have been to NYC a few times and based on what parking cost I can't imagine that cabs are not cheaper at least in Manhattan.

I make about 100k right now and I'm always broke too. Love me.









Oh, but I smoke a lot of P.O.T and am poasting from an iPad, so grain of salt I suppose.

thousands!?!

let us know when you come to a conclusion.

- Do as much of the cooking as possible in batches on weekends for efficiency

- Beans

- Cheaper cuts of meat, and things like buying whole chickens instead of just the breast for example

I'm not sure what I spend a month on groceries for 2. It's probably pretty high, but on the other hand I'm making pretty much zero effort to economize at the moment (a la Duke).

You were the one that said you exclusively eat italian food, right? raw pasta or even homemade pasta is some of the cheapest and easiest food to make. you are aware that if making things from scratch was more expensive than buying food retail, the very people you're buying food from wouldn't be able to make a profit?

^ They also get a big discount for buying in bulk

Aloysius,

Can you tell us more about your 'stress testing?' Just a paragraph or three of conclusions, maybe something you'd consider starting your own thread with?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

BWAhahhahahahahhahaha

I could get a modest but new-ish 3 bedroom house off the 215 in Las Vegas, ten minutes to the Strip, in a nice, low-crime residential neighborhood, for like $1350/mo.

holy crap

LasVegas sucks for the most part.

No. I prefer Italian restaurants and steak houses because I don't eat a lot of stuff but basically I'll eat from any ethnic background.

Pasta by itself wouldn't be something I would consider a meal. Maybe occasionally for lunch but I need it to have a significant amount of meat for it to count as a meal.

No. Packaging is one of higher costs. Having to pay that on ten items vs one. The same for transport. Also the quality of the ingredients -- you'll notice something about the consistency of chicken in a box or even chicken at lower level pubs and delivery that makes it clear that it is not the same as an actual chicken breast. Also as VoraciousReader pointed out we are not comparing apples to apples you can't buy frozen meals like real cooking. That was actually the core of my argument that people who are criticizing the $800 likely eat a lot of stuff that isn't really something that other people would consider acceptable food.