If you are living somewhere with 2k a month rent, then yes, $50k a year is awful and nigh unlivable.
You should not be in a position where you are working professionally and full time where you have to worry about having enough money each month to survive.
The cost of living is out of control and nobody wants to acknowledge that should reflect rising salaries. It is why there was so much momentum around a $15 minimum wage two years ago.
The economy has not stagnated or contracted. Markets are larger than ever. Corporations are profitable as always and are somehow finding billions to buy each other out rather than pay their employees a respectable wage.
If the momentum and progress of the 50s and 60s held to today the mean salary should be in the $150k a year range, not $50k. The average person is way too complacent to the march of inflation and growth of the economy to think that since $50k was a lot in 1978 that it should still be sufficient in 2018.
> The cost of living is out of control and nobody wants to acknowledge that should reflect rising salaries.
Alternatively, we could look into reducing cost of living. US is dealing with a legacy system in the form of suburban sprawl that makes housing far more expensive than it has to be because the demand by the biggest generation far outstrips supply (simply due to area constraints and ridiculous zoning policies).
A small dilapidated house built in the 1950s with lead paint and asbestos should not cost $400,000.
Unfortunately, that is politically untenable right out of the gate.
To be fair, in the 50s and 60s a lot of the jobs were more engineering than technical, and the US had the advantage of being one of the few nations whose industrial capacity wasn't damaged by World War II. Now, software developers of similar skills in the US and India are paid massively different rates, simply because of cost of living. All the "missed gains" the US has is because money is being funneled to other countries who are starting to produce wares (both soft and hard) that compete with what the US basically had a monopoly on.
There are 2 differences: first, US devs are paid substantially more. Second, their stated salaries is closer to what their employer spends than our salaries. Our employers pay various taxes before giving us our stated salary, they have private insurances. This is a gross oversimplification, but that's the idea. Third, the cost of living is often higher in the US.
To really compare salaries, you need to count what the employer actually pays, and factor in the various costs of living (taxes, insurance, home, food, transportation…).
In white collar jobs like software people don't usually have private health insurance (in the US). Employers cover that cost on top of your salary - 90%-100% of cost is typical in the industry, though it depends a biton whether it's just for you / your family.
Depends what caliber person you want. Highly educated, motivated, top 10%, maybe even 20% should be able to earn almost $100k upon earning a Masters, maybe even engineering/science degree. In the bigger cities in the US, I would expect most technical/finance/medical professionals to be making six figures easily by the time they are mid to upper 20s.
12 years ago I started out of college at $75k. Starting salaries are much higher now if you live in a major tech area (100k+ for SF Bay or new york city).
You should not be in a position where you are working professionally and full time where you have to worry about having enough money each month to survive.
The cost of living is out of control and nobody wants to acknowledge that should reflect rising salaries. It is why there was so much momentum around a $15 minimum wage two years ago.
The economy has not stagnated or contracted. Markets are larger than ever. Corporations are profitable as always and are somehow finding billions to buy each other out rather than pay their employees a respectable wage.
If the momentum and progress of the 50s and 60s held to today the mean salary should be in the $150k a year range, not $50k. The average person is way too complacent to the march of inflation and growth of the economy to think that since $50k was a lot in 1978 that it should still be sufficient in 2018.