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> If your stipend is $19K, a single student's take-home pay is $16,734, less ~$1,600 in required departmental fees. So, you've got about $1261/mo to pay for everything. If you split a 1-bedroom for $2.2K (not including utilities), that means you've got $161 for electricity, food, phone, internet, fun, literally every other expense for the rest of the month. Where is this? When I started my PhD in the early 2000's, my after tax monthly income (state school) was $1400-1500 per month, which is more than what you listed above. Granted, we got paid only 11 months of the year, and yes, did pay university fees, so the total per month may have been similar, but: Seriously, this was almost 20 years ago - I'm sure they pay more now. Either your numbers are off, or your school sucks (sadly, quite likely). When I went to grad school, my original goal was Berkeley. But when I found out how expensive it was to live there, I picked a top school in a cheaper town. The monthly stipend was only $100/mo less than at Berkeley, but rent was several hundred dollars cheaper. Edit: Hard to find numbers quickly, but just checked and one of the engineering programs there currently pay $2300/mo (11 months a year). That's $25K vs your $19K. Of course, in some cities, that's still not enough. |