[elzbardico]

A tenured position in a reasonably good university can give you quite a good standard of living, and depending on your area, there are even opportunities for occasional consulting work.

Not to mention that the professional prestige itself in an academic profession gives your family a lot of status that other people usually try to attain by buying expensive stuff.

Even in the fanciest neighborhoods, nobody cares if a Princeton Professor drives a 20 years old Volvo.