Jonathan Clements’ “How to think About Money” comes highly recommended.
For a short read, Dr. Bernstein’s “If You Can” was written for Millenials and there are PDF versions available you can search for.
Check out the Amazon pages for both.
Good idea @saillakeerie.
My kids listen faithfully to my career and financial and my daughter executes. Both have graduated and are working. She maxed out 401k and also was able to do a Roth. But, she had to rush at the last minute to sign her tax return and make her Roth contributions. I had suggested to her automatically saving 10% of her income and I think she is sort of doing that. But, she and BF are moving to the Bay Area, where savings may be hard (though their combined expected salary as a software engineer and a nurse practitioner is pretty decent). My son is so much like me that he needs little advising but is just swamped. I am setting up a trust for him which can own shares of companies he starts. Both estate planning and asset protection. He is raising his Series A financing for one of the two companies and is just overwhelmed. I did advise him to hire an EA to take administrative stuff off his plate and he and his partner did, but she has not turned out well. Ah well.
I hit a milestone. I signed up for Medicare A and B today. Need to get my numbers so I can enroll in the supplemental policies. Relatively confusing.
1974 as a college Mental Health in Indiana was $14,000
1979 County mental Health 29,000 (super great.
Kaiser HMO 50 % in 1983 18,000.
All I can think as all these horrific school shootings are happening is how School Counselors were dismissed over the years and that NOW (when there are so few who are trained in actual SCHOOL counseling) they want therapists who are generalists to work with 1,000 per counselor for an average of $45,000 per year.
Pay levels for each profession even at the low end (new entrant not many years out of school) appear to be higher than the median household income in major cities in the region. So two such incomes should be plenty to live comfortably while saving and investing a substantial amount of money for future needs (like their kids’ college and their retirement).
The San Francisco / Oakland / San Jose bay area is expensive, but not so expensive that two high income people with reasonable spending and saving habits would have any difficulty living on their incomes. (But they should make sure that their vaccines are complete before visiting Marin County.)
@shawbridge - the biggest issue is housing costs. The rest is not so expensive compared to other areas. If they can comfortably afford $4,000 for a 1-2 bedroom apartment with a parking spot, they should be able to live off the rest and put something in their 401(k)s.
And in California, they will get taxed out of their minds, even more so now that little of their state taxes/property tax is deductible. Expensive times for Californians.
Most income-based taxes are federal taxes.
https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-taxes#KSW7omcE7R says that a married couple in California with $250,000 income will pay:
$42,819 federal income tax
$11,586 FICA (Social Security and Medicare tax)
$16,938 state income tax
I.e. total of $71,343 of the above, of which $54,405 is federal income tax + FICA. Income remaining after all of the above taxes is $178,657.
For a high income person to lower income taxes, it helps for the income to be capital-based (sometimes given special lower rates, deductions, exemptions, etc. and/or easier to manipulate), rather than labor-based.
UCB - CA taxes capital gains as if it was your ordinary income. Still, that $16k in CA state taxes is about $16k more in state income taxes than that couple would pay in my state.
$16,938 of state income tax is a lot of money. A big reason why someone making $250K in a high cost area in California probably only middle income.
And if that is two salaries, going to pay more than $11,586 in FICA and Medicare tax.
The only place in CA I would want to move to is San Diego. I would move there despite the state taxes. Bay Area - ughghgh… no.
@BunsenBurner - I have been in San Diego for 39 years since I came here for college and have lived in California all of my life. We love living here, but definitely pay a “sunshine tax” for the privledge!
health care slams some seniors. btw: Boston College’s Retirement Center is a good source of general info.
https://squaredawayblog.bc.edu/squared-away/medical-costs-slam-a-minority-of-seniors/
Tech companies generally offer have generous matches to 401k’s. Nursing pays extremely well in the Bay Area, and NP’s are in demand. Get in with Kaiser for quality of life.
People seem to have extremely exaggerated ideas of income and cost levels in California. $250k is more than double the median household income in major cities (as opposed to a few small wealthy towns) in California, including the bay area, so it is not realistically “middle income”.
You can easily live a better lifestyle making 125K in some areas of the country than making 250K in high cost areas like NYC or SF. You can’t conveniently ignore the fact that people are paying much higher federal/state/FICA and Medicare taxes at higher incomes, allowing them to bring less home. At an average of 4K/year rent in SF, the money that is left shrinks quickly. People living in low cost areas at half the income might even be able to afford the luxury of a car. Now that’s living high on the hog in NYC and SF.
Wonder what the median income is of people paying out-of-pocket $250k+ for undergrad.
I love it here in the Bay Area, but I’ve lived here a long time. And most of my neighbors have lived here a long time as well.
That makes a huge difference. Especially if you own a place with a nice yard - without neighbors hanging above it 
Let’s see, $250k income becomes $178k after income and payroll taxes (federal and California). Even if you mean $4k per month ($48k per year) for housing, that still leaves $130k per year after taxes and housing, more than the median (pre-tax) household income in places like San Francisco, New York, and San Jose. Seems like if you have reasonable spending habits, you may be able to live well and save plenty of money for retirement and your kids’ college.