<p>Yes @jym626 I did notice the raspberries. My son grew from 5’3" and small-framed to 6’4"and relatively broad in HS and the food budget was cut in half when he left. We just went shopping today at the Costco next to his grad school and he bought raspberries.</p>
<p>I think the discussion is - what expenses “have” to scale up when you jump from 100k to 200k to 400k. And food is a perfect example of an expense that needn’t be “scaled up” very much, if at all. </p>
<p>“Those making $200K should live as though they make $100K. There are plenty of families at that income level all over the US. The difference can go to savings.”</p>
<p>That’s part of being a dual income professional household IMO. Once we could, we arranged things so that essentially we lived off one of our incomes and banked the other, dipping into that second one only for unusual expenses (such as buying a car - we always pay cash for our cars). </p>
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<p>The only thing in a typical household budget that automatically increases would be income and payroll taxes, although the people who complain about taxes all the time may be overestimating the effect of such taxes (particularly since some types of income that are more common at the higher income ranges get preferentially lower income tax rates, and the Social Security payroll tax is regressive in that it falls from 6.2% to 0.0% after a certain level of labor income). More expensive house, car, clothing, food, kids’ extracurricular activities, etc. are all options.</p>
<p>College costs, to the extent that financial aid is reduced at increasing income levels, also go up at many schools. But college costs only happen for 4-6 years per kid, as opposed to the 18 years that the kid is growing up where $100,000 more income per year could build up a very large college fund.</p>
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<p>I seriously doubt that a family who currently has $200K income, started having this level of income the year their kid is born.</p>
<p>However, the family with $100,000 in income when the kid is 18 also likely did not have that level of income when the kid was born.</p>
<p>RE the “Families with $200 k incomes should be able to live off of $150k (like we do)” I get it but those in the $75k bracket are saying that about those of us in the over $100’s too. </p>
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<p>Depends on the person. I don’t see why richer people need to live in bigger houses, but if my income doubled I’m eating fish every meal, which would double my food expenditure. But I wouldn’t move to a bigger place, I get no utility from that.</p>
<p>^^^
Once you have kids you need somewhere to hide. </p>
<p>Well, obviously plenty of people DON’T have houses big enough to hide from each other. I don’t, and as a result my daughter usually goes to her friends’ houses to hang out. It makes me a little sad that I can’t offer “the fun house” for all the kids, but having a bigger home would mean moving much farther out and adding other hassles, like traffic and commuting time.</p>
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<p>Agreed, but their income didn’t double overnight either. I’m sure most of us have our “$30/lb steaks.” My husband earns ~$60k/year, but our family rents a condo at the beach for a week every other year, and in alternate years we take day trips and go camping. If I returned to work we’d earn much more, but we chose to home school so our child with dyslexia, dysgraphia, & dyscalculia could have the most personalized instruction we could provide. We saved what we could over the years but chose to sign our kids up for karate, guitar lessons, and the local swim team, so our savings are not what they would be if we made other choices. We own a small house on a postage stamp and drive used cars, but will still probably end up going the 2 + 2 cc and 4-year public route because that’s what we can afford. The difference between our family and others I’ve seen post on this forum, I think, is that we didn’t make the choices we made, (to pay for various lessons, etc.), through 12th grade and then grouse because someone else isn’t picking up the bill for college. What we provided may help them get ACCEPTED to college, but it in no way entitles them to have someone else pick up the tab. I don’t really get the families who pay hefty sums for private k-12 schools, or expensive lessons, or what have you so their kids can get into elite colleges who then complain about laying out large sums so they can attend those elite colleges. Why do they seem to think their financial responsibilty ends after high school, and who do they think SHOULD pay for their child’s college education?</p>
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<p>It’s not size that radically drives up the cost. It’s location, location, location.</p>
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<p>It depends. I’ve been in offices where business casual was okay, but even then, dressing up for certain meetings was expected. My wife has to dress up often lately, which is a real drag since the majority of women’s suits don’t have pockets. </p>
<p>I’m retired and spend close to $0 on clothes. My wife spends very little on at-home clothes, but thousands on work clothes (and dry cleaning). </p>
<p>Well it’s both. We downsized two years ago and moved 4 blocks away. Housing costs cut almost in half.</p>
<p>I used to spend a lot more on clothes when I worked at a law firm. I bought my suits at Syms, but they still weren’t all that cheap.</p>
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<p>But I wasn’t the one who pointed out that
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<p>You were assuming the $100K gap was constant. The net pay between gross salary of $100K and $200K certainly will not be $100K.</p>
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<p>There are a lot of posters here who have been self-pay and don’t complain. We admit we are fortunate.
We were self-pay for private k-college.
We’ve been in our house for 37 years, bought it before the kids were born and plan to be here until we are carted out.
My H just sold the car he drove to work after 19 years. I know exactly what it means to live WAY below your means. I am still living it, though we travel quite a bit. I’ve just started a couple of years ago to take cabs to from airports instead of public transportation where available.
It frosts me to see people create animosity between $100K gap in income and pass judgement on those who spend a little more on extras if they can afford it.</p>
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<p>I spend most of my “forum time” on Bogleheads. There is a contingent there that thinks that spending money on private schools is a waste, that not having a child at CC for the first two years is a waste of money, that we spoil our kids by paying for college even if we can, that going into debt was good enough for them so it will be good enough for their kids, etc. </p>
<p>And then, there is a contingent to which I belong, that feels that the point of LBYM and saving and investing, is that we want to be able to spend on those things that matter to us. It’s not that I’m too unimaginative to think of other things to do with our money, but I honestly feel great satisfaction and happiness writing a tuition check for a great college. So sue me 
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<p>I moderate it by saying that one should not endanger one’s retirement by putting all of the eggs in the college savings basket. It is important to have an emergency fund, retirement fund, etc. We are lucky enough (and there’s a luck component, no matter how hard we worked) to be able to fund retirement and tuition, but I told my kids that more important than paying tuition was the fact that we wouldn’t be asking them to support us in old age. </p>
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<p>For that matter, there are people who are able to afford the nice house, the nice cars, the vacations, etc., AND pay for college without grousing, put away money for retirement, help out relatives, and give to charity. They are still living “below their means”, but their means is significant. Not everyone who has nice things is scrimping on the things that really matter. </p>
<p>Location does matter and the house matters more to some people. Our mortgage is below 30% of our gross salary, but with health insurance, utilities, car payments, gas money, food, and medical bills, we don’t save the EFC each year.</p>
<p>What could we cut down on?
- Vacations - we only go every other year, and average cost is $3,000.
- Sports - my son’s sports teams are about $5,000 per year including all travel and hotel
- Clothing - the kids get new clothes every fall or when they outgrow mid-year
- Location - the street is a cul-de-sac, and we definitely pay more for that IMHO.
- Schools - part of location, but significant national ranking for the HS
- Family - we support my MIL
- Medical - thousands per year, including travel to doctors
- Food - we do go out to eat too much, we could find something there, maybe $50 per week
- Car payments - yes, we have two cars we bought new, that’s about $1000 per month</p>
<p>I’m not sure what else. I don’t buy shoes, he doesn’t buy golf clubs. We don’t have expensive hobbies. We have pets, but they are not too much of a drain on our expenses.</p>
<p>The house could be something - but think about it - why should we cut down on the house if the money we save will go direct to the college? Our EFC would go to zero if we had cash-in-hand instead in our house. It does depend on the college, and some do not consider the family’s primary residence at all.</p>
<p>In that respect, if you are well-off enough to own a million-dollar house outright, but every other number points to breaking even, you can get a good deal on college - one that is not accessible to others.</p>
<p>I can imagine if someone does own that million-dollar house, that they could downsize their job to a lot lower salary, and apply to schools that only take FAFSA and do not consider equity in the primary residence. Who would turn that “free money” down? (especially when that means the family will be “job creators”!)</p>