Millennials Regret their Student Loan Debt. They Overestimated Starting Salaries.

[ucbalumnus]

@mom2collegekids

44% pay no fed taxes. So a student from such a household is going to think, “well my whole family lives on $50k per year, so I will have plenty of money to put towards loans when I’m earning $50k for just myself. Surprise! A single person earning that much will pay a good bit in taxes.

https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-taxes says the following for $50k income in Texas (no state income or payroll tax):

• Married couple with family of 4: $2,739 federal income tax, $3,825 FICA => **$43,436** after-tax take-home pay
• Single with no dependents: $4,370 federal income tax, $3,825 FICA => **$41,806** after-tax take-home pay

One thing that I have noticed in most threads on these forums is that people’s guesses of income and payroll taxes for hypothetical income situations are often far off the mark.