$100K isn’t $100K Anymore

The erosion of purchasing power due to ongoing inflation is persistently driving up the cost of living. In December 2022, more than half of the people earning over $100,000 reported living paycheck to paycheck, a 7% increase from the previous year.

For this study, SmartAsset used its paycheck calculator to apply taxes to an annual salary of $100,000. This online tool calculates your take-home pay per paycheck for both salary and hourly jobs after taking into account federal, state, and local taxes. They then adjusted the remaining amount for the local cost of living in 76 of the largest cities in the U.S. using data from the Council for Community and Economic Research. The cost of living considers the price of housing, groceries, utilities, transportation, and miscellaneous goods and services. Cost of living index data is for the third quarter of 2022.

We didn’t need SmartAsset to tell us it’s expensive AF in these streets. Every time we leave the house, it costs $1,000. Rent high, food high, liquor high, everything high!