this post was submitted on 19 May 2026
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me_irl
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I wouldn't say that's anywhere even close to rich.
What do you define as rich?
I'm not sure, but $100k/year isn't even close. That's you can finally afford a humble home money. That should be the standard for just a decent life.
It should be, but it isn’t. As I’ve said in another comment, I know several people who make around $100,000 a year, and they are struggling to make mortgage payments, pay for groceries to feed their families, etc..
$100,000 a year used to be more than enough to sustain a family, but, today? It’s not.
Just using a number is a bad metric since CoL can make such a huge difference.
100k in rural low CoL areas would set you up pretty well.
In SF or NYC, 100k is consider to be “poor”
$100k - now - is considered "poor" in a lot of places :(
I agree with the person responding to you and would just add that "rich" shouldn't be defined as "this is how much everyone should have". Rich is more like "could afford to not work for decades if not forever" or something along those lines.
I don't know. By that definition people who have saved and barely afford retirement are "rich".
I thought it was clear that this loose definition would not include retirement age people.
I don't think you intended it to, but it does. Defining things can be hard.
$100k, damn, in central europe the median income is more like $30k and that's already a juicy salary. CoL does a lot.
A social safety net (like free/cheap healthcare) does a lot too. 100k USD is great until something catastrophic (e.g. cancer, car accident) happens. And don't get me started on unemployment support.
That's going to largely depend on where you're living. With that salary you can do just fine in most places in the US.
Rich don't work for living. Probably have wealth for multiple lifetimes
Rich is when you don’t have to obey laws and you can buy politicians.
I didn't say rich, that's not having to work and living off investments.
I said the "no worries line". If you're making 100k and living paycheck to paycheck, it's not economic pressures that are keeping you down, it's your perceived required lifestyle. Leasing cars is stupid, instead of paying 1k/month for a showy BMW, go buy a civic outright. Living downtown is nice, but can you actually afford it or is it taking 2/3 of your income? That civic lets you move to a lower cost of living area. If I made 100k doing what I do now (landscaping business) I would be perfectly content having everything I need and most things I want.
lots of people choose to work because their investments don't provide enough income to live the life they want to live.
these threads just fail to understand, there is no human contentment. very few people are going to be like, be happy living off 60K from investmetns, living a simple life. The people who have those investments to live off of... want more, WAY more. They want boats, houses, cars, all luxury and all in plural. They want to travel as much as possible as poshly as possible, so on and so on.
I regularly interact with people who are multi-millionaires who could retire at 30/40, but they will tell you how they are poor and struggling and how unfair and cruel their life is that they don't have more. because no matter how many millions they have, they never will feel secure.
In that case, we agree. That largely depends on where in the country you are but 100k would alleviate a lot of your worry for sure.