Here's what my family's spending looked like over the last 12 months:
$8,824 housing
$1,870 food
$2,965 medical
$8,982 personal and transit
$55,306 savings
$52,761 taxes
$130,708 donations
$261,416 total (income)
For most of this year it was me and my wife, with our first child being born 2/3 of the way through. This is with both of us working; let's imagine instead we had two kids, one $100k income, and one of us stayed home with the kids.
To adjust for there being about twice as many people, let's double the first four categories. And because we're talking about a $100k income let's decrease taxes proportionally down to $20k. Now tax rates are graduated so we would really pay less than that, and kids cost less than adults per person in terms of food and housing, but let's be conservative and stick with this. What do we get?
$17,648 housing
$3,740 food
$5,930 medical
$17,964 personal and transit
$21,753 savings
$20,000 taxes
$10,000 donations
$100,000 total (income)
When an $100k income can support four people with enough left over to donate 10% and save 22% then I feel pretty confident calling it "rich".
(This is Boston, which is not quite as expensive as the bay area, but nearly so.)
To adjust for there being about twice as many people, let's double the first four categories. And because we're talking about a $100k income let's decrease taxes proportionally down to $20k. Now tax rates are graduated so we would really pay less than that, and kids cost less than adults per person in terms of food and housing, but let's be conservative and stick with this. What do we get?
When an $100k income can support four people with enough left over to donate 10% and save 22% then I feel pretty confident calling it "rich".(This is Boston, which is not quite as expensive as the bay area, but nearly so.)