This guy is a bit out of touch thinking $40,000 salary goes further these days, Im thinking he is probably taking that $40,000 US cash and thinking of how much further it would take you in India or Thailand and not here in the good old US of A.....Does this guy even buy a 1/2 gallon of milk or call up a plumber when his sink is clogged, hmmm, yea I didnt think so, does he know how much it costs to heat a home and how much taxes and maintenance is in a condo built in 1942, yea I don't think so... so here is the break down with a $40,000 salary..... after taxes is about $28,000-$30,000 Net, thats about $550-600 a week, $2200-$2400 a month, a 1 bedroom near me is about $1400 a month, you are now left with $1000, lets assume heat is included in that price, electricity is about $100 a month, add in food at about $200 a month....$800 left over, car, gas, car insurance, phone, a credit card payment, of course you want to stream music and movies and go out at least once a week for a little fun and entertainment...lets take a look $2400 -1400 1 bedroom apartment RENTED.... -100 Electricity -200 1 month of food ($50 a week) thats on the LOW end -150 car ins -100 gas -100 phone -200 credit cards for misc purchases -150 tv/internet/music/movies -200 student loans if you still have them So with that all said you are left with $0 a month, thats of course if you live within your means, these numbers above are based off of what I believe is average, and I'm sure people carry more bills than what I just listed off the top of my head, like gym memberships, vacations, pets, etc.....so how does a $40,000 salary go further these days, this guy has no understanding .... Just to let you know bill gates earns that $28,000-$30,000 net salary in 1 MINUTE The World's Richest Man Says a $40,000 Salary Goes Further These Days By Ros Krasny19 hours ago Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates, the world’s richest person, said the U.S. economy is strong and that it’s “just nonsense” to suggest current tax rates restrain growth by discouraging innovation. The world’s largest economy is struggling to gain momentum, and tepid wage growth continues even as the unemployment rate is at the lowest level since May 2008. Gates, whose net worth is estimated at $86 billion, according to the the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, said a person making $40,000 a year is better off now than someone making an equivalent salary decades ago because inventions like the Internet boost the quality of life. More from Bloomberg.com: Dollar Gains After Loss Streak as Euro Slides With Italy Bonds “It’s not quite as negative a picture as a pure GDP look would give you,” Gates said on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” on Sunday. “It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t worry about middle class incomes, but the comparisons overstate the lack of progress.” Addressing costs that have climbed, such as the price of a college education, Gates, who left Harvard University without graduating to create Microsoft with Paul Allen, said most people should consider a state university with lower tuition. More from Bloomberg.com: Is the Euro Zone Deflation Beast Slain? Gates scoffed at comparisons linking taxes and regulation to slower growth. “The idea that there’s some direct connection, that all these innovators are on strike because tax rates are at 35 percent on corporations, that’s just such nonsense.” Tax Offsets The current nominal level of U.S. corporate taxes is offset by elements such as overseas deferments and accelerated depreciation, Gates said. “Corporate profit as a percent of U.S. GDP, the tax, corporate profit tax, is 2 percent. It used to be 4 percent. That’s at a time where corporate profits are at an all-time high,” he said. More from Bloomberg.com: Israeli Banks' Rally at Risk as Price Chart Defies Bullish View “What’s actually being paid is way less. And the notion that change in that nominal rate will unlock something, you know, overstates how you improve things.” Gates, 59, stepped down as Microsoft’s chief executive officer in 2000 and established, with his wife, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which fights hunger, disease and poverty in the developing world. The foundation had a total endowment of $43 billion at the end of 2014. In 2010, Gates joined billionaires including Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and No. 2 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, and Oracle Corp. CEO Larry Ellison, in signing the “Giving Pledge,” a vow to give away the majority of his fortune to charity.
I think you missed the point. He said that 40k now gets you more than an equivalent salary decades ago, due to technology. He never said 40k is enoungh to live comfortably. Also, if you are paying 1400 a month on a 40k salary.... its time to move somewhere cheaper.
I know that was just a really low ball peanut butter and jelly, pasta and cereal kind of number.... SO lets add in some good eats....an easy $500 a month....now we can have some steak, fish, chicken, a bottle of red and some IPA...there you go, and $500 for that is still on the low end..
If by "decades" ago he means 20 years, I tend to think he is correct. 40K taken back 20 yrs and adjusted for inflation would be about 26K in 1995. I tend to think 40K today is better than 26K in 1995. One quibble is i don't think gates is a great innovator, so i'm not sure he is qualified to weigh in on such matters. He is a master capitalist, not an innovator. There is not much connection between serious "innovation" and wealth IMO - only occasionally do they overlap. Most of the real "innovation" of the technology revolution was created by anonymous engineers who might have made a great living but are not the tycoons.
I disagree. I guess it depends on what you value. Family life and civic engagement, for example, are generally worse than they were decades ago, and the Internet has given us artificial means of interaction such as Facebook that are IMO nowhere nearly as fulfilling as face-to-face interaction. I would say that the Internet has made some things more efficient (especially some areas of business/science/technology), but on the personal end, it's made quality of life worse. I also disagree with (some of) his comments on tax structure. Any disincentive towards starting a company is going to have some effect, and taxes are very much a disincentive, even if not to the point of making all innovators go "on strike". Also, small-to-medium business don't usually get the offshore tax benefits of the really big multinationals, and the small-to-medium companies are disproportionately (but by no means exclusively) the innovators.
When you think about it, what's the point of making the statement in the first place? Hey guys, you can do more with 20k these days then you could back in '95. BFD; you still can't live on it.