If this was you: you work 40 hours a week at $19/hr, typical take home pay would be $2,700 and all those things add up to $2,370. Basically all those things can be set up on ACH withdrawal, so do that. Your food and gas budget is $330. You probably qualify for food stamps. Next I would sublet your current place and find a two bedroom with a roommate. Electricity and internet are 2-3x what you should be paying, and water is not normally paid by the tenant in an apartment, but I guess it is sometimes.
I understand that this is a made up scenario with made up numbers but they should really use a more realistic list of bills. This doesn't include renters insurance, car payments or maintenance, a cell phone plan. Probably everyone agrees with the observation that it's very hard to afford even a basic quality of life on $19/hr, so you don't need to pretend your electric bill is $250/mo to make the point.
With a cell phone, they may be able to get by using only cell phone data. That would save $280 a month right there, although the cell phone plan might cost $70 or so a month (they are likely already paying that, or at least a good portion of it).
I believe you, I was just basing it off of 40/hr weeks and typical US taxes. It's possible you are withholding too much, or, if your household income is higher, you'd be at a higher tax rate.
I'm not witholding anything. My tax returns usually just about break even. My household is just me. Maybe you in fact, for real don't know what you're talking about.
You are right. I don't know about the particulars of your paycheck. It would be weird if I did. I do, however, know about surviving your salad days. It pays to be able to figure out a budget on any income. Even if you were able to implement some dramatic economic system change, it wouldn't help you this month or this year.
It’s just math. If you plug in 40 hours a week at 19 an hour into a take-home calculator you get about 688 a week after taxes (federal income, Medicare and social security), and you get 2752 a month. I would assume you live in a state with additional paycheck taxes, but you can’t account for every single one of those because they’re all different, and some states don’t have one.
Oh okay, so you're just plugging random things into random places and taking that shit at face value, with no regard to someone who is actually earning this amount of money. Not sure why you feel the need to speak on something you actually don't know anything about.
By the way, there are only 9 states that DON'T have state taxes. I'd be willing to bet my left nut that sales taxes and such are higher in those areas as well.
“You’re just putting the numbers given to you into a calculator and returning what they add up to” yeah dude, that’s how math works.
I’ll crunch them by hand for you right now. Let me know if there’s anywhere you don’t follow
19*40 =760 gross.
On those numbers, you’ll pay $49 in federal income tax, 11 in Medicare, and 47 into social security (rounded). That adds up to $107 in federal taxes.
760 - 107 =653
653*4 =2,612 (I accidentally used biweekly pay for the first number. Hence the slight difference, which I assume the original commenter also made)
Not counting for the 41 states with wildly different taxes, your take home, with 0 additional withholding and no other complicating factors like garnishment, will be 2612 dollars. Obviously it will be different depending on where you live.
If you tell me your state, I can give you that calculation in your specific tax rate, and factor that in.
ps: I’m aware that there are 9 states with no income tax. I live in one. We also don’t have sales tax, so hopefully you aren’t too attached to your left nut.
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u/a_nondescript_user 1d ago
If this was you: you work 40 hours a week at $19/hr, typical take home pay would be $2,700 and all those things add up to $2,370. Basically all those things can be set up on ACH withdrawal, so do that. Your food and gas budget is $330. You probably qualify for food stamps. Next I would sublet your current place and find a two bedroom with a roommate. Electricity and internet are 2-3x what you should be paying, and water is not normally paid by the tenant in an apartment, but I guess it is sometimes.
I understand that this is a made up scenario with made up numbers but they should really use a more realistic list of bills. This doesn't include renters insurance, car payments or maintenance, a cell phone plan. Probably everyone agrees with the observation that it's very hard to afford even a basic quality of life on $19/hr, so you don't need to pretend your electric bill is $250/mo to make the point.