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In Costly Bay Area, Even Six-Figure Salaries Are Considered 'Low Income' (mercurynews.com)
An anonymous reader shares an article: In the high-priced Bay Area, even some households that bring in six figures a year can now be considered "low income." That's according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which recently released its 2017 income limits -- a threshold that determines who can qualify for affordable and subsidized housing programs such as Section 8 vouchers. San Francisco and San Mateo counties have the highest limits in the Bay Area -- and among the highest such numbers in the country. A family of four with an income of $105,350 per year is considered "low income." A $65,800 annual income is considered "very low" for a family the same size, and $39,500 is "extremely low." The median income for those areas is $115,300. Other Bay Area counties are not far behind. In Alameda and Contra Costa counties, $80,400 for a family of four is considered low income, while in Santa Clara County, $84,750 is the low-income threshold for a family of four.
move
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I'm quite comfortably making it in the Bay in the low six, but I have a unique deal on rent and live out in the burbs. Rents in the city are going for absurd amounts - a two bed apartment in the city rents for almost 4k/mo. Raising a family in the bay area is nearly unaffordable - the huge costs in rent and property trickle through to everything else. Childcare costs are colossal - there are few child care centers in the bay and all are hugely expensive because the people who work in the centers are themselves paying obscene rent.
If I were to buy a home here, I'd probably put about 65% of my take home income towards it each month. I could afford it and pay for all my other expenses, but there'd be nothing left to put into savings, so the only 'saving' I'm doing is building home equity. That's not 'poor' but not normally a financial situation associated with people making six digit salaries.
$100,000/yr = $8333/mo. Lets say your rent is up there at $5500/mo, that still leaves you with $2833/mo to feed yourself, your spouse and your 2 children. The remainder of what you have to spend nearly $34,000 for the year to pay your bills, buy food and buy whatever other crap you need. A helleva lot of people don't even make that much and support a family of 4 on a single income and their salary hasn't yet even covered their housing expenses. The lower amounts they mention, I can agree with, considering current rent prices in SF. But $100,000+ per year? National prices aren't SF prices. Your money goes a helleva lot further on the internet than nearly everyone living outside of places like SF.
Here's an idea. Tell the NIMBYs to go suck a fat one and start building appropriate housing for the demand. Or people could wise up and stop giving a shit about living anywhere near SF.
The actual number is of little consequence most.
In most bay area locales, Section 8 housing is basically unavailable for new applicants. Wait lists are estimated to be greater than 8-10 years or simply closed to new applicants until further notice because of essentially unbounded wait times and basically zero new section 8 housing inventory.
AFAIKT, the increases of these income threshold numbers only serve to keep a small amount of existing people (the vanishingly small fraction of the 17,000 total served by section 8 with reasonable jobs near the limit) from being kicked out of Section 8 housing simply by getting cost of living raises at work and forced to fend on their own...
Basically, section 8 is totally broken in the bay area and is a non-factor in housing. This adjustment doesn't really do anything either way to change this...
For the same reason as the SanFranciscans on high wages are subsidizing Tennessee's shitty economy. Remember - CA is a net contributor to the US economy, it takes out less from the tax pool than it puts in.
California is one of those states that send more money to the Feds then they get back SOOOOO Tennessee dollars aren't going to California to subsidize those California people getting section 8 vouchers other Californians are doing the subsidizing.
you realize Tennessee takes in way more federal money than it pays out, and that California does exactly the opposite right? Like it or not these economic centers are the engine that keeps this country running. The tax dollars they pay go to supporting the people of Tennessee and other states.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
This gentrification map shows the underlying cause to rising prices:
http://www.urbandisplacement.o...
I live in the purple strip between San Jose/Sunnyvale. In the last 5 years, house prices (in that area) have gone up 30-50%. In my own neighborhood, 4 houses were demolished to the ground and completely new homes were built in their place (in the last 12 months). Most of these 'modest' homes sold for 1.5 million+. My guess is they would sell for 200-300k in less-demand-areas.
So in your misguided worldview, people who scrimp and save, research, and invest their earnings wisely should have to pay more taxes and be excluded from government assistance. While someone who earned exactly as much money but blew their income on parties, concerts, eating out, hookers, and blow should have to pay lower taxes and qualify more easily for government aid?
Net worth (wealth) is just the integral of income minus expenses (or if you prefer, income minus expenses is the first derivative of wealth). Income is the correct basis for determining taxation and qualification for government aid. How much wealth you accumulate depends not just on how much income you make, but also how much money you spend. As a result, any form of taxation based on wealth unfairly penalizes people who save their money instead of spending it unnecessarily. OTOH, taxation based on income treats everyone the same regardless of whether they spend their money wisely or foolishly.
Also, since wealth is the integral of income minus expenses, wealth is the accumulation of past income. So any attempt to tax wealth is an attempt to retroactively tax past income. Ex post facto laws are illegal under our Constitution.
If you want to tax rich people more, increase the tax rates on higher income. It's as simple as that.
Because a decent 3 bedroom condo is pushing $1.5M, and a house shouldn't be more than 3x your gross pay.