$40K a year on Remington Post

I've been thinking about the "poofed" post about "good paying jobs" for $40,000 a year.
In the area where the Remington plant will be established. What is considered a typical middle class home and it's price range? Double wide trailer, three bedroom frame house with a crawlspace and a carport? Or four bedroom brick home with basement and two car garage?
Health insurance? Would that be out of your pocket or part of the benefit plan from Remington?
Which tax bracket would $40K be in and what would the take home be after deductions?

Do you have any idea how many variables are involved in those questions? In SE Michigan a fairly average stick built house is about 1500-2500 square ft and most have basements. There are a LOT of McMansions in the subdivisions that are more by far but 2000 sf is a fairly good average. Head out to the countryside and you will see a lot more double wide trailers, some made into fairly nice little homes, sitting on basement foundations, etc, but realize that a double 14x70 is still almost 2K sf.

On the tax side you have numerous filing status options and other variables. Assuming a married filing joint status and no deductions, you would be looking at a 15% bracket (which actually can work out to less than 15% federal tax) BUT keep in mind most taxpayers, but not all, pay FICA taxes so, assuming gross of %40K you would have about $2111 federal, $1364 Michigan, and $3060 FICA for a net of about $33,465. All approximates based on assumptions I made up. You can live on that. I see it every day. BUT, you will eat cheap, there will be no luxuries, and you better hope your employer covers the benefits.
IMHO, Dave H, CPA

(quoted from post at 07:09:30 02/19/14) I've been thinking about the "poofed" post about "good paying jobs" for $40,000 a year.
In the area where the Remington plant will be established. What is considered a typical middle class home and it's price range? Double wide trailer, three bedroom frame house with a crawlspace and a carport? Or four bedroom brick home with basement and two car garage?
Health insurance? Would that be out of your pocket or part of the benefit plan from Remington?
Which tax bracket would $40K be in and what would the take home be after deductions?

Click to expand...

Good paying is relative term and does not include the type of home you like in. Most often a 40/50/20 or any other priced job includes bennies so take home can be considerably less. Lot of folks out there making less than 20K a year working full time. Tax rate is 15%.

Lot of folks out there making less than 20K a year working full time. To them 40K a year is a fantastic paying job.

Rick

In Pa a skilled factory job that pays 40K isn't that good. Maybe in rural pa, but around here any skilled technical guy should be making in the $20/hr +. Throw in some overtime and you are in the high 40's-50k easy.

i understand your question and agree that on its own $40k is not a real great salary, however, huntsville, al. is a quality city to live in and $40k does not match the high tech pay of other jobs within the area. what to be considered is it will be a steady and consistent income based on a 2080 hr. annual basis. in addition will be overtime and benefits. coupled with todays two income family it provides for a secure and long term employment with which to make long term plans for which typically mean homes, vehicles and material possessions that will be targeted for those incomes.

If you do the math on that, it's $40,000/2080 hours= $19.23 an hour. Of course that's probably before taxes. But I'm sure there is some insurance included in that and some other benefits.
I guess if you are working at a McDonald's and make minimum wage and don't have a degree, $19 an hour isn't too bad.
It's all perspective guys.

I see the average male income for Huntsville is 40003 dollars . If the workers at the Remington factory can't make up the extra three bucks then they may be in poverty. But as it stands it looks like 40000 a year in Huntsville and you can make a living.

Yeah - too many variables to answer tax questions.

For example, if you're the only working parent and head of household with a few young kids -

You'd probably still qualify for earned income credit. I forget where that peaks out - I think around 35k if I'm not mistaken.

It trails down on either said of that figure.

So if I'm not mistaken with that number, the government would probably still be giving you our money instead of taking any taxes from you.

And I don't mean that cynically - it's just a fact.

But then you've got state and local taxes to worry about - you're on your own there - no idea at all.

As others have stated there are many variables as far as what goes into a good standard of living. In the greater Rochester, NY area 40,000 dollars would make for a good salary even for a skilled laborer. The last factory job I worked almost ten years ago started pay at 10.50/ hr and maxed out at 13/ hr with overtime being available if you were willing to work in certain parts of the plant. The jobs are nearly gone here that paid 15 to 20 dollars per hour or more. Even when I was in college 30 years ago those jobs although more plentiful were extremely hard to get into never mind not being connected to anybody on the inside of a company.
Homes reflect the ability of the average worker's ability to pay for living space. Decent homes can be bought here for around 70,000 dollars as most jobs fall in the 10 dollar per hour range. If you are willing to commute an hour you can find something good for less. With the exodus of good paying jobs home values here can only head down over time. The only thing decelerating the decline is generous terms by the banks. If a drastic change in lending practices takes place (more drastic than what we saw a few years ago) I would expect a rapid decline in home values.

I didn't read the topic that got poofed, but I suspect there was a difference of opinion on what constituted a good paying job. It boils down to location, location, location!

Around here $40K isn't a lot, but it's not bad either! Unemployment, and under employment are a huge problem here in IL.
Professionals that make 70-80K in other areas are doing well to make 40-50K here. Most of the factory jobs pay 25-30K here. I did some ceramic tile work in the break room and rest rooms in a local factory. The plant manager was quite proud of how well his employees were paid....$14 an hour. Sadly, those are some of the better paying factory jobs around here.
There are only a couple of factories around here that pay their production workers 40K or more. If they were to advertise 100 new jobs at 40K they would get several thousand applications.
There is still a backlog of 1200-1500 SF homes on the market in the $80-120K range. Those prices are still down 25-30% from what they were before the economy tanked.

My in-laws recently sold their house in SC. My FIL was in management for a manufacturing company. $40K for a production job was unheard of in his area. His 1800 sf brick ranch home with a carport (garages are rare in that area), in very good condition but dated sold for 120K. The house was in a fairly exclusive neighborhood.
$40K goes a lot farther in SC than it does in IL.

I have a relative that's a machinist in a factory in OK. He would improve his situation by getting a 40K job.

I have a sister in CA. I wouldn't want to try to live on 40K in that area. It would be very, very tough.

I know someone that makes in the 40K range in TN and they are firmly in the middle income bracket for that area.

Someone mentioned overtime. I wouldn't count on overtime anymore. Many employers are cutting hours. 30-32 hours is the new full time at many places. I expect that trend to continue.

I guess if you are working at a McDonald's and make minimum wage and don't have a degree, $19 an hour isn't too bad.
It's all perspective guys.

Click to expand...

All too often a degree is worth far less than it cost. Lots of college grads can't find work in their field and settle for anything they can find.
Not a lot of demand for a degree if you're a production worker in a factory. Although one local manufacturer requires an associate degree for their entry level (floor sweeper) positions.

Say a married couple, 2 kids with a single 40K gross income, it would not take many deductions or credits above the standards to get to zero federal income tax but SS/Medicare would still cut around 3300 per year, probably most state taxes would be between 300-500 dollars, say they were lucky and only paid 300 per month for health insurance that leaves about $90.00 per day for everything else, they could live modestly well most places in the US on that.

That is why there are TWO wage earners in most families these days. One pays the fixed bills, the otherone affords the family some enjoyment.
Loren, the Acg.

Depends on health insurance. If it included good health insurance wife and I could live very nicely on that. If not, it would be still a go but not as easy. Never made over 11 bucks an hour but that did include insurance. We do live on just a little over half of 40K now and our insurance is over 500 a month. Really tight.

(quoted from post at 09:48:08 02/19/14)

I guess if you are working at a McDonald's and make minimum wage and don't have a degree, $19 an hour isn't too bad.
It's all perspective guys.

Click to expand...

All too often a degree is worth far less than it cost. Lots of college grads can't find work in their field and settle for anything they can find.
Not a lot of demand for a degree if you're a production worker in a factory. Although one local manufacturer requires an associate degree for their entry level (floor sweeper) positions.

Click to expand...

Pops a lot of that has to do with research before picking a major. Many young people have had a dream of what they want to be and ignore the fact that there are far too many people already in that field. We go a kid up here who majored in "the arts" so he could be an actor. 6 years of college. he's stocking shelves at Target. Lot of floor jobs at places like Target and other retail sales places have kids who tried taking the easy way out and did a 2 year degree in business. One cannot talk to someone at the school. Those instructors have to have butts in the seats to keep their jobs. So they lie about opportunities in that filed. So if you go to school and take a course that there are far too many people in now what do you expect? You did not increase your value to the employer. My son's ex girlfriend took a bachelor of art degree and couldn't figure out why she couldn't get more than about 9 bucks an hour. After all mommy and daddy told her a degree was golden, any degree. And when they we teens it was.

Rick

biggest surprise I have gotten lately was from a news broadcast that stated that "middle class" starts at 80,000

It's not how much you make,
it's what you do with what you make.

In the South housing and land is usually cheaper and taxes are a lot less than in the North.I pay about $1200 a year taxes on my house.A friend of mine has a similar size house in New Jersey he pays in the $7000 range.Plus little or no state income tax and they won't be paying Union dues and even if they have a union workers don't have to join.In the South you can garden most of the year to cut food cots and of course we all ride mules so fuel costs are way down(LOL) But hey the South is a terrible place to live so you Yanks just stay put in snow paradise(LOL)

Another thing that affects how much money a person makes is how much it cost to live there. If rent on a 3 bedroom apartment in is 1500 a month in NY and 700 in the south then in effect that 800 dollar a month difference can make 40K a year very livable.

Rick

Pops a lot of that has to do with research before picking a major. Many young people have had a dream of what they want to be and ignore the fact that there are far too many people already in that field. We go a kid up here who majored in "the arts" so he could be an actor. 6 years of college. he's stocking shelves at Target. Lot of floor jobs at places like Target and other retail sales places have kids who tried taking the easy way out and did a 2 year degree in business. One cannot talk to someone at the school. Those instructors have to have butts in the seats to keep their jobs. So they lie about opportunities in that filed. So if you go to school and take a course that there are far too many people in now what do you expect? You did not increase your value to the employer. My son's ex girlfriend took a bachelor of art degree and couldn't figure out why she couldn't get more than about 9 bucks an hour. After all mommy and daddy told her a degree was golden, any degree. And when they we teens it was.

Rick

Click to expand...

I agree about those that pursue a useless degree, but the lousy economy has made it tough for kids that have a useful degree.

Whatcha do if you live down there, is you get yourself on disability. Then you put your wife to work at the factory job. Between her paycheck and health insurance, and your disability check, you can be pretty comfortable. We might even be talking double-wide. You can sleep in late every day of the week, and spend your afternoons posting on the internet about how the country is going to pot because of all the freeloaders.

It used to be a general rule of thumb that a first time home buyer can afford to by a home costing up to a maximum of three times his annual wage. How much home will (3x $40K =) $120,000 buy there?

It will probably still require both parents to have jobs to support a family.

Or you can move to Michigan where even though the population is only twice Alabamas population there are six times as many people enjoying welfare and food stamps, not to mention you don't have to wait in line for a job because there aren't any because the unions committed hari kari on the factories and all the genious workers who blindly followed suit now get extended unemployment and foodstamps, but hey, they did not stoop to sweeping floors for less than 30 bucks an hour!!! Keep voting dimwitocrat for the sake of your grandchildren!!!

(quoted from post at 18:50:04 02/19/14) It used to be a general rule of thumb that a first time home buyer can afford to by a home costing up to a maximum of three times his annual wage. How much home will (3x $40K =) $120,000 buy there?

It will probably still require both parents to have jobs to support a family.

Click to expand...

That again depends on the area. Here 120K will by a an OK home. You can find stick built old homes in our area for less than 50K. Here 40K a year is considered good wages. I know people buying home, families, that are making less than 30K. As another poster said "it's what you do with it".

Rick

This coming from a fellow in a state that had the Welfare auto bailout from taxpayers and the whole city of Detroit is a liability to all US taxpayers.You folks in the rust belt have done nothing but drag the US economy down for the last 20 years while the Southern states have created jobs.

A few years ago so many people fleeing Michigan looking for jobs in the South they even got their own Nickname "Black Taggers" because of their licence plate.

You do not think that Remington is setting up there because of high wages there do you?

How's about this?
College grad first in family to waste 160,000

Uh, you do know about the Onion, don't you?