I'll take your analogy a step further. You can have a room in my apartment 1hr east of Penn Station for $650 if I can trust you. $650 is about a week's pay for

I'll take your analogy a step further. You can have a room in my apartment 1hr east of Penn Station for $650 if I can trust you. $650 is about a week's pay for me, so I make less than $60,000 for sure. But food and transport are things, and so is the occasional medical care or movie. I live pretty frugally and can typically save $1,000 per month. But in this area, inflation and rising cost of living will virtually guarantee it's a meaningless amount 30 years from now.