No, it is basically 215K post taxes. Taxes are marginal. 300K couple faces ~28% _effective_ tax rate in California. Even marginal tax rate is far from the 50% y

No, it is basically 215K post taxes. Taxes are marginal. 300K couple faces ~28% _effective_ tax rate in California. Even marginal tax rate is far from the 50% you claim - it is ~36%. They will have to be making 2M or higher in order to be paying 50% effective rate.