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>Working in tech, you're likely able to save >50% of your earnings. is this naivety or privilege?

ednevsky 3y ago
This is a perspective from my end, and not meant to be applicable to everyone. There are about 8 bil people in the world, for god's sake! PS: I'm in Europe.
jstx1 3y ago
Which one is "assuming most other people are like me"? That one.
vehemenz 3y ago
My savings rate is about 50%. I think this is accurate for any reasonably-paid job in tech.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
fknorangesite 3y ago
Por qué no los dos?
deleted 3y ago
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opportune 3y ago
I’m sure for part of the privileged bubble the author is in, but it’s super common for 20-something US tech workers to save >50% of take home. Some certainly choose to take on more expenses like living by themselves, choosing luxury housing, having a nice car, spending on nice clothes and vacations. But it’s pretty common for people to live with roommates and otherwise not “ball out” while eschewing most of that - it’s very common for tech college graduates to follow the money mustache/boglehead financial strategy of avoiding lifestyle inflation and living like college students for a while. And if you do that, you could easily have living expenses at 40k/y or less even in an expensive city like SF, Seattle, LA, NYC. And you don’t need an outlier income to save 40k+ per year (including 401k) on 40k of expenses either. The 401k contribution limit is 22.5k. Per smartasset’s calculator, you’d only need an income of about $100k to save $40k on $40k of expenses while living in California, (that’s without employer matching while maxing 401k). And $100k is a totally reasonable figure for new grad tech TC in California.
yamtaddle 3y ago
The average "technology professional" in the US made about $104,566 in 2021. Certainly not bad, but not "save half your money" good, if you have... like, a life, and a family. Maybe if you're single and don't do much, and live in a low COL area. People in the SV/fintech sphere tend to have a really skewed idea of what typical salaries are for people "working in tech". What they really mean is "FAANG(-alike) and fintech", not "tech". They're in the third hump of the trimodal distribution of developer salaries, and may have some inaccurate ideas about the rest of the market, as a result. (BLS gives me a median of ~$97k in 2021, if you're wondering if there's a big difference between the average and the median)
Yizahi 3y ago
He dismissed a need for a car, for a formal education, for keeping friends, for owning a place to live. all on the same page of text. We don't even need to guess about that question :)
- tester756 3y ago
  ehh, to be fair he basically said that cars sucks and I do agree with him, I'd rather do not have car, they're annoying and costly.

This is a perspective from my end, and not meant to be applicable to everyone. There are about 8 bil people in the world, for god's sake! PS: I'm in Europe.

jstx1 3y ago

Which one is "assuming most other people are like me"? That one.

vehemenz 3y ago

My savings rate is about 50%. I think this is accurate for any reasonably-paid job in tech.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

fknorangesite 3y ago

Por qué no los dos?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

opportune 3y ago

I’m sure for part of the privileged bubble the author is in, but it’s super common for 20-something US tech workers to save >50% of take home. Some certainly choose to take on more expenses like living by themselves, choosing luxury housing, having a nice car, spending on nice clothes and vacations. But it’s pretty common for people to live with roommates and otherwise not “ball out” while eschewing most of that - it’s very common for tech college graduates to follow the money mustache/boglehead financial strategy of avoiding lifestyle inflation and living like college students for a while. And if you do that, you could easily have living expenses at 40k/y or less even in an expensive city like SF, Seattle, LA, NYC. And you don’t need an outlier income to save 40k+ per year (including 401k) on 40k of expenses either. The 401k contribution limit is 22.5k. Per smartasset’s calculator, you’d only need an income of about $100k to save $40k on $40k of expenses while living in California, (that’s without employer matching while maxing 401k). And $100k is a totally reasonable figure for new grad tech TC in California.

yamtaddle 3y ago

The average "technology professional" in the US made about $104,566 in 2021. Certainly not bad, but not "save half your money" good, if you have... like, a life, and a family. Maybe if you're single and don't do much, and live in a low COL area. People in the SV/fintech sphere tend to have a really skewed idea of what typical salaries are for people "working in tech". What they really mean is "FAANG(-alike) and fintech", not "tech". They're in the third hump of the trimodal distribution of developer salaries, and may have some inaccurate ideas about the rest of the market, as a result. (BLS gives me a median of ~$97k in 2021, if you're wondering if there's a big difference between the average and the median)

Yizahi 3y ago

He dismissed a need for a car, for a formal education, for keeping friends, for owning a place to live. all on the same page of text. We don't even need to guess about that question :)

tester756 3y ago
ehh, to be fair he basically said that cars sucks and I do agree with him, I'd rather do not have car, they're annoying and costly.