Six-figure income or bust? Forum

[BarelyConcealedRage]

Go hiking. Stop trying to craft your life to your resume; you will burn out in record time doing that.

Better yet, don't go straight through. Take a couple of years (at least) to live in the world, work, pay for your own apartment, etc. Going K-JD means that you not only miss out on some pretty fundamental life experiences before being thrown into extremely high-pressure (and potentially high-paying) jobs, it also makes you far more likely to commit to a career path before knowing it's what you really want.

Just as a counterpoint, my gap year has been abject misery. I could not get a job that pays enough to "go hiking" or "have meaningful life experiences". Almost certain that is what people who either have high paying jobs and shouldn't go to law school anyway, or people with rich parents do.

I will agree it taught me one thing - law school seems to be the only way out. Sales is a nightmare if you didn't focus on it in college. It also taught me to never allow my children to major in the liberal arts. Anything like traveling, Appalachian trail, "living it up" requires money and really quite substantial income which is totally out of my grasp.

The only thing I gained from a gap year was a tiny income I could just barely subsist on. It was anything "fun" or "memorable" like people say gap years are supposed to be.

None of this means the experience won’t benefit you more than simply going straight through K-JD. No one is saying OP has to have the best years of their life before going to school.

Also, I'm really not sure why OP and BCR are both flogging the point that they don't have sufficient assets to spend a year vacationing & traveling the world or "living it up." I fear BCR went into their gap year with very unrealistic plans and expectations. I don't think a single person ITT has suggested that OP - or other 0Ls - ought to take a gap year in order to vacation. The advice is to work for a year, preferably as a BigLaw paralegal or in law-related PI work (as I pointed out in my earlier post ITT). Even my well-off friends who took a gap year spent that year working. They did not spend an entire year jetting around Europe and Asia, though their families would certainly have had the resources to pay for that.

Law school is by no means "the only way out." BCR mentions sales, but it's hardly like the only two fields in the world are law and sales. (In fact, lawyers typically need to be great at sales in order to land work...) Going to law school out of desperation is often a very, very bad life choice. Although, in fairness, majoring in the liberal arts at a non-elite college is also often a very bad life choice (i.e., a HYP English major will do just fine, but not so much an English major at an unranked state college).

You know what js a terrible life decision? Having children you can't afford or care for. I've long concluded I will hate every day of job and live in total professional misery, because the only alternative is living in total professional misery AND being broke.

If I can't make six figure by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet. I mean that with 100% seriousness. If I do not make 100k by 30, I will no longer be of this world. That's preferable to being a suffering prole the rest of my life. I am already losing so my youth, I better at least make money.

[nixy]

You know what js a terrible life decision? Having children you can't afford or care for. I've long concluded I will hate every day of job and live in total professional misery, because the only alternative is living in total professional misery AND being broke.

If I can't make six figure by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet. I mean that with 100% seriousness. If I do not make 100k by 30, I will no longer be of this world. That's preferable to being a suffering prole the rest of my life. I am already losing so my youth, I better at least make money.

Okay, this took a weird turn. No one suggested having kids you can't afford/care for. You can also afford/care for kids on less than $100k. Also picking an arbitrary amount of money as the key to your happiness is disturbing (which isn't to say that money doesn't matter; of course it matters, but "If I can't make six figures by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet" is a seriously disturbing statement).

[cavalier1138]

If I can't make six figure by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet. I mean that with 100% seriousness. If I do not make 100k by 30, I will no longer be of this world. That's preferable to being a suffering prole the rest of my life. I am already losing so my youth, I better at least make money.

Please find a therapist. Social workers are available for low-income patients. Literally everything about your post is a giant, screaming red flag about mental health, and law school is not likely to have a good effect on that.

[QContinuum]

You know what js a terrible life decision? Having children you can't afford or care for. I've long concluded I will hate every day of job and live in total professional misery, because the only alternative is living in total professional misery AND being broke.

If I can't make six figure by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet. I mean that with 100% seriousness. If I do not make 100k by 30, I will no longer be of this world. That's preferable to being a suffering prole the rest of my life. I am already losing so my youth, I better at least make money.

Okay, this took a weird turn. No one suggested having kids you can't afford/care for. You can also afford/care for kids on less than $100k. Also picking an arbitrary amount of money as the key to your happiness is disturbing (which isn't to say that money doesn't matter; of course it matters, but "If I can't make six figures by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet" is a seriously disturbing statement).

A $90k income would put you in the top 10% of all U.S. salary earners. BCR's post suggests that over 90% of the U.S. population cannot afford or care for children and are living an awful, wasted life. We know the first half of the suggestion is objectively false, based on the proportion of the population raising children who aren't on welfare. The second half - that 90+% of the U.S. population are "broke" and would be better off if they were "no longer ... of this world" - is extremely toxic and disturbing, and not remotely reasonable.

BCR, please seek professional mental health care on an emergency basis. Classes can wait. Finals can wait. You need to do this for yourself.

[BarelyConcealedRage]

Let's count the number of things you can never, ever enjoy if you make South if six figures:

- Travel

- Owning a home

- Having a car newer than 5 years

- Having children and allowing them to have a future

- An emergency medical condition

- Vacation, really of any sort


Must I remind you thst we live in the United States? Your value as a human, as a citizen, and as a person is 100% dependent on your net worth and your net worth alone. Nothing in our culture even remotely believes that a persons value is - in any capacity - seperate from money. Simply surviving often takes making north of at an absolute minimum 40k.

I life without money isn't a life worth living, especially when you are reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures while you have to look your mother in the eyes and say: I'm sorry, you are on your own and she goes to live in her 20 year old beater.

I feel like very few, if any, people on the sub know what that life is like. And those that do seem gifted enough they can rely grit and natural intelligence to at least provide a comfortable enough life thst their kids can do something. But for a poor, non URM individual with really average intelligence, you can only make so many mistakes before the gates if social mobility are shut to you - forever.

[Bingo_Bongo]

Let's count the number of things you can never, ever enjoy if you make South if six figures:

- Travel

- Owning a home

- Having a car newer than 5 years

- Having children and allowing them to have a future

- An emergency medical condition

- Vacation, really of any sort


Must I remind you thst we live in the United States? Your value as a human, as a citizen, and as a person is 100% dependent on your net worth and your net worth alone. Nothing in our culture even remotely believes that a persons value is - in any capacity - seperate from money. Simply surviving often takes making north of at an absolute minimum 40k.

I life without money isn't a life worth living, especially when you are reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures while you have to look your mother in the eyes and say: I'm sorry, you are on your own and she goes to live in her 20 year old beater.

I feel like very few, if any, people on the sub know what that life is like. And those that do seem gifted enough they can rely grit and natural intelligence to at least provide a comfortable enough life thst their kids can do something. But for a poor, non URM individual with really average intelligence, you can only make so many mistakes before the gates if social mobility are shut to you - forever.

I don't care who you are, or what you do, you can make six figures. Just give it time. Not everything's going to happen right away.

I started out making a poverty-level salary right after I passed the bar (well south of six figures). Then I moved into a slightly better firm that made more money. Then that firm sent me to a TAP program at a DA's Office to get trial experience, and I fell in love with being a prosecutor working 40 hours a week and getting weekends completely off, so I ditched the firm for a full-time Deputy DA position. Then I got hired at a city attorney's office where I'm now at making well into the six figures working less than 40 hours a week. I'm a little over ten years out from graduating middle of my class a third-tier school.

My point is, just give it time. Keep at it and you'll eventually end up in a really good place. Pretty much everyone I graduated with (at this point) is employed with a respectable job making well over $100k, they own houses, have families, and have jobs that have decent work-life balance. And we all graduated from a third-tier school that frequently gets laughed at on here. Point is, wherever you end up right out of law school (or at 30) certainly isn't where you'll be in a decade.

And a lot of really important people who did a lot of good in this world were complete nobodies at age 30. Keep that in mind.

[cavalier1138]

Let's count the number of things you can never, ever enjoy if you make South if six figures:

- Travel

- Owning a home

- Having a car newer than 5 years

- Having children and allowing them to have a future

- An emergency medical condition

- Vacation, really of any sort


Must I remind you thst we live in the United States? Your value as a human, as a citizen, and as a person is 100% dependent on your net worth and your net worth alone. Nothing in our culture even remotely believes that a persons value is - in any capacity - seperate from money. Simply surviving often takes making north of at an absolute minimum 40k.

I life without money isn't a life worth living, especially when you are reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures while you have to look your mother in the eyes and say: I'm sorry, you are on your own and she goes to live in her 20 year old beater.

I feel like very few, if any, people on the sub know what that life is like. And those that do seem gifted enough they can rely grit and natural intelligence to at least provide a comfortable enough life thst their kids can do something. But for a poor, non URM individual with really average intelligence, you can only make so many mistakes before the gates if social mobility are shut to you - forever.

Again, please get yourself to a counselor. None of that is remotely true.

[nixy]

Let's count the number of things you can never, ever enjoy if you make South if six figures:

- Travel

- Owning a home

- Having a car newer than 5 years

- Having children and allowing them to have a future

- An emergency medical condition

- Vacation, really of any sort


Must I remind you thst we live in the United States? Your value as a human, as a citizen, and as a person is 100% dependent on your net worth and your net worth alone. Nothing in our culture even remotely believes that a persons value is - in any capacity - seperate from money. Simply surviving often takes making north of at an absolute minimum 40k.

I life without money isn't a life worth living, especially when you are reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures while you have to look your mother in the eyes and say: I'm sorry, you are on your own and she goes to live in her 20 year old beater.

I feel like very few, if any, people on the sub know what that life is like. And those that do seem gifted enough they can rely grit and natural intelligence to at least provide a comfortable enough life thst their kids can do something. But for a poor, non URM individual with really average intelligence, you can only make so many mistakes before the gates if social mobility are shut to you - forever.

Look, it’s obviously true that money is important/lack of it is a huge problem. But many many many people accomplish the things you list above making well under 6 figures. (I have never made over 6 figures and do all of those things comfortably except the kids part, by choice.) And the medical condition issue doesn’t have anything to do with income in this country, but with insurance, which is more about employment rather than literal income. (Even the 6-figure plus people would be bankrupted if they actually had to pay for all treatment for any serious medical condition.)

I can’t pretend to know you or what you’ve gone through that leads you to believe the above (I know from some of your other posts it’s not good), but the attitude in your post is misery of your own making and it can actually be changed, which would make your life much happier, I imagine.

[Npret]

I know this thread is derailed. But I want to add, if you want a guaranteed 6 figure income, law is not the correct profession.

Maybe explore other options?

[QContinuum]

Let's count the number of things you can never, ever enjoy if you make South if six figures:

- Travel

- Owning a home

- Having a car newer than 5 years

- Having children and allowing them to have a future

- An emergency medical condition

- Vacation, really of any sort


Must I remind you thst we live in the United States? Your value as a human, as a citizen, and as a person is 100% dependent on your net worth and your net worth alone. Nothing in our culture even remotely believes that a persons value is - in any capacity - seperate from money. Simply surviving often takes making north of at an absolute minimum 40k.

I life without money isn't a life worth living, especially when you are reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures while you have to look your mother in the eyes and say: I'm sorry, you are on your own and she goes to live in her 20 year old beater.

Look, it’s obviously true that money is important/lack of it is a huge problem. But many many many people accomplish the things you list above making well under 6 figures. (I have never made over 6 figures and do all of those things comfortably except the kids part, by choice.) And the medical condition issue doesn’t have anything to do with income in this country, but with insurance, which is more about employment rather than literal income. (Even the 6-figure plus people would be bankrupted if they actually had to pay for all treatment for any serious medical condition.)

I can’t pretend to know you or what you’ve gone through that leads you to believe the above (I know from some of your other posts it’s not good), but the attitude in your post is misery of your own making and it can actually be changed, which would make your life much happier, I imagine.

Agree with all of the above. It's simply not objectively true by any stretch that a $100k salary is required to own a home, travel, vacation, drive a new car, have kids, have adequate health insurance, or otherwise do any of the things commonly associated with a comfortable middle-class life.

To the extent that BCR feels bad because s/he is "reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people [who] get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures," I suggest they stop reading about the jet-setting lifestyles enjoyed by Hollywood A-listers. 99.999% of Americans don't live like that and living like that is neither necessary nor sufficient for a happy, healthy life (lots of A-listers with high-flying lifestyles are clearly miserable and flit in and out of rehab and counseling). Also, living in "unbelievable luxury" would require far more than a six-figure salary. I don't even think a 7-figure salary would cut it. I'd say an 8-figure salary, and probably considerably more than $10m, if you want to fly around in a private jet, maintain an entire staff of household attendants, and rent out entire islands when you vacation.

To the extent that BCR isn't able to afford gifting their mother a new car, the vast majority of young adults wouldn't be able to do that and I don't think there's anything wrong with it. It's unreasonable to expect a twenty-something, fresh out of school, to not only be able to support themselves but also have $15k+ lying around to buy their parents a new car. If the parents didn't budget well for retirement, that's the parents' fault, not their children's.

What the six-figure salary allows that a five-figure salary doesn't is maybe a house in an expensive neighborhood. Maybe sending the kids to private school instead of public school. Maybe skiing in the Alps instead of the Rockies. Maybe a $40k car instead of a $20k model. But none of those items are necessary (or sufficient, for that matter) for a very comfortable, very happy, very fulfilling middle-class family life.

[AJordan]

Second the advice to go talk to a counselor/therapist, OP.

[nicole1994]

I didn't get into cornell for free for undergrad because I wanted to go town ivy league..I didnt even know what ivy league was until I got in .rather ..I simply wanted to be the best student possible

I think the day we let money define our value as opposed to being the best at anything or the nest version possible is the day you say that money is greater than anything you could ever become or amount to ....

[LSATWiz.com]

Let's count the number of things you can never, ever enjoy if you make South if six figures:

- Travel

- Owning a home

- Having a car newer than 5 years

- Having children and allowing them to have a future

- An emergency medical condition

- Vacation, really of any sort


Must I remind you thst we live in the United States? Your value as a human, as a citizen, and as a person is 100% dependent on your net worth and your net worth alone. Nothing in our culture even remotely believes that a persons value is - in any capacity - seperate from money. Simply surviving often takes making north of at an absolute minimum 40k.

I life without money isn't a life worth living, especially when you are reminded every second of every hour of every day of every year all the people get to enjoy unbelievable luxuries and pleasures while you have to look your mother in the eyes and say: I'm sorry, you are on your own and she goes to live in her 20 year old beater.

I feel like very few, if any, people on the sub know what that life is like. And those that do seem gifted enough they can rely grit and natural intelligence to at least provide a comfortable enough life thst their kids can do something. But for a poor, non URM individual with really average intelligence, you can only make so many mistakes before the gates if social mobility are shut to you - forever.

It’s flatly wrong to say Americans measure value based solely on net worth. There is also physical attractiveness.

I’m kidding, but OP, I can relate to everything you said re: facing poverty, struggling, etc. If you let the stress break you, you won’t hit your goals. If you are smart and normal and badly want money, it isn’t hard to make six figures in law.

If you come across as a crazy motherfucker who would “eat a bullet” over money, nobody will give you a six-figure job because they won’t trust you.

[Ohiobumpkin]

You should seek mental health counseling. I hope you find help and realize that there is more to life than making money. There is literally no reason to end your own life because you make less than a certain amount of money.

[objctnyrhnr]

There’s a significant biglaw right out of LS or bust mantra and I just don’t think it’s true.

OP, echoing what another poster said, if you hustle and network and are just a smart-ish hardworking guy working at law firms with maybe a niche type practice (think bankruptcy or l and e lit for examples) you can improve your income substantially within several years by trading up every 1-2 years for the first handful of years out of school.

As long as you don’t try to go solo, it can definitely be done. Not saying it’s impossible as a solo, but once you do that, it’s tough to be anything else for the rest of your career.

[Johnnybgoode92]

Go hiking. Stop trying to craft your life to your resume; you will burn out in record time doing that.

Better yet, don't go straight through. Take a couple of years (at least) to live in the world, work, pay for your own apartment, etc. Going K-JD means that you not only miss out on some pretty fundamental life experiences before being thrown into extremely high-pressure (and potentially high-paying) jobs, it also makes you far more likely to commit to a career path before knowing it's what you really want.

Just as a counterpoint, my gap year has been abject misery. I could not get a job that pays enough to "go hiking" or "have meaningful life experiences". Almost certain that is what people who either have high paying jobs and shouldn't go to law school anyway, or people with rich parents do.

I will agree it taught me one thing - law school seems to be the only way out. Sales is a nightmare if you didn't focus on it in college. It also taught me to never allow my children to major in the liberal arts. Anything like traveling, Appalachian trail, "living it up" requires money and really quite substantial income which is totally out of my grasp.

The only thing I gained from a gap year was a tiny income I could just barely subsist on. It was anything "fun" or "memorable" like people say gap years are supposed to be.

None of this means the experience won’t benefit you more than simply going straight through K-JD. No one is saying OP has to have the best years of their life before going to school.

Also, I'm really not sure why OP and BCR are both flogging the point that they don't have sufficient assets to spend a year vacationing & traveling the world or "living it up." I fear BCR went into their gap year with very unrealistic plans and expectations. I don't think a single person ITT has suggested that OP - or other 0Ls - ought to take a gap year in order to vacation. The advice is to work for a year, preferably as a BigLaw paralegal or in law-related PI work (as I pointed out in my earlier post ITT). Even my well-off friends who took a gap year spent that year working. They did not spend an entire year jetting around Europe and Asia, though their families would certainly have had the resources to pay for that.

Law school is by no means "the only way out." BCR mentions sales, but it's hardly like the only two fields in the world are law and sales. (In fact, lawyers typically need to be great at sales in order to land work...) Going to law school out of desperation is often a very, very bad life choice. Although, in fairness, majoring in the liberal arts at a non-elite college is also often a very bad life choice (i.e., a HYP English major will do just fine, but not so much an English major at an unranked state college).

You know what js a terrible life decision? Having children you can't afford or care for. I've long concluded I will hate every day of job and live in total professional misery, because the only alternative is living in total professional misery AND being broke.

If I can't make six figure by age 30, I'll simply eat a bullet. I mean that with 100% seriousness. If I do not make 100k by 30, I will no longer be of this world. That's preferable to being a suffering prole the rest of my life. I am already losing so my youth, I better at least make money.

Please understand y people are alarmed at stuff like this. And please understand most people get by on way less money and are ok w that.

[LSATWiz.com]

I'll just add that if you're smart enough to break a 170, you're smart enough to find a way to make a six-figure income that doesn't require do or die ultimatums. As someone that works around salespeople, your personality seems way too intense to succeed at sales.

[QContinuum]

I'll just add that if you're smart enough to break a 170, you're smart enough to find a way to make a six-figure income that doesn't require do or die ultimatums. As someone that works around salespeople, your personality seems way too intense to succeed at sales.

I mean, BCR gets that. They acknowledge that they aren't cut out for sales. They then conclude that law's their only remaining option. As I pointed out earlier ITT, there are many, many lines of work besides sales and lawyering. (I also pointed out that in many cases, being a successful lawyer requires having many of the same skills required to be a successful salesperson.)

[LSATWiz.com]

I'll just add that if you're smart enough to break a 170, you're smart enough to find a way to make a six-figure income that doesn't require do or die ultimatums. As someone that works around salespeople, your personality seems way too intense to succeed at sales.

I mean, BCR gets that. They acknowledge that they aren't cut out for sales. They then conclude that law's their only remaining option. As I pointed out earlier ITT, there are many, many lines of work besides sales and lawyering. (I also pointed out that in many cases, being a successful lawyer requires having many of the same skills required to be a successful salesperson.)

True, but the extent to which its relevant probably depends on what kind of people OP is selling to. My observation was many of the rainmakers wouldn't be that successful selling home or auto insurance but would do great at raising capital for a business, but there's definitely still a correlation. We also don't know how OP defines not being good at selling. If they're comparing themselves to really successful salespeople, they may be well above average.

I think the appeal of law is it can be a viable way of going from struggling to making six-figures if you follow each step. They already completed the LSAT step, and I'd imagine that do or die aspect will make it unlikely OP coasts as a 1L. The greatest risk is burnout/coming across in person as they do here in which case OP is at risk of having excellent grades and striking out. I don't think that OP is necessarily serious about the six-figure salary or kill-self mantra, but really just wants to earn a decent wage and is using six-figures as a proxy. I think the more concerning thing is the belief that owning a home and taking vacations will magically make OP happy. It's possible he achieves both and is not happy, and then becomes deeply depressed when happiness seems unobtainable. On the other hand, I think knowing your loved ones are provided for can be enough to feel a relief tantamount to happiness even if one dislikes their work.

[BarelyConcealedRage]

It is important to note here that the skills I am learning in "sales" are quite a bit less useful than law then people here seem to think. At my job, I am encouraged to be misleading, to play fast and loose with legal regulations and to go directly against them sometimes even.

All for a paltry sum of 35k. This country is a nightmare where it is impossible to live a decent life unless you are 1) Albert einstein, 2) extremely lucky or 3) born wealthy.

I don't think vacation time or buying a home will make me happy. What I do know is being in an overpriced, squalid home that damaged my health taught me the value of a decent house. Vacations won't make me happy - but spending every hour at a job I will almost certaibly hate will absolutely make me unhappy.

And my 20 year old beater comment was not about purchasing a brand new car for my parents - that is completely unthinkable and outside the possibility of normal human achievement. That is a relation to the fact that she has to live in that 20 year old beater.

Tell me, without money, how do you do anythng in life but lice in your squalid apartment and watch TV all day? How do go and eat out? How do you retire? How do you travel? How do you do anything in life that makes it worth living? How are you any fundamentally different from the countless peasent ancestors whose lives are determined by their rich local Lord? There is nothing that differentiates you other than you are now less likely to die. Even the 40 hour work week is bypassed if you dont make enough money.

I feel 99% if the people who tell me otherwise had substantial assistance from their parents and do not know what i am talking about because such horror stories are alien to them.

[Johnnybgoode92]

It is important to note here that the skills I am learning in "sales" are quite a bit less useful than law then people here seem to think. At my job, I am encouraged to be misleading, to play fast and loose with legal regulations and to go directly against them sometimes even.

All for a paltry sum of 35k. This country is a nightmare where it is impossible to live a decent life unless you are 1) Albert einstein, 2) extremely lucky or 3) born wealthy.

I don't think vacation time or buying a home will make me happy. What I do know is being in an overpriced, squalid home that damaged my health taught me the value of a decent house. Vacations won't make me happy - but spending every hour at a job I will almost certaibly hate will absolutely make me unhappy.

And my 20 year old beater comment was not about purchasing a brand new car for my parents - that is completely unthinkable and outside the possibility of normal human achievement. That is a relation to the fact that she has to live in that 20 year old beater.

Tell me, without money, how do you do anythng in life but lice in your squalid apartment and watch TV all day? How do go and eat out? How do you retire? How do you travel? How do you do anything in life that makes it worth living? How are you any fundamentally different from the countless peasent ancestors whose lives are determined by their rich local Lord? There is nothing that differentiates you other than you are now less likely to die. Even the 40 hour work week is bypassed if you dont make enough money.

I feel 99% if the people who tell me otherwise had substantial assistance from their parents and do not know what i am talking about because such horror stories are alien to them.

That's unfair. You don't know me or anyone else in here or what we've been through. Everyone has problems. Don't lash out at us.

[cavalier1138]

I feel 99% if the people who tell me otherwise had substantial assistance from their parents and do not know what i am talking about because such horror stories are alien to them.

I lived on significantly less than your salary for years. Your attitude is not normal; you need to get professional help. I will keep repeating that until it sinks in.

[BarelyConcealedRage]

I feel 99% if the people who tell me otherwise had substantial assistance from their parents and do not know what i am talking about because such horror stories are alien to them.

I lived on significantly less than your salary for years. Your attitude is not normal; you need to get professional help. I will keep repeating that until it sinks in.

When was this? And do you make that now?

How financially secure are your parents and how much did they subsidize your lifestyle? Do you have to worry about their homelessness?

I am not saying it is a starvation salary but it is definitely impossible to build a life to be certain.

I don't mean any of what I say as an insult but it is a matter of fact and relevent to my decision making.

[nixy]

It is important to note here that the skills I am learning in "sales" are quite a bit less useful than law then people here seem to think. At my job, I am encouraged to be misleading, to play fast and loose with legal regulations and to go directly against them sometimes even.

All for a paltry sum of 35k. This country is a nightmare where it is impossible to live a decent life unless you are 1) Albert einstein, 2) extremely lucky or 3) born wealthy.

I don't think vacation time or buying a home will make me happy. What I do know is being in an overpriced, squalid home that damaged my health taught me the value of a decent house. Vacations won't make me happy - but spending every hour at a job I will almost certaibly hate will absolutely make me unhappy.

And my 20 year old beater comment was not about purchasing a brand new car for my parents - that is completely unthinkable and outside the possibility of normal human achievement. That is a relation to the fact that she has to live in that 20 year old beater.

Tell me, without money, how do you do anythng in life but lice in your squalid apartment and watch TV all day? How do go and eat out? How do you retire? How do you travel? How do you do anything in life that makes it worth living? How are you any fundamentally different from the countless peasent ancestors whose lives are determined by their rich local Lord? There is nothing that differentiates you other than you are now less likely to die. Even the 40 hour work week is bypassed if you dont make enough money.

I feel 99% if the people who tell me otherwise had substantial assistance from their parents and do not know what i am talking about because such horror stories are alien to them.

Sure, money is important, the US overvalues income and material goods, and not having enough money is terrible. No one is debating those things. They’re debating your focus on an arbitrary number. It’s more than possible to live comfortably and do the things you describe for less than $100k. There are lots of cheap restaurants. There are inexpensive vacations. You may not eat out every day/week or vacation every month, but you can do those things. Also starting at $35k out of college does not mean you’ll die making $35k. You need to think a little longer term.

Also I’m sorry about your parents’ situation. But you’re also talking in absolutes as if their situation means it’s true that no one can live happily on less than $100k. If your personal situation is such that you have unusual financial burdens, that’s not an indictment on the rest of US society. (That’s also not me assuming everyone else has parental support, just that not all people are trying to support two full grown adults right out of school. And really you shouldn’t have to.)

[cavalier1138]

I feel 99% if the people who tell me otherwise had substantial assistance from their parents and do not know what i am talking about because such horror stories are alien to them.

I lived on significantly less than your salary for years. Your attitude is not normal; you need to get professional help. I will keep repeating that until it sinks in.

When was this? And do you make that now?

How financially secure are your parents and how much did they subsidize your lifestyle? Do you have to worry about their homelessness?

I am not saying it is a starvation salary but it is definitely impossible to build a life to be certain.

I don't mean any of what I say as an insult but it is a matter of fact and relevent to my decision making.

It was for a period of years after I graduated undergrad but before I applied to law school. I'm finishing up school this year, so practically speaking, I'm losing money through August. I did not have to worry about my parents, but they did not subsidize my "lifestyle," which mainly consisted of making rent and food money. There's absolutely no point in you knowing this information, but you seem to have deluded yourself into thinking that everyone telling you that this isn't a normal outlook is doing so because they live in the lap of luxury.

The vast majority of people in this country make less than six figures. They own homes, have children, take trips, and live relatively comfortable lives. There is something between abject poverty and making the kind of insane money that lawyers at big firms make.

Get into counseling.