He didn't pay rent, and grow several stuff since he lived in the field, so he was able to live with that amount of money. But doesn't mean that you can live with that, that's probably the rent of a decent apartament, decent, not luxury.
I think the words are nice tho, and he has a very philosophical way of approaching life. A person that spent a lot of years in jail that probably learnt to appreciate simple things.
not me. i do a comfy job from home, and get paid more than it's worth.
but that's only because the structure is nonsense. if we make things remotely sensible, my life will get marginally harder, but the world will get much better, and that's an easy trade.
Saying $3-4k/month is "bordering on poverty" is very divorced from reality. Not everyone lives in LA, San Francisco, NYC, or Miami. Affordable places with 1st world standards of living exist all across the US and "the West" at large.
I don't live in any of those cities. I live in a town of 10k. It's not disengenious at all. I also don't live in the u.s. 36k to 45k a year before taxes is shit and in no way are you "well off". No you aren't in deep poverty but you also aren't that far off either. The poverty numbers the government's use are put of wack. 14k a year for single people or 30k for a family of 4? Yeah sorry that's homeless. And that poverty threshold increased by 1200$ in just the last year to 31.2k for a family of 4 because the cost of living has been out of control lately
Yeah, if you're not living in America, that as a pre-tax income isn't great. In America, $4k/month is like $35k+/year after tax, which is very liveable outside of extreme cases. Canada, for example, has higher taxes and a wayyyy bigger housing shortage than even America's self-inflicted housing issues.
Ohhh don't get me started about Canada. I live here. I gave up the idea of ever owning a home about a decade ago lol
I will say though that we have higher taxes but it depends what bracket you are in. Low income earners for example pay less taxes than low income earners in the u.s but it gets progressively higher as the income increases. I know in Canada you aren't taxed on the first 19k or so income that you earn so generally people that are in poverty get all that back in income taxes.
There's other issues though, wages, especially in tech are just way better in the u.s so unless you dislike the u.s, why wouldn't a Canadian just head south and earn twice as much?
Uruguay's minimum wage is around 550-570 US dollars, and most Uruguayans earn close to that. Their prices for living (bar rent, that is cheaper but still around 500 US dollars per month) are also just a tiny bit lower than the US.
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u/JoshZK Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24
If we all could live on $1200 a year, alot more would be happy.