<p>That’s a good one! Just wait a few years and he’ll have a book and a movie too.</p>
<p>There is a movie about him - Dead Man Walking.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>If a single guy can’t live on $150k net of tax, in ANY area, I need to go retake elementary school math.</p>
<p>We’re talking about a family living in D.C., or a similar area, with kids looking to go to college, not some single guy.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Jonathan Edwards: “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Admissions Committee” ?</p>
<p>Coming back to the discussion of the GA HOPE scholarship for a minute, here is the way they calculate it <a href=“http://www.gacollege411.org/images/ga/pdfs/HOPE_Calculation.pdf[/url]”>http://www.gacollege411.org/images/ga/pdfs/HOPE_Calculation.pdf</a> Not all guidance counselors understand the changes and nuances of it. It is important to understand which courses will count and which will not. Go to the Gacollege411 dot org site and read about it from the correct source-- the state. Here is another useful link from the state [GAcollege411</a> Electronic Transcript Exchange Document Library](<a href=“http://www.gsfc.org/main/ga411info/transcript.cfm]GAcollege411”>http://www.gsfc.org/main/ga411info/transcript.cfm) also-- read the “GPA calculation” section here <a href=“http://www.gsfc.org/main/publishing/pdf/2005/transcript_faq.pdf[/url]”>http://www.gsfc.org/main/publishing/pdf/2005/transcript_faq.pdf</a> If a class doesn’t fall in one of these core categories
it won’t be calculated into the HOPE eligible GPA. AP and IB classes will be weighted. Jablalf was right in his/her post a few pages back. Your GC is wrong protagonist. AP stat will count as it will fall in the math section, and AP Euro in the Social Studies section.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Since that’s not in my foreseeable future, that’s irrelevant, isn’t it? And are you saying a family of four can’t live on $150k net of tax? My parents live on that much PRE-TAX, and not only that, in two different countries, and they manage to send me to NYU (AND we pay full tuition) and my sister to a $28k/year private school. AND we just bought a house which we’re spending $100k on remodeling. $12,500 is A LOT of money to live on for thirty days.</p>
<p>And if it’s that hard, I’ll stay single. Problem solved. $300k in any jurisdiction (maybe with the exception of France and Scandinavia) is a lot of money.</p>
<p>^^^
Huh?
If they are paying for college with current earnings: $150K pre-tax yields $100K after tax at best minus NYU full fare @ $52k minus your sister at $28K, leaves 20K/year to live on and pay for a $100K remodel?</p>
<p>Maybe you should retake elementary school math.</p>
<p>futurenyu: your parents didn’t tell you about the large investment income they have. Your scenario is a fairy tale, to coin a phrase, and the fact that you can’t see that as a college student, is troubling.</p>
<p>^^The fact that they managed to save that much money on much less than $150k a year makes me believe that I can do it. I’m just as financially savvy as my parents. And even MORE tech savvy. I looked at my dad’s stock portfolio. It’s significant. But trust me, he doesn’t earn that much in dividends. It’s coming from savings+current income. It’s only recently he started making more money. We used to live on $100k a year. If my parents can run two households and manage to accumulate that much savings, all the while sending me to private school, there’s no reason I can’t do it, running one single household on my own. With more money to play with.</p>
<p>And if I can’t do it, then I shouldn’t be out in public unsupervised with a credit card.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>$100K/year doesn’t go as far as it used to.</p>
<p>Good for you, futurenyu, you may end up to be a financially responsible person if you can stick to your plan, go for it!</p>
<p>Then again, the reality is that sure, you can even live well on 20K/year if you have a multi-million dollar stock portfolio. The premise of “living on $150K/yr” was that you are not dipping into your savings (if you have any), but actually subsisting on your income.</p>
<p>My parents never had a year that they made more than $80K/yr, and now they have a multi-million dollar stock portfolio. Well, how can someone do that? They spent 0 on their kids lower school and college, we shopped at Goodwill stores and they have lived without heat or air conditioning for over 40 years in the same house they bought for $15K, almost 50 years ago. The stock market has greatly increased since they started investing many, many years ago. We never went on vacation, ever, and fixed everything ourselves.</p>
<p>Am I willing to do that to have a larger stock portfolio in my eighties? No way, life is short and I’ve lived in uncomfortable conditions for too many years of my life. I would never do that to my kids, they have the best of private schools and a nicely heated home. Would you live like that? </p>
<p>My point is really, that there are all sorts of circumstances in people’s lives and when you grow up and start paying for a family yourself, you might figure out how expensive things are. You can completely go without and save alot of money during your life. But your investments might go sour, your job might disappear, your health expenses might increase and if you decide to send your kids to an expensive school and live in a nice neighborhood-well, there goes all your money.</p>
<br>
<br>
<p>Yes, it is possible to accumulate wealth on a modest income, or to never accumulate wealth on a large income.
Read The Millionaire Next Door
[The</a> Millionaire Next Door - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Millionaire_Next_Door]The”>The Millionaire Next Door - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>A good complement to TMND is Paul Fussell’s humorous Class, which skewers middle class aspirations toward upper class status.<br>
([Class:</a> a guide through the American status system - Google Books](<a href=“Class: A Guide Through the American Status System - Paul Fussell - Google Books”>Class: A Guide Through the American Status System - Paul Fussell - Google Books))</p>
<p>A sample passage:
</p>
<p>That is an amazing book. I wish I’d read it years ago, before we bought our house and started kids in private school!</p>
<p>What is funny though, is that my parents never paid attention to money. They just lived that way because it made them feel “alive” to suffer and struggle. And they came from dirt poor backgrounds. A couple years ago, they discovered they had been depositing every check that people gave them for many years, into a checking account they didn’t realize they had (obviously they never bothered to balance a checkbook). It had over $40,000 in it. In this case, I would say wealth came about because of lack of desire to spend it, not effort!</p>
<p>Agreed about early and careful savings. Start young and be consistent, and even small savings can grow and grow. Having done that, even with modest salaries we were able to save nicely and afford to send our kids to private school and to good colleges. And we are not struggling while having to live on one income at the present time. I have friends who didn’t start to save for retirement until late in the game, and now they are hurting. One friend got divorced, lost her job and is now having to sell her home (if she can find a buyer) and live off of what is left of her savings. It is really sad. She used to live the high life, and still wants to, but on a spendthrift income. That doesn’t work.</p>
<p>As an aside, still waiting to hear of the OP talked to his GC and got the correct info about how the HOPE scholarship is calculated. While some dont want to believe it, sometimes (maybe more than sometimes) posters here know MORE about this stuff than a HS GC. That is also kinda sad.</p>