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bay & skinner:</p>
<p>In your view, what constitutes "middle class" income?
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<p>It depends on where you live and what your family situation is. But I would say that where I live (Bergen County, New Jersey) middle class income for a typical family of 2 parents and 2 or 3 children who are school age is roughly $75k to $175k per annum.</p>
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Im not sure why some college tuition has risen so much-
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<p>Again, I see that as the root of the problem.</p>
<p>Thirty years ago I put myself through 3 years of private law school with a Sallie Mae loan of $18,000 (available to any student) and a job that paid for my rent-controlled room, gas and meager food budget. My parents were middle-class and I didn't qualify for grants. I don't remember it being a pitiful or onerous experience at all.</p>
<p>That school's tuition is now $36,000 per. I don't think its possible for any middle-class kid to put him/herself through it now without a parent's help or $108,000 in loans.</p>
<p>$18,000 30 years ago must be about $50-70 K today.</p>
<p>30 years ago an enginner with M.S. would get about 15 k, today about 70k+</p>
<p>Minimum wage was $1.35/hr</p>
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Again, I see that as the root of the problem.</p>
<p>Thirty years ago I put myself through 3 years of private law school with a Sallie Mae loan of $18,000 (available to any student) and a job that paid for my rent-controlled room, gas and meager food budget. My parents were middle-class and I didn't qualify for grants. I don't remember it being a pitiful or onerous experience at all.</p>
<p>That school's tuition is now $36,000 per. I don't think its possible for any middle-class kid to put him/herself through it now without a parent's help or $108,000 in loans.
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<p>I basically agree with you. In the past, it mattered a lot less if you qualified for financial aid or not. When I went to law school 10 years ago, tuition was a little under $20k per year. In the last 10 years, tuition has more than doubled. You can't tell me that's not a substantial increase in real terms.</p>
<p>thanks skinner -- your definition of "middle" includes individuals in the top 3% of income earners in the nation. It's all those other guys who are rich. :D</p>
<p>btw: According to her earlier posts, the OP was accepted to Cal-Berkeley in-state and was interviewed for a Regents, which means that she would have most likely recieved full tuition discounts from Davis, Santa Barbara and Irvine. OP also recieved merit money at a couple of schools, but applied mostly to need-only schools and was denied need-based aid. IMO, ranting is inappropriate with those kind of choices.</p>
<p>A student who is active in the community, ECs with good grades, test scores and actively pursues scholarships can get enough money to pay for a state school...I know several who have done just that, without any need based aid.</p>
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thanks skinner -- your definition of "middle" includes individuals in the top 3% of income earners in the nation.
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<p>That's may very well be the case. So what? Life is expensive in Bergen County, New Jersey.</p>
<p>So what? Life is expensive in Bergen County, New Jersey.</p>
<p>Apparently- Beverly Hills too I hear.</p>
<p>Looks like the OP turned down Cal, Tufts, Oberlin and Colgate to attend Wesleyan and is pleased with her aid package.</p>
<p>So I am imagining that she got a * really* good offer from Wesleyan, as I know that Colgate also gives a lot of aid.</p>
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Apparently- Beverly Hills too I hear.
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<p>I would guess that Beverly Hills is a lot more exensive.</p>
<p>Better believe it. BH is expensive, but NOT middle-class. NJ is expensive for the middle class!
Folks not living in NJ just have a hard time believing what we in the Garden State have to pay for. As a denizin of Essex County, I pay $13,000 pa in property taxes for a 2500 sq ft house on < 0.25 acre; $2400 pa for car insurance to drive 6 miles to and from work; $11,000 combined in state income tax, and so forth. Utility rates are obscene. Rutgers has the highest state U tuition in the US; UMDNJ has the highest state med school/dental school tuition in the US. Oh yeah, we save a few cents on gas we do not have to pump ourselves, no tax on clothes. Big deal.</p>
<p>"So what? Life is expensive in Bergen County, New Jersey"</p>
<p>So what? cash in your home equity and move out.</p>
<p>Simba, offering us a job? you think it's as easy as that? Really? (to quote Amy Pohler on SNL)</p>
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Simba, offering us a job? you think it's as easy as that? Really? (to quote Amy Pohler on SNL)
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<p>Nice, but here's what's really precious about Simba's little crack. Here's part of an exchange between me and Simba earlier in this thread:</p>
<p>Simba: </p>
<p>I need a car to go to work -----> NEED</p>
<p>I need a Lexus to go to work -----> WANT</p>
<p>Me:</p>
<p>But why do you need a car to go to work? Why not take the bus? . . .</p>
<p>Simba:</p>
<p>There are many cities in this country where that option is not available.</p>
<p>Me:</p>
<p>Why do you need to live in one of those cities? . . .</p>
<p>Simba:</p>
<p>Boy this brings back those good old memories....when my son was pre-school age, he would argue with similar logic.</p>
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<p>No mother I don't think it is easy. This was just for Iskinner, who was advising others to live in homeless shelter.</p>
<p>But, the high equity can also be leveraged. Don't you think?</p>
<p>People with low home price area did not spend money to build up their home equity. They put money in the bank. The liquid assets grew and they have to pay, or in a sense they are rather 'borrowing' from their liquid bank accounts.</p>
<p>People in high home prices put their money in their home instead of bank, and their fixed assets grew. So now they also can 'borrow' against the fixed home account..</p>
<p>In both cases size of the assets shrinks.</p>
<p>I would wager that in NJ, a 2 earner family of 4 making $75K is just barely in the middle class - you'd really be just a step ahead of working class. Same in CT, where we have the second highest taxes in the nation (behind....NJ). </p>
<p>I would like to see tuitions reduced. But I think we also have to acknowledge that in the race of life, not everyone starts at the same point - some people have to come from behind, and I think it is beneficial to give those people a little lift. Or think of it in golf terms - how about we give a handicap to the people who haven't played before?</p>
<p>Iskinner: You left out another part of our exchange.</p>
<p>you missed: "Why do you need to live in one of those cities? Besides, why do you need to go to work at all? Why not just quit your job and live on the street or in a homeless shelter?"</p>
<p>Then my response,</p>
<p>" Boy this brings back those good old memories....when my son was pre-school age, he would argue with similar logic."</p>
<p>I am sure, you leaving out part of the exchange was unintentional. I know it happens when you are cutting and pasting.</p>
<p>Frankly, by the definition of many, middle class means a step ahead of the working poor. It does not mean much. To others it means a step below one who lives in a home worth over a million dollars, or an annual income over 300,000. Different people have different definitions. It is all relative. An income of 50,000 and a roof over one's head is middle class to some, and poor to others. In NYC one might not keep that roof with an income of 50,000 for a family of 4.</p>
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Iskinner: You left out another part of our exchange.</p>
<p>you missed: "Why do you need to live in one of those cities? Besides, why do you need to go to work at all? Why not just quit your job and live on the street or in a homeless shelter?"</p>
<p>Then my response,</p>
<p>" Boy this brings back those good old memories....when my son was pre-school age, he would argue with similar logic."</p>
<p>I am sure, you leaving out part of the exchange was unintentional. I know it happens when you are cutting and pasting.
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<p>No, I used ellipses to show that there were parts I omitted. It was completely intentional, because those parts were irrelevant to the point I was making, which was that for you, living in your chosen area seems to be a "need," but for others, living in their chosen area doesn't seem to be quite so important.</p>
<p>And by the way, I note that you completely misrepresented my position when you claimed that I was advising others to live in homeless shelters.</p>
<p>sorry, NJMom:</p>
<p>Rutgers is a bargain relative to any UC, which all cost more than $20k per year in-state. Cal-Berkeley is ~$25k in-state. Moreover, Rutgers offers merit aid which can approximate a full ride, in contrast to Cal which offers a miserly $1-2k discount to a handful of students.</p>
<p>While your local property taxes might be higher than some states, the total tax take (sales, property and income) for NJ places it #10 nationally, a slight two spots higher than California at #12. (Vermont, Maine & NY are 1-3, respectively.)</p>
<p>Median household income in Bergen County, NJ is $65,241; median family income is about $78,079. Average male earns $51,346; average female earns $37,295. See: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergen_County,_New_Jersey#Demographics%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergen_County,_New_Jersey#Demographics</a></p>
<p>I live in an expensive area too. In the city where I live, the median household income is just under $72K - median family income is around $78K. Males earn slightly less than $51K, females earn about $40K. I'm self employed, income around ~$50K. I guess as a single, head of household that means I'm doing about $10K better than average around here, which is fine with me. I consider myself solidly "middle class" with everything that goes along with the American dream -- I've got my t.v. and DVD player and a computer in every room, what more do I need? I sent each of my kids in turn to go off and live in other, less privileged parts of the world so they could appreciate what we have -- I guarantee our home is palatial compared with my son's host family in rural Thailand.</p>
<p>So I qualify for financial aid, which is nice. Since I'm self employed, my assets, including home equity are counted... I have a feeling that would happen even at Harvard, where I assume they ask for the same noncustodial parent submission as every other Profile school. So I get to pay based on what my ex earns on top of my own earnings, even though he doesn't contribute. As near as I can figure, the colleges add about half of his ~$50K earnings to mine and write up financial aid as if I earned $75K. </p>
<p>Which... guess what? Leaves me with affordable options, with an EFC of about $20K a year, and me planning to borrow about half and pay the other half as I go. </p>
<p>I don't think that people with 6 figure incomes are "middle class" in Bergen County or my town or anywhere else. They are "affluent". Worse than that, they appear to be "affluent" plus unappreciative of their own wealth. I'd like to send them off to rural Thailand for a month, too, to get a sense of how the rest of the world lives. </p>
<p>I understand that the high earners are not rich like Bill Gates -- they don't live in mansions or fly around in private jets. But I still think that they could afford to pay for private college if they wanted to, the same way that I can, by borrowing about half of their EFC's. If it's a choice between paying for college and funding my IRA, I'm going to pay for my kid's college. If I made twice as much money, then it would be easy to borrow twice as much -- its just a question of how much I can pay out each month on the loan. </p>
<p>The issue really isn't that the upper "middle" class can't afford it... it still comes down to the fact that they don't want to pay -- and I do sympathize. I don't think I'd want to spend $50K a year to educate my kids, even if I could afford it - certainly not out of my own pocket. But that's a choice based on a sense that $35K is too much for annual tuition, not because I don't have the ability to get it if I really want it.</p>