• @RustyEarthfire
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    1 month ago

    The report describes living comfortably as spending no more than 30% of one’s income on rent.

    This is abusing a crude, outdated rule of thumb that never worked in HCOL areas [1]. Put simply, if your rent goes up by $10K annually and all other costs remain the same, you only need $10K more per year to be just as “comfortable”, not $33.33K.

    Granted, $35.1K is a lot (that would be 100% of minimum wage in Los Angeles). The median rent for a **1BR ** is $2.2K [2], so 26K per year (i.e. still too much).

    In short, minimum wage isn’t enough to afford rent in L.A., but you certainly don’t need to be making $100K.

    1. https://www.earnest.com/blog/rent-and-the-30-percent-rule/
    2. https://www.zillow.com/rental-manager/market-trends/los-angeles-ca/?bedrooms=1