Inflation and price gouging are taking a huge toll on Americans, with even many top earners finding themselves tight on cash at the end of the month. Now, a new report says that a full third of Americans who make at least $250,000 annually still find themselves living paycheck to paycheck.
$250,000 is about four times the nation’s median salary and people who make at least that much are known as “high earners,” but a third of the people making that kind of money use almost all of it to pay for household expenses, according to industry publication Pymnts.com and LendingClub Corp. Things are especially tight for high earning millennials, more than half of whom say they’re out of money at the end of every month.
There’s a difference between “struggling financially” and “living paycheck to paycheck.” Only about ten percent of high earners report struggling to make ends meet at the end of the month. The rest of the group that say they live paycheck to paycheck can cover their household expenses, but have little left over. For many of them, soaring housing costs are the primary culprit.
Obviously, high earners are doing significantly better than the average American. Over 61 percent of all Americans say they live paycheck to paycheck — a sharp leap from 52 percent the previous year.
