NYC's minimum for "middle-class" a six-figure income

[Chica Yeyé 41]

I'm sure every single person who reads the Wall St Journal is rich.

it's the first step to becoming rich

you gonna hang with poor people who can't manage their money and sit around and talk about how much money you have? poor people who have no money sit around and talk about being poor, not what they can to to get more money. i'm telling you read the journal. it's the first step to financial success.

Is that how you personally got rich? Or anyone you know?

I know someone who sat around and read the journal. learned some stuff. hung with the journal readers. learned some more stuff. now worth millions.

I guess you must not read the WJS! It would be a good way to get out of the parent's basement

WOW. A bit uncalled for, me thinkssssss.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Some more interesting graphics from the same study (link in a previous post):

Edited February 9, 2009 by A.J.

[Chica Yeyé 41]

Where is Seattle in those charts???? Why do you hate the NW????

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Another interesting excerpt, on the subject of education:

A PAROCHIAL VIEW

Catholic schools once offered a quality alternative to substandard public schools, but dozens have

been shuttered and those that remain are charging more and have larger class sizes

For many middle class families unsatisfied with the quality of their public schools, the Catholic parochial system long offered an academically strong and reasonably affordable alternative with a welcome focus on discipline and moral values. This was particularly the case for the children of disadvantaged immigrants. At their height in the 1950s and ‘60s, Catholic schools charged a nominal tuition of $100 a year. Through the 1980s, that price climbed to approximately $600 a year for elementary schools, and $3,000 to $4,000 a year for high schools, which for most families was still relatively affordable. Things have changed in a big way since then, however. Tuitions have more than doubled and since 2000 nearly every year brings a fresh wave of school closings.

In just the last decade, the Dioceses of Brooklyn and New York have shuttered over 60 schools in the city (29 in 2005 alone). The church has cited the rapidly rising cost of operating these schools in an era of high insurance rates and state-of-the-art computer labs as a reason for their closings. But, according to experts, just as important are the city’s shifting neighborhood demographics and a subsequent decline in enrollment. In 1970, nearly 400,000 students between kindergarten and 12th grade attended Catholic schools in New York City and seven neighboring counties in New York State. Today that number is down to 160,000, a 60 percent drop in less than 40 years.

More than a few New Yorkers find those numbers alarming. Tim and Anne Reidy, who are siblings from the Riverdale section of the Bronx, both attended Catholic schools growing up and did fundraising work for inner city parochial schools after college. Both feel they got a top-rate education for a reasonable price and, if they stay in New York City, hope to be able to send their kids to a parochial school as well. But, according to Anne, who works for the Diocese of Brooklyn, that dream is fast becoming unrealistic. “The world we grew up in is really over,” she says. “Operating costs have really driven up tuition. When Tim went to Fordham Pratt [a Catholic high school in the Bronx] in the 1990s, the tuition was $5,000 a year; now it’s $12,000. That doesn’t mean it’s a better school. It just means

it’s a more expensive school.”

Part of what’s ailing the Catholic school system, the Reidys say, is the city’s rapidly changing neighborhoods. Tim, who works as an editor for a national Catholic magazine, maintains that the more affluent schools like St. Gabriel’s in Riverdale or St. Luke in Whitestone are going to continue to lose their core of students, which traditionally come from Irish and Italian families, as they move away or get priced out of the neighborhood. If Catholic schools are going to continue to play an important role in New York, Tim says, it will be through poorer inner city schools like Sacred Heart, where he volunteered after college. He observes that more than 50 percent of the students at that school come from families who fall below the poverty line.

Henry Levin, a professor of education at Columbia University who specializes in the economics of private schools, more or less agrees. “The Catholic school system will continue to shrink,” he says, “but newly arrived Hispanic immigrants are definitely a target for growth.” With any luck, maybe these schools will manage to do for them what they did for the immigrants of decades past.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

More graphics, same source:

[Ban Hammer 13,443]

I guess you must not read the WJS! It would be a good way to get out of the parent's basement

apparently you don't read it either, it's the wsj.

[Saddle Bronc 124]

More graphics, same source:

Go Norcross (, Duluth, ...)!

[Heracles 417]

I received a brochure to join a Wine club from WSJ today, does that count?

[Amby 490]

I received a brochure to join a Wine club from WSJ today, does that count?

did you read the brochure?

[Heracles 417]

I received a brochure to join a Wine club from WSJ today, does that count?

did you read the brochure?

Yeah.

Actually it's not a bad deal. $70 for 12 bottles of various wines.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Congrats, you have just taken your first step to becoming a billionaire.

[ginger1981 0]

I guess you must not read the WJS! It would be a good way to get out of the parent's basement

apparently you don't read it either, it's the wsj.

typo, you know what I mean.

So in theory, someone who is 50 and decides to go back to college can move back into their parent's basement/guesthouse?

Btw...what is uncalled for is a snooty attitude...especially when one has yet to do anything of serious merit in life. I called it like I see it...

[Chica Yeyé 41]

I guess you must not read the WJS! It would be a good way to get out of the parent's basement

apparently you don't read it either, it's the wsj.

typo, you know what I mean.

So in theory, someone who is 50 and decides to go back to college can move back into their parent's basement/guesthouse?

Btw...what is uncalled for is a snooty attitude...especially when one has yet to do anything of serious merit in life. I called it like I see it...

But my dear friend - isn't your attitude responding to amber's post also quite snotty? I mean, amber is a 21 year old med student. She living with her parents does not count against her, really. And how do you define merit? I say we let it go like the adults we are. Calling it like I see it, too my friend.

[HAL 9000 96]

Oh come on ladies... wait let me get the mud ring ready at least.

[Ban Hammer 13,443]

I guess you must not read the WJS! It would be a good way to get out of the parent's basement

apparently you don't read it either, it's the wsj.

typo, you know what I mean.

So in theory, someone who is 50 and decides to go back to college can move back into their parent's basement/guesthouse?

Btw...what is uncalled for is a snooty attitude...especially when one has yet to do anything of serious merit in life. I called it like I see it...

i lived with my dad for a month and a half too, prior to moving here to kansas. of course, that was during a move from europe to the usa, but i still don't see a reason to harp on amby about living at home still. not everyone is so quick to move out when they turn 18. apparently her and her mom get along fairly well, so what's the harm in her living at home still?