It was conducted in 2010, so I wonder if anything would change if it was conducted again today. The current tech industry was in its infancy 10 years ago, and a lot of high paying jobs have been created since.
- To ensure that is true for your life time. (at 4% reasonable return, that would mean $1.75MM in savings) assuming you don't want to bite into the principal.
- Then you want to account for inflation. (Add a buffer to the above)
- Then you want to ensure this is on top of your car, house, child costs. (Depending on where you like to live and your car choice, add anywhere between 200k -> 2MM)
- Then you realize this car/ house kinda bumps into the 70k limit - especially if you went for a giant house because reasons.
And so on. So yes, folks can definitely start to feel 'safe' at 70k, but that's nowhere close to the checkout point. Once you figure out a target number based on above, you will realize you need to make so much more than 70k to get to that comfort state.
> Then you want to account for inflation. (Add a buffer to the above)
A buffer?? Assuming 2% inflation, the "buffer" you're adding is just over 100% of the original amount.
Years ago, these studies were going around saying that people are happier when they make more money up to about $70k, at which point more money doesn't make you happier anymore. I'm sure that has to be adjusted for inflation etc by now, but very few devs make less money than they need to live comfortably by most people's standards.