Most of that is likely retirement savings. That's 3.5k per year if you have employee match.

I'm guessing car ownership counts for a lot considering how universal it is in the US

It's not $7k per year, because that's not how investing works. Even given that, for young people who don't have a lot of fixed expenses besides student loans it's not hard at all for people with a professional salary to save that much per year.

The US Census Bureau says 49.2% of adults 30-34 are homeowners in the US, so clearly many people are figuring out how to save and invest.

That seems a bit unbelievable to me, mind linking the source? I believe the trend in home ownership at this age is downward, in any case.

Extremely unbelievable figure. I don't even think 49.2% of US adults will ever buy a home.

I had a net worth of over $200k when I was 34 and making like ~$20/hr. Mostly from Bitcoin

Yeah but that's quite lucky. A lot of people lost money on Bitcoin too.

I got pretty lucky with one of the (EdTech) startups I was early employee at giving me shares and it grew from nothing to over 1 million active paid subscriptions. Also, I joined a crypto project which rose to $4 billion valuation (joined at like $300 million valuation) but I was only able to get about $30k out of that in spite of hard hustling and leading one of the most important teams. Literally I put pressure on them to get a raise for 1 year and eventually had to quit to show I was serious.

I self-taught myself coding at 14 and have been working non-stop including nights and weekends and saving everything I could.

My net worth now is only $80k liquid at 36 years old. $130k if you include my illiquid retirement fund. So to me, $70k at 33 on a median income looks incredible. I'm not based in the US though. Maybe it's easier over there.

I found sad, that someone on their early 30, on the pinacle of their capabilities and the pinacle of their "I'll grind until I get <insert capitalism goal here>" and then burnout have "only" $68k to know figure out what to do... in the usa... if you don't have a place to live but you have a car you can still do things, the other way around you can't, 95% of the time you need a car... and if you have a health issue you will start bleeding money really fast... there is no safety net...

And I say only because it's a lot of money, and it's not a lot of money... if you have to pay rent, or mortgage payments, or car payments... car will be reposesed, credit score will go south really fast, and everything is tied to the credit score, so they know how low they can drop the ball and you will still accept because you are in need.

I want you to remember, the american dream... one person working as a mail man can bring food to the table, pay the mortgage while the wife raise the kids and kids go to school, you retire 40 years later with social security giving you enough for the basics...

Then this is for someone with university debt... so this is the case for someone with a title... what's the situation for the other unlucky 95% of america?

The situation is super good, objectively. Much better than most of Western Europe except a few outliers like Switzerland maybe. And infinitely better than Eastern Europe and the even poorer countries. You have no idea how good you have it. Maybe not as good as some fake idealized back in the day, but very good. It's just that reality can't keep up with growing expectations. Okay there was like a brief window after ww2 when the US did exceptionally well because it was shielded from the war by two oceans while the rest of the developed world was in rubbles. But that state of things couldn't last.

"Super good" is overstating the situation. The US trails most of Western Europe in average lifespan. Obviously the US is a great place to be rich (maybe the best place in the world?), but most of us aren't rich.

It's true that being very poor or uneducated is harder in the US. If you're an educated professional, the US is way ahead in terms of opportunity, savings etc. over the rest of the world. Yes, you have college debt, but the salaries are much much higher than places like Germany or France, so even with paying that, you're way ahead. How many people move to the US from Europe and how many vice versa? Sure you find the odd example but it's not a real trend.

US lifespan is lower because young Americans make poor life choices

https://xxcancel.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1641799707583299587

Easy to get the best of both worlds by simply living in the US and not making poor life choices

> Much better than most of Western Europe

I doubt most of Western Europe would agree with you. They seem to feel a lot happier and healthier. They have better social mobility, and less household debt.

The kind of home people seem to want and the kind of level of lifestyle is out of control and never ever was possible anytime anyplace as a default.

I lived in 3 EU countries (The Netherlands, Germany and Malta) .

> They seem to feel a lot happier and healthier.

On average I would agree. I didn't see extreme poverty like I saw in the US and cost of living is a lot better when you consider that quality of everything is higher; especially in terms of food.

> They have better social mobility,

My experience is that this is not the case. Germany had almost no mobility at all. Even startups are structured in such a way that you can barely even see the CEO, let alone talk to them and society is structured to protect incumbents through regulations and bureaucracy.

[delayed]

The median wage for an adult 24-35 who has a college degree is $84k-91k [1] and around 40% of 30 year old have college degrees. If your making 90k you can even save 7k a year in HCOL places like NYC and Boston if you live well below your means. I.e. lots of people would just use that disposable income on traveling/ eating out/ concerts etc but if your a homebody and live with an SO or don't mind commuting and cooking most of your food 90k goes quite far with no kids.

https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2025/median-weekly-earnings-by-...

if you grind... live well below... not below, not without extravagancies... well below..., don't travel, don't eat, no avocado toasts, have two works, no wife, no kids... burn the eff out....

THEN it will go quite far

quite far to teach you you have been played out of your youth and now you are poor

I don’t personally live like this to be clear! Just that it’s quite achievable on a normal non tech/ finance W2 salary.

One of the best aspects of “youth” is your health to be fair which can often be enjoyed cheaply - I.e. gyms/ hiking / healthy food doesn’t require a ton of lifestyle creep.