Exactly. Crazy income spread for middle class in the same area. I'm sorry, but how can an income difference of over $130,000 put both incomes still in the middle class in New Jersey?
In my county, not a big area geographically, it really varies town to town. The median household income in Newark is $33,000, in Essex Fells it’s $175,000. They’re around 10 miles apart. Make a wrong turn and you can go from mansions (not McMansions) worth millions to housing projects. The median home price in Newark is still $560,000 (Essex fells 1.5 million).
Well, there is a difference between median income and middle income. Just in the zip code I live in there is a HUGE difference. The median income is $41,438. But if you make less than $60,050 in our county you are considered low income and qualify for special assistance.
Never thought too much about independent business people. I knew it was tough, and involved risk, but never thought about the challenges small business owners face when they want to retire. My neighbor is still running his business at age 73, because he can't find anyone to buy his business so he can't retire. Not only does he have money tied up in equipment, there is a lot of value in his 30 years reputation for how he runs his business. He has been fighting cancer for 10 years, but if he shut down his business he would lose hundreds of thousands of dollars and put 6 people out of work. And the business still makes a nice amount of money most years. The pandemic it went sideways, and he made the mistake of taking pandemic relief so he didn't have to lay off his employees. But as many of us experienced, the pandemic unemployment benefits were more than we would have earned working. His company, and his workers would have been better off financially if he HAD laid them off.
