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What is a good salary?
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Nathaniel_Essex
Forumite 159 posts
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Been of a open topic and I know the answer will change depending on where people live etc. but would be interested to hear what you think is a good salary in general and what do you think is a good salary for you.
I live in London and just from my experience, I think earning £30k is a good salary. Reason being, especially if you work in professional services, if you are getting paid less than that, you could most likely find an exact, similar or less demanding role that would pay you £30k. For me personally, as long as I am clearing £2,000 I am happy (so Around £36k). I have a job that pays more, but would happily swap it for a less demanding role and something I find more fulfilling. The extra salary for me is not worth the headache and stress.
I live in London and just from my experience, I think earning £30k is a good salary. Reason being, especially if you work in professional services, if you are getting paid less than that, you could most likely find an exact, similar or less demanding role that would pay you £30k. For me personally, as long as I am clearing £2,000 I am happy (so Around £36k). I have a job that pays more, but would happily swap it for a less demanding role and something I find more fulfilling. The extra salary for me is not worth the headache and stress.
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Replies
I'm counting my salary as good for my experience, since if I moved to one of the 'big 4' they'd hardly pay me any more. But I need to clear about £3k a month to cover the costs of my family and house. By the time I hit my 40s I want to be making £4k a month.
Didn't you claim to be earning £50k on another thead? That's roughly £3k a month after tax
Anyway - a good salary is one in which you have some money left over to do the stuff you want to do, whilst maintaining a lifestyle that you want.
As a rough guide I've always gone by the theory that if you convert someone's age into thousands of pounds that is a reasonable wage. I'd suggest a good wage is 1.5x someone's age and an excellent wage is 2x someone's age. Above would apply to the London area.
I believe that's currently around £28,000 pa.
Therefore for me to describe a salary as good would mean being noticeably more than that. I would say £40,000 pa then upwards in that case.
....and yep....I'm retired now - but I never managed to earn even average salary. I was always on poor salary. I'd be lucky if I hit £20,000 pa if I were still working:(:mad::(
I often ponder what income level I would be prepared to work for now - bearing in mind I can manage now that I'm a pensioner. Not really quite sure - it varies. I would say it would have to be twice the Living Wage (meaning "The Living Wage" and not NMW misnamed "Living Wage").
I tend to think "good" is an objective word and nothing to do with peoples own individual circumstances - though I clearly needed a rather higher salary as a single person than I would have done if I were married. Didn't have it:( - but, to have the same standard of living as a married person then that was the case.
I would expect noticeably higher salary if I were in London though...
Aren't you in 'professional sales'? For all we know you could be referring to OTE salaries and the likes or be very confident when it comes to salary negotiations, there's some hope.
I have a monotonous job, there are more Chiefs then there are Indians, I don't have to think much, pleasant surroundings, I'm on the leaderboard 4 out of 5 days on a bad week which might say something about the other Indians as much as it say's about me. (That even got put out there at a recent interview I can't say I'd ever recall someone putting it like that in past times but certainly seems more prevailing now)
Only recently I went for another position at 1.5k more turning up at this place in middle of nowhere, in an undesirable barn setting down this one track road (should have realised then it was likely danger money!) working with just one other person in a rather active, take the initiative role.
I consider myself a realistic type of person as much as possible but these two even similar sounding jobs titles were very different.
I still remember when I turned down 23k+ and felt good (that had something to do with London weighting) (and perhaps because ha I simply didn't try it) but as I knew then I didn't like the sound of the target conversion required and seeing what I saw on the employer's wall it sure would have been like going uphill in custard with flippers on!
If you told a 21 year old graduate who is earning £22k that you're on £35k, they may be impressed. But if they're in a flatshare and you're paying for a mortgage and childcare, chances are the graduate has more disposable income than you do! I certainly had to count the pennies less when I was a 24 year old singleton in a house share, compared to now, married and buying a house (my wife can't work full time due to health issues, which may have something to do with that though!).
Broadly, I guess £30k+ (outside of London and the other more expensive parts of the country) counts as a good salary. At that level, if you manage your money well, you should not have any issues.
Objectively I think all you can do is look at the wage ranges, adjust for age and location and put descriptions against percentile ranges. Something like
0-20% - very poor
20-40% - poor
40-60% - average
60-80% - good
80-100% - very good
So here 'good' would kick in once you reach the top 40% of all earners, so probably about £35k
Obviously top 1% is much higher
- I think family income is a better measure when you include the expenses of family life
Now, living 35 miles from London and working locally, I think £28K is very good, but it is a pressured environment, and ten years ago the same job would have been paying £30K.
Of course, now we are mortgage free, the money seems great, but the reality is that our circumstances have changed a lot.