Is 35K a Good Salary For a Single Person & Family? (Answered!)

So if you’ve found a job and it pays $35,000 a year, it’s important to pause for a moment and ask yourself, is 35K a good salary?

$35,000 is half the current median household salary in the US. It may be a good salary for a single person living with their parents or sharing a room with friends. But it won’t sustain a family of three or four despite its lower tax bracket.

Living the American dream means something different to different people. For many of us, it comes down to making enough money to support those we love as well as ourselves.

More often than not, the best way to determine whether $35,000 is good enough is to examine the cost of living in your state as well as your spending habits, your current marital status, and your financial goals.

In this guide, we’ll look at the factors that determine whether $35K is a good salary if you live in the United States. Where possible, we’ll give you some examples to help you learn how you can get the most out of this salary.

How Much is $35,000 a Year Per Month After Taxes? 

Your after-tax income is the money you have available to pay your expenses, buy yourself nice items, and save for the future. But how much exactly do you take home per month after taxation from a salary of $35,000 a year?

The first, and perhaps the most important, thing to understand is that tax rates will vary by states. Still, we can calculate how much Federal income tax you’d have to pay.

If you get your salary on a monthly basis, you will earn $2,916 before taxes. You’ll have to pay Federal income tax, Medicare tax, and Social Security tax, and what remains after the deduction is the net pay that you take home.

We’ll assume for the purposes of this example that you have no dependents. Federal income tax would be approximately $296, Social Security tax would be $181, and Medicare tax would be $42.

These figures might be different if you had dependents or pre-tax deductions such as 401K contributions or health insurance.

How Much is $35,000 a Year Biweekly?

If your job pays you, you will receive 26 paychecks every 12 months. The amount you receive is contingent on a number of factors.

Obviously, your tax rate is important, but so are the advantages offered by your company, including compensated vacations.

Your biweekly paychecks would total $1,346 before taxes and pre-tax contributions. You may receive two paychecks in certain months and three paychecks in others.

The same would apply if your company paid you twice every month on the same dates, such as the 15th and 30th of each month.

How Much is $35,000 a Year a Week?

You get 52 checks every year if you work on a weekly payment plan. Your weekly payment would be $673 before taxes and any other contributions. You’d earn four or five paychecks every month depending on the month’s length.

How Much is $35,000 a Year a Day? 

We believe it’s important to know how much you earn per day for the total number of hours that you’re at work.

Of course, a salary of $35,000 per year isn’t a huge as a salary of $100K a year. But it can still make a difference. However, it’s hard to assume that the amount is good enough if you don’t know how much you take home per day.

So, knowing how much you earn when you start working to the time you finish every single day can help you get a clear picture of what exactly you’re getting in exchange for your effort.

To calculate this, you must first determine how many days you work every year. There are 262 working days in a year if you work a normal weekday 9 to 5 job. That equates to around $96 every day.

If you work fewer days but work longer hours per day or work more than five days per week, your earnings will vary, but the typical individual who makes $35,000 a year earns $96 each day.

How Much is $35,000 a Year an Hour?

When looking for work, it’s beneficial to assess the job’s advantages and disadvantages, including the opportunity cost of choosing the position based on its hourly salary.

Why?

It’s because knowing how much you earn per hour is critical, even if you get your salary on a daily, weekly, biweekly, or monthly basis.

If you work in a 9 to 5 job, you will earn $16.83 per hour, regardless of whether you receive paid vacation or not. If you receive paid vacation, it means you get a compensation even if you don’t work. 

If the company you work for provides you with advantages, you may choose to assess their financial value.

For example, health insurance is an expensive perquisite. If your company pays for your insurance in full, this is a benefit to your hourly rate. The same holds true if they provide a 401K match or other financial advantages.

Even if you do not receive payment in cash, you will receive advantages in lieu of money, which may help you decide if the work is a good match.

Is 35K a Good Salary to Live on For a Full Year?

Here are four things you can do to make sure you live well on a salary of $35,000 a year:

1. Live With Your Parents If You’re Single – And If They Allow

Finding a high-paying job takes time, even more so if you’re just out of college. If you can avoid living alone for a while, you can save thousands of dollars by remaining at home with your parents.

If living with your parents is not an option for reasons well known to you, rent an apartment with a roommate. You’ll get your own room and will get a taste of independent living without spending a lot of money in the process.

2. Cut Down Your Monthly Expenses

Reducing monthly expenses might be challenging, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do it.

Take communication cost, for example. You can ask a family member if they can allow you to hop on their family mobile plan, get a pay-as-you-go plan, or opt for prepaid rates that start for as low as $15 per month. 

Another way to reduce monthly costs is to cancel unused subscriptions such as streaming services and gym memberships.

You get the idea!

3. Buy Only What You Need

Monthly essentials should be straightforward to determine and budget for.

Utilize the previous three months’ worth of bank statements to determine how much you spend every month. By doing so, you’ll know where your money goes and why.

We strongly recommend that you spend your money on the items that matter the most. Eliminate the purchases you don’t need from the list and then budget accordingly so that you buy only the items that matter.

Channel your spending to food, utilities, insurance, rent, and personal hygiene products.

Get the sum of the amount of money you spend on essentials and subtract that amount from your monthly income. What you have left is the amount you can spend on leisure, debt repayment, saving, and investing in your future.

4. Discipline Yourself to Save

Remember to maintain an emergency savings account. You don’t want to be in a financial bind when the very worst moments occur.

What Can You Do With $35K a Year?

If you are debt-free and have sound money management skills, you can live the life you choose with a salary of $35,000.

• You can rent a house in a respectable area in your neighborhood
• You should be able to cover your essential costs month to month 

You won’t have a lot of money to spend on luxury purchases as someone who gets a salary of $75,000 a year. But at least you’ll have the ability to save up to $5,000 a year.

Can You Live on $35K a Year Very Well?

It’s no secret that making ends meet on $35,000 a year is difficult. Nonetheless, it is possible, even in light of the current financial instability. You must be deliberate in your spending and saving of each dollar.

Is $35K a Year Middle Class?

Although estimates vary, Pew Research Center states that a middle-class income ranges from $40,500 to $122,000 a year.

However, according to 2017 statistics from the United States Census Bureau, the household middle-class income ranged between around $35,000 and $99,999.

So we might as well consider $35,000 to be middle class.

Final Thoughts: Is 35K a Good Salary?

If you’re wondering whether $35,000 a year is a reasonable pay, look at it from the point of view of the minimum hourly wage that you get from your job.

In the United States, the minimum wage is $7.25 per hour, which means you make more than double the minimum hourly wage if you make $35,000 a year pre-tax and additional deductions.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average American earns $865 per week working full time. This equates to $44,980 per year. If you earn $35,000, you are earning less than the typical American is.

Depending on your financial objectives, you may or may not consider incorporating extra revenue streams.