How much $$$$$$ do you make?

[highdesert]

Let's put it this way ...

We don't make anywhere near enough to justify the dive trips we take. We're landlocked, and diving for us is an expensive proposition to another part of the world. Could we dive closer and cheaper? Yup. We're old enough that we should be thinking really seriously about retirement, and saving accordingly.

But after getting married later than a lot of people, starting to dive well into middle age, and putting a daughter through college, we figure it's our turn to see some of the world, and experience some amazing diving, before they're both gone, and we're too far over the hill to really enjoy it.

So instead of diving close and cheap, and "working up" to the big, exotic trips, we've just said, "Let's do it now, before we smart up and realize we can't afford it." Having said that, we're pretty tight with $$$. Planning a trip means a lot of time finding the cheapest way within reason to pull it off.

But the experience and the memories are worth it. And if we have to go to soup and crackers a little earlier in our retirement than we would have without diving, we will have had the satisfaction of having done it.

Ummm, what was the question ...????

 

[Blackwood]

I make less than $5,000,000/year

You're in good company.

Bringing debt into the equation, I'm worth somewhere in the ballpark of negative $500,000.

Used gear is my friend.

 

[Noob@40]

First off, I think this a great question. No more rude than a lot of things I have read on this board. If the question offends you, simply don't read it. Not even to peek at the poll results.

That being said I am a middle class, working stiff and still manage to do the important things in life like diving as much as I can, making sure my kids have a good life and traveling once a year to a tropical destination with my lovely wife. This life is much too short to worry about where every dime goes and as long as I can keep my head above water now It is all paid for when I am gone.

When my time comes, my goal is for my true friends to stand by my very cheap coffin (hopefully Walmart sells them by then) and say "He lived a full life and never had any regrets". That, my friends, is why my signature line will always read..............

 

[beester]

I guess it all depends, where you are in life, what your local situation is, average wage reflects this...

I think what you make is not an accurate reflection on what you can spend, what your disposable income is. That depends on your own running costs (be it kids, rents, leases, etc) and what the all loving Federale state decides to take in their infinite wisdom.

In my situation:
Gross 100%
After taxes 52 % left
After running costs (VAT is another 21% on all goods bought, fuel is about 9$ a gallon, etc) I'll be approxematly left with about 26% disposable income of the gross.

Is this sufficient for me... yes... I can go regularly on dive holiday, there are a lot of local divesites that are quite fun, I can regularly go wreckdiving... so all in all my salary is sufficient to support my hobby.

 

[cdiver2]

Everything is relative. $20K is extremely expensive for some, for others it's not something they even notice. Some folks are wondering how they're going to feed their family.



Am I the only one who thinks this is a rude question?

extremely rude

 

[Randy43068]

How can the OPs question be rude? No one is asking YOU directly how much money you make. It's a poll where one can voluntarily select their income range if they chose to do so.

For crying out-loud you can't be that sensitive that this question offends you...

 

[cdiver2]

If you have to ask how much a Harley Unit is worth, you can't afford it and are not worthy of owning one. Personally, I'm happy to covet my neighbor's Harley Unit since I would kill myself if I owned one. Therefore, I allocate between 0.5 and 1.0 Harley Units annually for gear and trips. I also "give" the government several Harley Units every year so poor people can have a chance to buy scuba gear.

those that dont mind living / dying in debt

 

[cdiver2]

How can the OPs question be rude? No one is asking YOU directly how much money you make. It's a poll where one can voluntarily select their income range if they chose to do so.

For crying out-loud you can't be that sensitive that this question offends you...

As many posters have stated Its a useless poll if anonymous.

 

[Randy43068]

Huh?? :frustrate

 

[Rick Inman]

My Dad was like that. You never asked about money - how much a person makes or what they spent on something... It was considered just plain rude. I think that comes from a generation that worked hard to build back a good life in the shadow of the depression. A person's merit was based on his work ethic, his morals and his integrity, not his income.

As a kid, when we went out to dinner, you never looked at the check unless you were going to pay for it. You didn't talk about money issues in front of strangers - period.

Today's generation of FaceBook and MySpace tells everything to everyone in open public. Nothing is personal or secret. So far, about 200 people have given their income in this thread's poll (I did).

Funny, all those years of the 1960's and 70's, everyone worried about the government becoming Big Brother... and here we turned out to do it to ourselves voluntarily with MySpace and FaceBook.

Oh. The topic.

Yeah, I guess, like most hobbies, scuba can be as cheap or expensive as we make it to be. I'd like to make more money. But the truth is, if you've met my wife, my children and grandchildren, my friends, seen what I get to do for a living day in and day out, I am wealthy beyond my dreams...