how much money you need to be happy in your country
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In Australia any non home owning (rent paying) family of two adults and two children earning less than $750 US/AU per week is officiially classed as living in poverty. To live comforably i suppose you would as a conserative estimate have to increase that amount by 50% which would comes to around $5000 a month for a family of four. Terrible i know!
Actually I'd say to live comfortably in Aus you would need $5000 a month for 2 adults, nevermind children. I guess it's where you live though, and how much you are forking out on mortgage/rent.
The U.S. is a giant country, and as such how much it costs to live the good life is dependent on where you are living, and what your idea of the "good life" is.
Northern Minnesota is cheap by national standards. The cost of living index (using 100 as the national average) is something like 76 for my zip code, similar to others in the area. A single person can "make it" here on $30,000 a year, and still have money left over for "toys" - guns, hunting stands, four-wheelers, snowmobiles, and boats (canoes and kayaks with the chi-chi crowd, motorized boats and personal watercraft for the hoi polloi) are very popular here, and not only among the rich (if there are any rich people left in Northern MN). A "working class" person (carpenter, plumber, etc.) can own all of these within no more than 5 years of working, if they budget wisely (or even if they don't). I know of no other place where normal people have as many toys as northern Minnesota and its environs. It appears to me that the population in other parts of the country are largely focused on having a bigger house or a Porsche, while Minnesotans like to kick back and exit the rat race.