How Much Money Should You Make?

How Much Money Should You Make?

In my primary book, The Unchained Man, and at my blogs, I talk about the fundamental baseline of how much money the typical man in the Western world requires for long-term happiness. According to several large and empirical studies, this number is $75,000 per year or close to it. (If you live outside of the USA, please convert this figure to your own currency, get that number in your head, and mentally replace that number whenever I say $75K. Itâs important.)

To summarize the importance of that number, if you make less than $75K per year the odds are extremely high that you wonât be able to afford aspects of a lifestyle that you will (or do) really want. This will cause you to be unhappy, at least in the long-term.

The flip side is that making much more than $75K per year does increase happiness for most men, but not nearly as much as it does going from your current average income (whatever that is based on your region) to $75K. You start to experience diminished returns once you start making more money than $75K per year, at least on average for most men.

This means that $75K is the statistical sweet spot in terms of your long-term happiness as a man in the modern era.

There are, of course, exceptions to this. Some men do indeed need to make more than $75K per year for maximum happiness. Iâm one of these guys. I would be quite unhappy if I only made $75K per year, and I know this because when I did make $75K per year I wasnât happy with my lifestyle at all. I wasnât miserable, but I wasnât really happy. The good news is that once I was making just under double that, about $140,000 a year, and had zero debt, I was happy as fuck. I make many times that now, and Iâm still really happy.

Like I said, thatâs me. You may be like me, in that you wonât be totally happy until you make some income figure well past $75K per year. Or you may be more normal, and at $75K per year youâll be happy as a clam, particularly if you follow the other Alpha Male 2.0 financial standards of low/zero debt, living somewhere with very low taxes and low cost of living, never being a moron by legally combining your finances with a woman, and so on. A guy doing all of those things making $75K per year, especially if thatâs location-independent income, is going to live a great life.

That begs the question as to whether or not you would be happy making less than $75K. After all, if there are men like me who need to make more than $75K per year to be happy, it stands to reason that there are other men who would be totally and truly happy making only $55K per year or even less⦠right?

The answer is, it depends.

If you are one of those guys with very simple needs, who is totally happy not owning a car, living in a shitty little apartment, never really traveling that much (or doing so on the ultra-cheap like being a hostel backpacker), then possibly, yes, less than $75K might make you happy.

Ah, but thereâs a catch. As always when I talk about happiness, Iâm not just talking about happiness, Iâm talking about long-term happiness, as in happiness that will last you the next 30+ years, not just right now.

If youâre a 27 year-old single guy with no kids, no debts, no girlfriend, no nice place to live, and no car, and who doesnât want any of those things right now, then sure, you might be okay with $40K per year (or whatever). Maybe (even though most guys like you would like a little more money.)

But what happens when you hit 37 and now you want to settle down with a woman and have kids?

Iâll never want that, BD!

Oh, câmon now, weâve talked about that defensive, bullshit statement at this blog many times. Iâve shown you the stats on this, as well as shown you examples of men who said this when they were young only to turn around in their late thirties or forties and suddenly change their minds.

So yes, Iâm sorry, but the odds are overwhelming (something like 92%) that you will want something like kids or a wife or a family someday. Maybe not today. Maybe not in five years. But someday.

What happens when you want this and youâre only making $50K per year? Heh. Youâve got a serious problem.

Then comes the issue of retirement and old age. If you make $30K, $40K, $50K, or whatever your entire life, how do you think your old age will look? Iâll tell you. It will look like POVERTY (at least in the vast majority of cases). Will that make you happy? Uh, no.

So unless youâre willing to kill yourself before you get too old (and I realize there are those on the internet who advocate this) or youâre this very rare and bizarre exception to the rule who will literally never want to live with a woman or have any kids ever, no matter how old you get, then making less than $75K wonât make you long-term happy, even if such a thing would make you happy today.

How Much Money Can You Make?

So if you need to make $75K per year or more to be happy long-term, how much money can you make?

As Iâve talked about before, building your self-employed, location-independent income up to $75K per year (which is only $6250 per month before taxes; not a lot of money with todayâs inflation rates) only takes you anywhere from 1.5 years to 3-5 years on the outside, provided you put in the work.

Even if it takes five years, before you bitch and complain about how much âworkâ that is and how you donât want to âwait,â take your current age and add five. Now youâre that age, and you have $6,250 coming into your life every month, location-independent, for the rest of your life. Is that a good deal? Was it worth the five years? YES. (And again, if you hit this hard and do everything correctly it wonât take you five years; youâll pull it off in far less.)

Consulting is even better. There are pros and cons to all types of businesses and consulting is no different, but the strength of consulting is that you can hit big income numbers very fast, with no college degree, no special certifications, and minimum job experience. This is how I was able to go full-time as a consultant as a 24 year-old beta male moron and get my income to six figures in just three years doing most things in my business wrong. The velocity of income under a consulting model is really amazing. (Today I could go from zero to six figures in consulting (meaning at least $8300 per month pre-tax) within three months, perhaps six months on the extreme outside if I ran into a stream of bad luck.)

If six figures seems like too big a number for your subconscious to accept, thatâs fine. Stick with the $75K figure ($6250 per month) and go for that, which is even easier under a consulting model. Once you get to that income, you can decide then if you want more or if youâre satisfied with the $75K per year baseline. Itâs really up to you.

Any man in the Western world can get his income up to at least $6250 pre-tax USA equivalent given a little time, work, and focus. As always, Iâm not saying you need to be a multibazillionaire, make six figures, â10X your lifeâ or any other internet bullshit-hype you hear. Just get your income to $75K per year at least. You can do that. Anyone can.

And you can do a lot more too, if you want.

One of the fastest ways I know to get to this income is by being a consultant. The Consultant Course comes out first thing in the morning, 12:01 PST/PDT Friday, March 22^nd. Put it on your calendar, because youâll only be able to get it for one week after that.