Salary & business class
Dec 9, 2018, 7:33 am
#122
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much just like anything else. Car people spend crazy amounts on cars. They know the difference between the years.
Many flyertalkers spend tons and travel and know the different levels of J cabins on different airlines flying the exact same planes.
Many flyertalkers spend tons and travel and know the different levels of J cabins on different airlines flying the exact same planes.
Dec 12, 2018, 12:07 pm
#124
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Apr 7, 2019, 12:55 am
#125
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The question regarding whether/not I'm spending too much on travel (vacation) has been on my mind a lot recently. So this is a great thread. There's almost not travel in my work, so almost everything is on my own dime. Plus it's usually me, wife and 2 kids traveling together everywhere.
You are brave to disclose your income. But when you say your income is $115-125k, I presume this is your gross income? If so, your take-home after tax, insurance and retirement contribution is in the $60-70k range? In that case, $25k/year on travel is a pretty hefty travel spending. Makes me feel better to know there are others spending as much or more %-wise than us on travels. Out of my take-home, I spend 25% on travel and 30% on mortgage. With what's left, we still live comfortably but we're almost living paycheck to paycheck.
More to the point of this thread... even though we spend a lot on travels, we still can't afford J/F because there're 4 of us and we also travel internationally multiple times a year. J is something I do once in a while as a splurge, but only via award booking. Have to fly Y almost every time, except I will try to do PE if it's more than 12-14hrs of flying.
I spend about $25K/year on travel and I always fly business class overseas. To Europe I just use upgrades or miles unless I get a ticket for low $2,000rt. For Asia and Africa I always buy biz class on Qatar but I never spend more than $4000 for a ticket and Qatar is the only airline I'll give my money to as I feel they're worth every penny. My income is generally $115-$125K.
More to the point of this thread... even though we spend a lot on travels, we still can't afford J/F because there're 4 of us and we also travel internationally multiple times a year. J is something I do once in a while as a splurge, but only via award booking. Have to fly Y almost every time, except I will try to do PE if it's more than 12-14hrs of flying.
Apr 7, 2019, 6:44 am
#126
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Apr 7, 2019, 7:22 am
#127
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More to the point of this thread... even though we spend a lot on travels, we still can't afford J/F because there're 4 of us and we also travel internationally multiple times a year. J is something I do once in a while as a splurge, but only via award booking. Have to fly Y almost every time, except I will try to do PE if it's more than 12-14hrs of flying.
Apr 7, 2019, 1:46 pm
#128
Join Date: Feb 2013
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My wife and I spend about 20% of our combined after tax income on travel every year, and do not fly for work, have no mortgage and minimal bills. We have 11-13 weeks a year vacation, which we spend 8-10 on actual vacation. We could easily fly J, but find very little value in it, unless its on points.
I'm envious that you get that much vacation per year. I get 1/4~1/3 of what you get for vacation and work in a field that's notorious for burnout. I feel like I have to get my vacation fix at least every 3-4 months to keep going. But due to limited vacation days, I usually only get away for 5-10 days at a time. I agree with you that I find little value in spending 3-5x to fly in J and much more value in spending the extra $ to stay in a luxury hotel. But on our typical vacation, we would take an 8-day trip to a place that takes 24hrs door to door. When the travel time is 1/4 of your entire vacation, I think there's all the more value in flying comfortably. Yet, traveling in J is cost-prohibitive and would likely push our vacation spending from our current 25% of take-home to ~50%. Totally unsustainable. On the other hand, I find it a torture to fly more than 12 hours straight in Y. So I splurge for PE on really long flights, knowing that PE is probably the worst value out of all the cabins.
Apr 7, 2019, 7:03 pm
#129
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Even if a major Bay Area law firm goes under, most of the partners in such a major business center office for such law firm will have done way better financially than the average resident in the area or anywhere else in the country. This became rather clear even after the dot-com bust.
Apr 7, 2019, 7:06 pm
#130
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I spend about $25K/year on travel and I always fly business class overseas. To Europe I just use upgrades or miles unless I get a ticket for low $2,000rt. For Asia and Africa I always buy biz class on Qatar but I never spend more than $4000 for a ticket and Qatar is the only airline I'll give my money to as I feel they're worth every penny. My income is generally $115-$125K.
Apr 7, 2019, 10:03 pm
#131
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Apr 8, 2019, 2:35 pm
#132
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Apr 8, 2019, 3:40 pm
#133
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One must have pretty poor budgeting skills not to be able to scrounge up $25k on a $115k salary to cover travel (or whatever they want to spend $25k on)
Apr 8, 2019, 5:16 pm
#135
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It's not possible to conclude that without knowing more about a person's whole financial picture. Consider person A and person B, each earning $115k annual salary. Person A supports a family of 4 and has a modest size mortgage and car payments. Assume this is the US, where health care costs for a family of 4 are a significant budget item, as is having to set aside money for one's own retirement. Even $5k of annual discretionary budget could be hard to identify, let alone $25k. Now consider person B with no mortgage or rent (maybe the house is paid off, maybe they're living free of charge in Mom and Dad's pool house) and no dependents (no kids yet or kids are grown). Earmarking $25k/year for travel may still not be trivial for person B but it is at least conceivable.