If I Had 40 Thousand Dollars

I feel a bit mer­ce­nary doing this, because mon­ey isn’t the only rea­son I’m seek­ing a non-dead-end job. But while I’m craft­ing my online State­ment of Ambi­tion as it per­tains to my career, I might as well dish out some basic met­rics for what cer­tain salaries would mean to my lifestyle; at least in Cleve­land. I’ve tried to frame it so that it should be easy to see how much mon­ey I’d actu­al­ly end up giv­ing back to the com­mu­ni­ty. $30k won’t get me far in NYC.

If I had a job in Cleve­land that paid me $30k a year I could:

• Drink more than one beer at local bars like Edis­on’s and The Lit­er­ary Café.
• Buy beer for my friends at afore­men­tioned bars.
• Go out to eat at local places like Steven­son’s Ham­burg­ers and the Lin­coln Park Pub on Taco Tues­days.
• Have an inter­net con­nec­tion at home.

If I had a job in Cleve­land that paid me $35k a year I could:

• Drink more beer at local bars, and do a Bar Crawl of the fan­cy places like The Vel­vet Tan­go Room and 806 for Tremon­ter.
• Buy more beer for my friends at afore­men­tioned bars.
• Take girls on dates.
• Pay off my stu­dent loans twice as fast and save a bit.
• Go out to eat at local places and con­tin­ue my search for the best burg­er in Cleve­land. I could also prob­a­bly eat at a fan­cy restau­rant like Fahren­heit once or twice with­out hav­ing to save up for it first.
• Join Cleve­land Colec­ti­vo.
• Take a pro­gram­ming class at Tri‑C or anoth­er local col­lege.
• Move into a larg­er apart­ment that would allow me to have a dog.
• Take a small vaca­tion to go camp­ing and fish­ing.
• Buy a small piece of art from a local artist.
• Have an inter­net con­nec­tion at home.
• Start fenc­ing again.

If I had a job in Cleve­land that paid me $40k a year I could:

• Drink more beer at local bars.
• Buy more beer for my friends at afore­men­tioned bars.
• Pay off my stu­dent loans thrice as fast and also save or invest a bit.
• Go out to eat at local places and con­tin­ue my search for the best burg­er in Cleve­land. I could also prob­a­bly eat at a fan­cy restau­rant and even take a girl on a date there.
• Join Cleve­land Colec­ti­vo.
• Take a pro­gram­ming class at Tri‑C or anoth­er local col­lege.
• Buy a fix­er-upper house and get a dog.
• Afford to enter Notre Dame Foot­ball Tick­et lot­tery.
• Cre­ate a small schol­ar­ship for walk-on fencers at ND.
• Take a fun vaca­tion some­place.
• Buy a small/medium piece of art from a local artist.
• Have an inter­net con­nec­tion at home.
• Start fenc­ing again.