Here is a comparison of MIT’s estimate and my budget as revised in post #5 and adapted to MIT’s categories,
| MIT budget | My budget | |
|---|---|---|
| living wage | $15.44 | $12.20* |
| pre-tax annual income | $32,117 | $25,376 |
| taxes | $4,480** | $4,314 |
| post-tax annual income | $27,636 | $21,062 |
* In post #5 I erroneously gave the living wage for my budget as $11.51. I had forgotten to take out Medicare and Social Security taxes in addition to the federal income tax.
** MIT's estimate on taxes may be a little over $1,000 short. The federal income tax rate for that bracket is $995 + 12% of income over $13,900 (see IRS Publication 15-T). With an annual income of $32,117 the employer would withhold $3,181. Then the employee's Medicare tax rate is 1.45% and the Social Security tax rate is 6.2%. That makes for an additional $2,457 in taxes. The total taxes levied on the income given by MIT should be, by my calculation, $5,638. Some of the withheld money will probably come back, so maybe that's where the discrepancy is. One would have to understand the "Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center Microsimulation Model", version 0217-1, to close this mystery.
| MIT budget | My budget | |
|---|---|---|
| food | $3,177 | $3,000 |
| medical | $2,792 | $3,240 |
| housing*** | $11,868 | $13,500 |
| transportation | $5,113 | $360 |
| civic | $1,811 | $0 |
| other | $2,875 | $960 |
| total | $27,636 | $21,060 |
*** MIT's housing category includes utilities but not telecoms (which are "other"). My budget as presented in this table reflects that categorization. MIT also assumes a I'd be renting a bedroom rather than an apartment or house, or co-renting a dwelling. I didn't search for those arrangements when making my budget because its so circumstantial.
The largest difference is transportation, which I cut entirely from my original budget in favor of a $30/mo bus pass. In the “other” category, of note, MIT includes equipment and service for broadband (at $60/mo) and a cell phone ($48.64/mo), whereas I only include cell phone service (at $45/mo). I can’t tell from the whitepaper but it is possible MIT counted the cost of broadband and cell phone service twice in their “other” category estimate - once with their own dedicated cost factor, and again when drawing on the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey. See pages 7 and 8 here, where after describing their own “cost element for broadband and cell phone service”, they write “expenditures for other necessities are based on 2019 data […] including: […] (5) Broadband and Cell Phone Service.”
~Max