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From the time we are young, we are told that a six-figure salary or six-figure income is all we need to make it in the world and be successful.
Six figures are simple to calculate. Anytime you make between $100,000 and $999,999 in a year, you have achieved a 6-figure salary. There are much more to six figures than just an income, though, and in the following article, we will discuss it more in-depth. We will discuss the following:
- Annual Income
- Jobs to Make Six-Figures
- Net Worth
- Financial Goals
Are you ready to dive in? Then let’s get started.
Annual Income
Did you dream of the day that you made a six-figure salary or even a seven-figure salary? As I was growing up, a high salary made over $100,000 a year, which would let you live the good life. You’d have multiple family vacations, enough for a nice car and a beautiful home for your family.
Is $100,000 still considered a lot of money? We’re going to tackle that exact question. I will compare what it will buy you today versus 20 years ago and then talk about some of your financial goals and how income relates to achieving those goals.
If we take a look at this chart here at officialdata.org, we see that if we compare the income levels of 2000 to 2022, there has been a cumulative price increase of 52.74%. That means to have the same lifestyle in 2000; you would actually need to make $154,740 in annual income. That is a significant increase!
So what has caused this?
Well, the biggest issue that we are facing is two-fold. We have seen a steady rise in inflation. It has hovered around 2.5% for the duration of those 21 years and has ranged between %1 and 4% during that time. We have also seen an increase in our general cost of living that has had significant adjusted rates. Rent in many places has more than doubled.
In 2000, the median gross rent was $602 per month. That same average rent is now nearly doubled, and you’re looking at an average of $1,129.22 to rent that same apartment today. The reason this information is essential is it decreases the lifestyle that a six-figure salary can provide. $100,000 a year will no longer buy you that dream life unless you can live in a low cost of living area and you live relatively frugally.
$56,310 is the national mean average of all annual salaries!
Let’s look at the Bureau of Labor Statistics. We find that the national mean average salary for all occupations comes in at $56,310 a year. Hopefully, you are on the right side of that number, but if you’re on the left, stay tuned because I will list some of the jobs that allow you to make in the six-figure range.
As you may have noticed in your own life, the salary range for what is considered a high salary varies by location. If you earn $100,000 a year in San Francisco, you’re likely going to struggle to have all of the things you need. The median rent on a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco is $3,690 per month, based on a Business Insider report.
If you want a house, you better buckle up. The median listing price for a home is $1.3 million. That $100,000 income won’t pay you enough to successfully own real estate there. This makes your cost of living higher than even in New York City!
However, if you were to move to somewhere like West Virginia, the home’s average cost is $107,927, based on information here. That can leave you with substantially more cash in your pocket after you’ve paid your expenses. You now have monthly savings you can put aside to save for retirement and set up your dream life.
That will lead us right into our next topic.
Jobs with a Six-Figure Salary
So, how do you balance the cost of living with high income and financial security? You need to find a position that is both flexible and fun. Here I will talk about some jobs out there which will pay you above $100,000 per year. Some of these will require a college degree, but there are quite a few that don’t.
Anesthesiologists
Topping the list of mean salary for doctors is an Anesthesiologist. These are individuals who take patients’ lives under their care every day when they go into surgery. They help by putting the patient to sleep, and they keep them in that state through the course of the surgery.
If you love schooling, this is a great way to get there. You will have to finish your bachelor’s degree, then go on to Medical School. After med school, which is about four years, you will complete a one-year internship. Once that is done, you get three years of residency and then potentially your fellowship. All in, you are looking at 12 – 15 years of schooling and education.
For all of that schooling, they reward you with a median salary of $271,440.
Other Medical Professions
Some other occupations that have a mid salary range above $200,000 per year and is also in the medical field are:
- Surgeons
- Obstetricians and Gynecologist
- Orthodontists
- Oral Surgeons
- Physicians
- Psychiatrists
- Prosthodontists
- Family Medicine Physicians
One thing to point out is that it also isn’t uncommon for a few of these to earn 7-figure or even 8-figure salaries. They are high earners with incredible yearly income potential. This is especially true if they become business owners and open up their own practice. We will discuss business owners in another part, though. Stay tuned!
One thing to keep in mind is that if you don’t have the money saved up to pay for school, you could find yourself drowning in student loans for individuals who take this route. The average medical school student loan debt is around $251,000, with 8 out of 10 medical students having more than $300,000 in student loan debt per this article at Credible.
That is a lot of money to repay before you ever get started. Are you wanting to look at some other options?
Commercial Pilot
If exploring the skies and traveling the world is your cup of tea, then becoming a commercial pilot may be in your future. Airline pilots, Copilots, and Flight Engineers have a 6 figure salary and fall into high-income earners. They make a median salary of $163,480.
Being a commercial pilot also gives you a robust set of benefits. From health, dental, and vision to an excellent retirement and travel package. Despite being in the middle of a pandemic, we see more and more flights going out every day.
And here is some good news! You do not need a college degree to become a commercial pilot. Instead, there is a series of certifications that you need to pass to eventually become a pilot.
If you would like to look at the requirements, I found a pretty straightforward guide.
Air Traffic Controller
Pilots aren’t the only individuals in the air-traffic field to make six figures.
You also have air traffic controllers as well. You could potentially need either an associate degree or a bachelor’s degree from Flight Academy Administration(FAA) with this job. Otherwise, you can use prior work experience so long as you can pass the FAA certification tests.
And while you won’t work specifically for an Airline, you do get all of the advantages of working for the federal government. That means annual and sick leave, health and life insurance, and federal retirement benefits.
That isn’t a bad deal! What other jobs are out there that net you at least a six figure income?
Sales and Marketing Managers
Next on the list are Sales Managers. Sales are the backbone of our economy. It is really a job built around relationships. Many sales jobs can help you earn 6 figures or more, but your goal is to lead a sales team as a sales manager.
How much money you make is dependent on your own skills with working and leading people. This is great for people that like helping others succeed. The average median pay for a Sales Manager is $150,400.
The same here goes for Marketing Managers. There are many similarities to sales and marketing, and many of these teams are built under one branch. Sales typically tend to be person-to-person communication. Marketing influences people through words, commercials, etc.
Software Development and I.T.
Another industry that has multiple six-figure jobs available is in the world of Programming. From I.T. to a software developer managing several projects. If you are a person that likes to solve complex problems, this is the field for you.
Every day you tackle new tasks and help to solve various problems. Many positions allow you to earn a high income in today’s environment. Most of these jobs have shifted to remote work. Not only do you get the benefits of working remotely, but many software companies also give some fantastic benefits packages as well.
You also don’t need a college degree! Many people have started in the industry in their spare time and learned to program by learning some front-end languages first, like HTML and CSS. If you want to check this out for yourself, Codecademy offers free lessons here. Feel free to take a look!
Real Estate – Agents and Investors
If you’re looking to get wealthy and make a six figure income and achieve 6, 7, or 8 figure net worth, then real estate is the path that has created the most millionaires. Agents can achieve significant sales commissions, upwards of 3% – 6% of the sales price. On a $500,000 home, that is $15,000 – $30,000 of commission from the sale of just one house!
As a real estate investor, you can create substantial amounts of passive income. Like investing in the stock market, you have to invest money to make money in real estate. That doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be your own money.
Many individuals can net $200 – $400 per door that they own in profit. If your goal is to make $100,000 in a year, that means you need to make $8,333 per month. If you’re netting an income of $200 per door, you would need roughly 42 doors. The beauty of this method is that it turns into semi-passive income and increases your net worth substantially.
Business Owner
The last job I want to talk about is being a business owner. With your own business, you can work as hard as you want. You can run the company as a solopreneur or hire a team to manage the day-to-day. Most successful business owners are small business owners.
I recommend to people who aren’t making the income that they desire to start side hustles. This is the best way to make extra money and learn a new skill or two. The easiest way to get started with a side hustle is to do something you already like and enjoy doing.
It takes hard work to do this, but that hard work pays off because you build something you love and own. The harder you work, the greater the chance for success. Even this blog that you’re reading is a side hustle that I created to help individuals like you grow their wealth and achieve financial peace.
You can get started using the skills you already have here at Fiverr. This is a great way to utilize your talents and build some extra income. An important thing to note is that it can help bolster the amount of income you can earn per job when you get more reviews.
Many people use the platform and places like Upwork and Freelancer to earn a few extra dollars per month.
Business Owners and Professional Athletes don’t just make an extraordinary six-figure income. They can earn enough to take you into the double comma club of 7 figure and 8 figure incomes. If you want to make that type of income, you need to learn from Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg. If you’re going to make a lot of money, you need to build a product that impacts many people’s lives!
Net Worth
So we already talked about 6 figures, but what is 7 figures, or even 8 figures? Why is this important for net worth?
7 figures is any number between $1,000,000 and $9,999,999. 8 figures is simply $10,000,000 to $19,999,999. When we look at net worth, these numbers become more important.
Many individuals believe that if they have $1,000,000 that they are rich. I break down the 4% rule in more depth in this article here, but if we look at the 4% rule on a $1,000,000 asset, you can only pull out $40,000 annually. That isn’t a tremendous amount of money to live on.
If you want to live off of $100,000 a year for the rest of your life and make that six-figure income, you need to grow your investable assets to $2,500,000. This will make it nearly impossible for you to ever run out of money in retirement and still earn that six-figure salary.
By the time you’ve reached this level of wealth, you are among the wealthiest people in the world and likely have reached financial independence.
So, how do you calculate your net worth? The equation is actually pretty simple
Assets – Liabilities = Net Worth
Assets are anything that you own that holds value, such as the following:
- Stocks
- Bonds
- Mutual Funds
- 401k
- Real Estate Equity
- Money Market
- Bank Account
- Emergency Fund
Liabilities are basically any debts that you own. This would include the following:
- Mortgage
- Car Loan
- Credit Card Debt
- Student Loans
- Business Loans
If your Assets are greater than your Liabilities, you have a positive net worth. If your liabilities are greater than your assets, then you’re operating in the red.
Financial Goals
When we talk about 6 figures, we usually look at that from a salary perspective, but really, reaching six figures in saved assets is a tremendous feat.
In the United States, we can see in this article by Synchrony, the median retirement savings by age:
20s Median Retirement: $16,000
30s Median Retirement: $45,000
40s Median Retirement: $63,000
50s Median Retirement: $117,000
60s Median Retirement: $172,000
Synchrony Bank
If you’ve allowed lifestyle creep to enter the picture and you’ve been a high-income earner most of your life, this could be a problem. You need to find a way to start saving more of your income, and the goal would be to eventually save upwards of 40%.
You will notice a significant change in your wealth over 10 or 20 years when you start saving closer to 25% of your income. At 40%, you change the trajectory.
The best thing you can do is to set your financial goals early. It doesn’t matter if you’re 18 or 58. If you’re still working and have a life in retirement that you want to achieve, you need to write down your goals and then figure out how you will attain them. This could be taking on extra work or building side hustles.
You will never achieve a goal unless you jot it down. I’m not sure who wrote this quote but,
“A dream written down with a date becomes a GOAL. A goal broken down into steps becomes a PLAN. A plan backed by ACTION makes your dreams come true.”
– Greg Reid
Write it all down.
Wrap Up
So, we walked through a lot of stuff here. You now know what six, seven, and even eight-figure salaries are. We even went through some jobs to shift towards today and start earning that income level for you and your family.
You don’t need a college degree to make $100,000 or more a year, but it will just take a lot of hard work. You can either do that by learning new skills or building your own business and working for yourself.
If you want to learn to program, check out Codecademy. If you’re going to build your own websites and work from home, there are many other resources online to help you with it. You just need to be willing to put in the work.
Remember, for net worth, it is assets – liabilities. It is elementary math, but it can genuinely change your trajectory and your confidence.
If you have any questions or if you’ve found this information helpful, please leave a comment below. I love reading about the successes of my readers!
Stay Happy!