A new study by SmartAsset found that a single person must make $136,781 to live comfortably, while a family of four needs to earn $312,915 to do the same.

SAN DIEGO — What exactly does it mean to live comfortably in San Diego County and across the nation? Financial researchers at SmartAsset define living comfortably as being able to spend 50 percent of your post-tax income on immediate needs – think housing, food, clothing, utilities- while 30 percent goes to wants, and the remaining 20 percent gets deposited into savings. It is called the 50/30/20 rule.

In San Diego and Chula Vista, that means single adults need to earn $136,781 a year while families of four need to bring in $312,915 a year to live comfortably, according to the 50/30/20 budgeting rule.

In a new study, SmartAsset found San Diego and Chula Vista to be tied for seventh in the country with the highest salaries needed to abide by the budgeting rule,, only New York City, San Jose, Irvine, Anaheim, Santa Ana and Boston are higher. 


Meanwhile, San Antonio had the lowest salary needed to live comfortably. According to SmartAsset. Single adults need to earn $83,242 to maintain a comfortable lifestyle while putting 20% away for later. New Orleans, Memphis, Oklahoma City and Baltimore rounded out the top five cities with the lowest incomes needed to follow the 50/30/20 rule. 

For the study, SmartAsset looked at the 100 largest cities and used data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 1 Year American Community Survey.