I NEED A RAISE
Here's what it takes to be a middle class earner in Dallas-Fort Worth, new report finds
Plano has one of the highest middle class income ceilings in the nation.
In a world where a six figure salary doesn’t go as far as it used to, how much money do you need to make to be deemed middle class? Out of 13 Texas cities and 100 total in the United States, a Dallas suburb has one of the highest middle class income ceilings in the nation.
Plano has the ninth highest income ceiling for American middle class earners, according to a new study by SmartAsset. To define the term “middle class” and determine income limits, analysts looked at data from the Census Bureau's 2021 one-year American Community Survey to find the median income for households in every state. They also looked at income data from 100 of the largest American cities.
Middle class earners in Plano would need to make between $63,651 and $190,004 a year, with the median household income coming out to $95,002 a year.
Several of the country’s best employers are located in Plano and in the greater Dallas-Fort Worth area, as discovered by Forbes, which is a helpful boost to the local economy. The study additionally discovered Plano has the lowest average home value out of the top 10 cities (mostly from California and Arizona) at $487,000.
Plano was the only Texas city to make the top 10, with Austin coming in second at No. 23. An Austinite would need to make a minimum of $53,293 to be considered middle class. Other Texas cities included in the study are Corpus Christi (No. 63), San Antonio (No. 77), Lubbock (No. 78), Laredo (No. 84), and El Paso (No. 87).
Here’s what it takes to be middle class in other Dallas-Fort Worth cities:
- No. 38 – Irving: between $47,128 and $140,680 a year
- No. 44 – Fort Worth: between $45,717 and $136,470 a year
- No. 59 – Garland: between $41,277 and $123,214 a year
- No. 62 – Arlington: between $40,126 and $119,778 a year
- No. 72 – Dallas: between $38,857 and $115,990 a year
Four of the top 10 cities with the highest middle class income ceilings are in California (no surprise there) and three of the four are in the Bay Area. The report found that tech cities like those in the Bay Area are notoriously the most difficult to attain a middle class status. California’s overall high cost-of-living means residents in the No. 1 city of Fremont would need to make between $104,499 and $311,936 a year to be labeled middle class.
The top 10 cities with the highest middle class ceilings are:
- No. 1 – Fremont, California
- No. 2 – San Jose, California
- No. 3 – Arlington, Virginia
- No. 4 – San Francisco
- No. 5 – Seattle
- No. 6 – Irvine, California
- No. 7 – Gilbert, Arizona
- No. 8 – Scottsdale, Arizona
- No. 9 – Plano
- No. 10 – Chandler, Arizona
The full report and its methodology can be found on smartasset.com.
