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What About This…? 11.21.2013

By Wayne William Cipriano

We were talking to a friend of ours from Chicago the other day and they were telling us about fantastic buffet lunch they attended. All the steak, all the crab legs, all the trimmings, all you wanted, all day long. It was, they said, “to die for.”

And, it costs them $50 per person.

Wow, I thought, that is a lot of bread for lunch. But then I thought that around Chicago people make a lot more doing regular jobs than we do around here.

Did you know that the median annual income in our country (the income of a person exactly halfway between the highest paid person the lowest paid person) is $50,000? Maybe that is for two earners in a family but still an average of $24 per hour before taxes.

To balance the low wages paid in rural America there has to be a large group making more than that in the higher-paying metropolitan areas like Chicago. And when there are a lot of people making a lot of money, stuff costs a lot more.

So, maybe $50 per person for a fantastic buffet lunch isn’t all that expensive if you make say $30 or $40 an hour.

I would bet it ends up to be pretty much the same in Chicago as it does in Ava. Everyone is broke on the last day of the month no matter how much they make. Although, the buffets may be better.