1300€ a month would be nice, could go to Japan every year :P. Honestly don't think I would ever pay that much in my state, I think it would cover bigger cities though.

I could never hold onto any job. The longest time I could endure at a single occupation was a little more than a year. That was at Mc Donald's. It's not that I have a problem with the work itself. Especially in the kitchen I have a lot of fun. But I have a real issue with authorities. Everytime someone wants to tell me how to do my job I get really pissed off. I was never fired mind you. I always quit by myself. I guess it must be the consequence of the anti-authoritarian education I enjoyed. Or something. I also dropped out of the Bundeswehr after just a month. No way some Hauptmann can tell me what to do and what not to do! Screw dat! xD

Anyway, now I'm working as a freelancer since almost 6 years and I'm loving it! When I started in 2011 I had real problems. I almost didn't get any clients at all. Nobody knew me, so nobody wanted me. The poor souls who decided to give me a job paid me next to nothing. For example I wrote a book about the ketogenic diet. A whole friggin' book with 121 pages, with all the research involved it took me 2 months to finish. I got a whopping 250 € for that, lol. So I lived from 125 € a month in that time. =D

It got a whole lot better in the coming years. Today I can quite comfortably just pick my contracts. I have so many requests that I can't possibly take them all. I already thought about recruiting someone else, but all the hassle with hiring someone in germany holds me back. Payment also is a shitload better today. I come along just fine and I worked hard to get where I am. Wouldn't want it to be any other way.

Anyway, this probably isn't the right place to talk about it. for the OP, I wish you the best of luck, hope you like the new job. I myself wouldn't even be so concerned about the money. It never was a deciding factor for me. When I worked in the kitchen as a cook, I got next to nothing but I didn't care because my job was so much fun. Also today I would prefer writing an article about video games over anything else, even when I get less money for it. but maybe that's just me.

Well, I do live in the biggest city but more at the edge where rent is even lower than in the smaller cities. I could easily shave off 500€ of my monthly expenses but I don't wanna. Currently saving up for bigger expenses like 5000€ for a 3 Week Japan trip next year.

Next year is gonna be fucking expensive for me so I hope to save up to 12k this year so I won't have to hold back next year.

You got big plans for Japan?

I went for 18 days and visited Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara, and Osaka.

I hate to keep referencing the comparisons to my situation. But I went for $3500 during prime summer season. Was a huge mistake imo, as I could have gotten it much cheaper. If you got huge plans I can understand the expense though.

My friend will be going there soon to work, and I plan to buy a $500-$1000 ticket at some point. We gotta visit Ka-pi though :D.

Water is free, so I guess that is why my rent was higher. I make sure to take long showers to pay them back though :P.

Yeah can't make it this year because of the expense. Honestly it was a massive heat wave

https://weather.com/news/news/heat-wave-japan-deaths-tokyo-record

is when I went lmao. And I went up this GD mountain in Kyoto. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fushimi_Inari-taisha

Was all good fun, luckily Japan and vending machines.

5k is my buffer. I'm expecting around 4k. Gonna go for about 3 weeks to Tokyo, Kyoto and Okinawa. It's my very first trip to Japan and I plan on splurging as much as possible on souvenirs and stuff. I will certainly not hold back on anything.

I see. I just dn't think you'll like those jobs much. BSN can easily fetch 50k starting out.

Cost of living in the US varies too much to give a definitive answer. In the Southeast, Midwest, and Mountain West, it's very cheap. Cost of living is closer to Eastern Europe than Western Europe.

I was able to buy a home and support my wife in school making 35k/year. I do a lot better than that now of course.

I love this line of work honestly XD