How Much Is 18 Dollars An Hour Per Year? (Can You Live Off Of It?)

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Nowadays, it seems that prices keep going up, and salaries keep going down.

It can be difficult to maintain a comfortable living position in the 2020s, especially if you are unsure on how to budget efficiently.

How Much Is 18 Dollars An Hour Per Year? (Can You Live Off Of It?) — How much can you make each year off $18 an hour?

If you earn $18 an hour at your job, you may have a couple of questions. How much do you make annually, monthly, or even weekly?

Is it possible to live a comfortable life off of this salary?

In this article, we will be discussing and answering these questions. We will also look into budgeting plans, and how many jobs pay this salary throughout the country.

So, let’s get into it.

How Much Does The Average American Pay In Taxes?

A percentage of your earnings will be withheld from your salary for tax purposes, depending on how much money you earn at a job.

This money is used to pay for things like Medicare, federal and state taxes, and social security.

So, how much money does the tax man take altogether?

The progressive tax structure in the United States makes identifying an ‘average’ taxpayer challenging. As of 2021, tax rates span from 10% to 37%, and there are seven of these.

Therefore, the average tax rate might be around 24.57 percent.

Your own personal tax rate will depend on how much you earn annually. Therefore, you would need to calculate your own tax rate depending on how much you get paid.

You can use this Salary Tax Calculator to calculate how many taxes you will be paying daily, weekly, monthly, and annually, depending on your wages and living situation.

How Much Is $18 An Hour Per Day/Week?

When working out an hourly salary, you may want to know how much money you will be earning throughout a whole shift.

$18 an hour is how much a day? How much is it a week?

Working Part Time

In the US, part-time employees are defined – by the Bureau of Labor Statistics – as those who work fewer than 35 hours a week.

That means that these people can work anywhere between 1 hour per week to 34 hours per week to be considered a part-time worker.

So, you can work out a rough estimate of your wages by multiplying the hourly salary of $18 by the amount of hours worked by a part-time employee – the average working hours being 5 hours per shift.

18 multiplied by 5 equals 90. This indicates that a person earning $18 an hour working 5 hours a day will earn around $90 per shift before taxes.

Then, multiply that calculation by the amount of days worked – e.g., 5 days a week. 90 × 5 equals to 450.

So, at an average, a part-time employee may earn $90 as a daily rate, and $450 per week before taxes have been deducted.

However, following tax deduction, you would expect to take home around $79. This equals to just under $400 a week.

Working Full Time

Despite the fact that most people regard 35 or 40 hours per week to be full-time, the amount of hours you are required to work depends on your employer and workplace.

It may be less in certain circumstances, but it may be greater in others.

That being said, as a rule, full-time employees tend to work between 35 and 40 hours a week.

If a full time employee was to work, at least, 8 hours a day, you would need to multiply 8 × 18. This comes to $144 per working day.

Multiply this number by 5 – assuming that the employee works 5 days a week – and the calculation goes up to $720.

Therefore, without taxes, a full time employee who works 8 hours would earn $144 per day, and $720 per working week.

After taxes, you could expect to bring home roughly $122 a day: just above $600 per week.

How Much Is $18 An Hour Per Month?

The next step is to calculate how much your wages will be after a month of labor.

Since most people get paid monthly, it is more practical to calculate how much money you will receive each month.

Working Part Time

Is it possible to live off $18 an hour pay?

Again, let’s assume that a person operating part-time works 5 days a week, with 6 hours per shift. This would be a 30-hour working week.

There are usually 30 or 31 days in a full month, so for the sake of this calculation, let’s assume that you are getting paid on the last day of May 2022 (31 days).

If your contract required you to work Monday to Friday, and you didn’t take any time off, you would have worked a full 22 days. $108 – your daily rate – multiplied by 22 equals to $2,376. This would be your monthly wage without taxes.

At an average, a part-time employee would expect to take home around $1,700 per month.

Working Full Time

If you worked a 40-hour week, getting paid $18 an hour for 8 hours a day, a rough estimate of a gross monthly income would be around $3,120.

However, after tax deductions, that pay would lower to, roughly, $2,700.

How Much Is $18 An Hour Per Year?

So, now, let’s return to the titular question: $18 an hour is how much a year? Can you live off of this annual income?

Working Part Time

So, we have already worked out that a part-time employee who works 5 days a week, 5 hours per shift, will make $79 per shift.

This makes up to just under $400 a week, and around $1,700 a month, after taxes have been deducted.

A part-time employee that works these hours at an hourly rate of $18 would expect to make $23,400 before taxes.

After taxes, $18 an hour for someone working part time is $20,473 from their annual wages.

Working Full Time

If a person works full-time – earning $18 an hour – and they work a 40-hour week, they would be receiving $122 a day, and $2,700 a month.

A rough estimate for an annual salary for a full-time worker would be around $37,440 before taxes.

After taxes, the annual salary amount would equal $28,080 if you are making $18 each hour.

Can You Live Off Of $18 An Hour Per Year?

According to the US Census Bureau, the yearly average personal income in 2019 was $35,977. Therefore, if you earn $37,440 each year, you are slightly over average as far as earnings go in the US.

From our previous calculations, a person earning $18 an hour – whether full-time or part-time – would be earning below the average amount of personal income.

However, regardless of whether you work part-time or full-time at $18 per hour, you will be paid well above the poverty threshold in the United States, which is $12,750 per year for a single person.

So, although a person with this salary may not have the highest wages possible, they certainly aren’t earning the lowest.

Surviving Off Of $18 An Hour Per Year

While it may not be easy, an individual that lives alone could easily survive off of this annual wage.

Of course, several aspects come into play when taking into consideration a person’s personal budget.

Monthly rent in the US, in the year 2020, was $1,164 on average, with $1,104 as the median rent.

A person receiving a monthly salary of $1,700, as a part-time employee, will only have around $500 left to survive off for the remainder of the month.

Through careful budgeting, this is definitely possible.

An individual with a full-time job, earning $18 an hour, would have around $1,500 left to spend.

This is also possible, especially if the person lives alone, and only needs to provide for themselves. With a family, however, this may prove to be more difficult.

Living Comfortably Off Of $18 An Hour Per Year

Now that we know that a person can survive off of an hourly salary of $18, let’s look at whether or not they can live a comfortable life with this pay.

Unfortunately, you cannot live a comfortable life on this pay, according to a new survey performed by Go Banking Rates, which takes into consideration rising housing costs as well as basic living expenses.

To comfortably make ends meet in this country and have enough pocket money for less essential stuff, you will need to be earning anything from $58,321 per year to $136,437 per year.

On 18 dollars an hour, you may need to adopt some frugal living tips.

Can You Buy A House With A Salary Of $18 An Hour?

Can you afford a house if you make $18 per hour? — Can you afford to buy a house if you are making $18 an hour?

This is a difficult question to answer accurately, as there are many aspects that come into play when working out how much money you need to buy a house.

You could be able to purchase a modest-sized home with this wage if you buy in a low-cost neighborhood, if you spend/save sensibly, and providing you have a debt-to-income ratio of 43% or less.

Click here to learn the 6 steps to buying a home.

How To Live Off Of An $18 Hourly Salary

Being responsible with money is a valuable skill to have, and one that you should learn if you haven’t already.

If you live alone, you already have an advantage: you only have yourself to look out for, therefore you are fully in control of your finances.

By sticking to a low-cost food/essentials plan, and living on less than you earn, you will be able to live comfortably while, potentially, being able to save for the future.

It may also help to have a roommate, if you live alone. Renting alone can be costly in this day and age, so splitting the cost with another individual who is also wanting to save money makes sense.

A Sample Budget For An $18 Hourly Salary

If you earn $2,647 per month from a full-time job that pays $18 per hour, creating a financial plan to organize your funds may be beneficial.

A great way to do this is to organize your pay check using a 70/20/10 budget: 70% of income gets spent on monthly costs (including leisure), 20% is placed aside for the future, and 10% is used to pay off debt.

Monthly Costs (70%)

Rent/Mortgage: $950

Utilities: $150

Transportation: $225

Food and Groceries: $300

Leisure/Entertainment: $222

TOTAL: $1,847

Savings (20%)

TOTAL: $530

Debt Repayment (10%)

TOTAL: $270

Another option to determine how much you should save each month is to use the 50/30/20 rule which you can learn about here.

Ways to make more money if $18 and hour isn’t enough

If $18 an hour just isn’t enough money each week to make it, here are a few side hustles you can start to make more:

Rent something out:

Rent a spare bedroom out to a roomate or on AirBnb
Rent space out in your garage
Rent your car on Turo

Get paid for your opinion:

Drive in your free time to make extra with these companies:

Doordash
Lyft
Uber
UberEats
Grubhub

There are many creative ways to make extra money and supplement the $18 an hour you make is it isn’t enough salary to make it.

What Jobs Pay $18 An Hour?

The majority of $18-an-hour occupations, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, do not require prior experience or formal education.

It is crucial to remember, though, that most places do require a high school diploma to be considered for employment.

Here are some careers that offer a rough $18-per-hour salary:

Animal Control Worker ($18.07)
Optician ($18.19)
Motorcycle Mechanic ($18.19)
Healthcare Support Worker ($18.49)
Pipe Layer ($18.66)
Camera Repair Technician ($18.69)
Quality Control Inspector ($18.82)
Audio Equipment Installer or Repairer ($18.99)

Final Thoughts on $18 an Hour

To sum it up, an individual who works 40 hours per week for an $18-per-hour wage can receive an annual salary of $37,440, which is $28,080 following tax reduction.

This salary is higher than the national minimum wage, and if the person is competent at budgeting, they should be able to live well on it.

However, since it is significantly less than the average annual income, it may be difficult if the earner is not a natural money manager.

By adapting to a frugal lifestyle, and creating a budget plan for your everyday needs, you should be able to manage just fine on a wage of $18 an hour.

We hope you found this article useful.