Would you feel financially secure earning $500,000 a year? A surprising share of Americans who actually make that much say they’re struggling to get ahead.
More than a third (36.6%) of respondents with household incomes above $500,000 say they primarily live paycheck to paycheck, according to Goldman Sachs Asset Management’s Retirement Survey and Insights Report 2026. That’s a higher share than any other income group except households earning less than $50,000, where 60.8% said the same.
The report’s first key finding sums up the broader problem: housing, healthcare, education, caregiving, and everyday costs have outpaced wage growth for decades, leaving households with less room to save. “The challenge is no longer participation,” Goldman wrote. “It is competing needs.”
Prices are up, and paychecks haven’t kept pace
That won’t surprise most Americans. Consumer prices have climbed roughly 22% over the past five years, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Price Index. Households are paying more for everything from groceries to healthcare to rent and mortgages. Fuel has added to the pain: gasoline prices were up 27.4% year over year in August.
The typical household has more income to absorb those costs than it used to. Median household income hit a record $87,460 in 2025, according to the Census Bureau. But many families still say rising costs are squeezing both their monthly budgets and their long-term savings.
The strain is showing up even though the broader economy looks solid. Unemployment was 4.2% in September, and consumer spending rose by $190.8 billion in August, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Goldman’s report notes that beneath strong employment and resilient spending lie “growing financial pressures that threaten long-term retirement readiness.”
Retirement saving momentum has also stalled. The share of working respondents who increased their retirement savings fell from 55% in 2025 to 39% this year—a drop of more than 16 percentage points. Goldman called it the largest single-year decline since 2020. Younger workers are feeling it, too: Fortune previously reported that many are taking on extra work to make ends meet.
A U-shaped curve
The more striking finding is how many households earning roughly 5.7 times the national median say they’re barely keeping up. The survey drew on responses from 5,106 people, including 3,612 workers and 1,494 retirees ages 45 to 75. Respondents chose one of three descriptions of their finances: primarily living paycheck to paycheck and struggling to make progress on long-term goals; making moderate progress; or making significant progress on both short- and long-term goals.
Goldman grouped respondents into six income bands: under $50,000, $50,000 to $100,000, $100,000 to $200,000, $200,000 to $300,000, $300,000 to $500,000, and above $500,000. The paycheck-to-paycheck share fell from 60.8% in the lowest band to 22.2% among households earning $100,000 to $200,000. It then climbed back to 34.2% for the $300,000 to $500,000 band and 36.6% for the top band.
Households earning $200,000 to $300,000 were most likely to report significant progress. In that band, 42.2% said they were making meaningful headway on both short- and long-term financial goals.
Credit card habits follow the same curve. Some 46% of households earning more than $500,000 say they typically pay only the minimum on their credit card balances each month, or less. That’s nearly identical to the 47% of households earning under $50,000, and well above the 30% of households earning $200,000 to $300,000.
Top earners are also putting off their plans. Eighty percent of respondents earning more than $500,000 say they’ve had to delay a major financial goal despite being employed, the highest share of any income group. Forty-five percent say they’ve delayed retirement savings specifically, also the highest of any income group.
Why big paychecks don’t always feel big
Goldman says the strain at the top looks different from the struggle at the bottom. Lower-income households are trying to cover essentials. Higher earners point to more complex financial lives, higher lifestyle expectations, larger fixed commitments, and a gap between the retirement they envision and what they’ve actually secured. In practice, that can mean a bigger mortgage, pricier cars, private school tuition, and frequent travel—the kind of lifestyle inflation that can quietly absorb a raise. It’s a familiar pattern for so-called HENRYs, or “high earners, not rich yet.”
Family obligations play a role at every income level. “Higher-income individuals may be the financial anchors for their extended families,” a Goldman Sachs spokesperson told Fortune.
The report also notes that two households can report the same strain for very different reasons. For one, it may mean struggling to cover the bills. For the other, it may mean expenses and expectations that have grown faster than income. The results are self-reported, and most top earners still feel secure in their jobs: 87% of respondents earning more than $500,000 say their work provides a stable path toward long-term financial security.
Still, the data challenges a common assumption, Goldman wrote: more income doesn’t automatically buy more financial security.
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
