1. Your family
2. Monthly costs where you live
Starting numbers are rough U.S. averages that I set as placeholders, not MIT's county data. Type in your local numbers (rent, childcare, and so on) for a result that fits your area.
Your living wage
Get the official local numbers
MIT's own calculator has county, metro and state figures for 12 family types, based on rent, food, childcare, health care, transportation and tax data for each place: livingwage.mit.edu. Use it to look up your area, then type those cost figures into the boxes above.
How this works: add up the eight basic needs (food, childcare, health care, housing, transportation, civic engagement, internet and mobile, other necessities), add income and payroll taxes, then find the hourly wage whose after-tax pay covers the total. Taxes here are an estimate using 2025 federal brackets, the child tax credit, the earned income credit, payroll tax and your state rate; MIT uses a fuller tax model. It budgets no restaurants, vacations or savings. This is an independent tool and is not affiliated with or endorsed by MIT.