And how much was the good old state of NJ pulling from your income?
Just short of zero. In one ten-year period I pulled down about $3MM and paid a grand total of $1500.00. The virtues of having a whoop-ass accountant.
Of course, fucking the taxman meant I could save nothing and am now in the dumper. I just could not reconcile myself to paying taxes to these bastards who subsidize the parasites of all stripe. Steve (accountant) kept me in the middle of legality the whole time, so I could tell Themme to fuck off without fear. I just kept my head down, worked like a mad bastard, billed like crazy, and spent it all just to deny Themme the least bit of my labors. I worked strictly C2C through my engineering consulting corporation.
It all seems an age ago and so far away, as if it never happened and I am just imagining it all. I do sometimes wonder.
I reckon that taxes in Freehold, in the type of home I am imagining you had, are probably $1000 a month now.
I bought the house, situated in Monmouth Battlefield State Park, in '87 for $177K; rather high in those days. It sold recently for $660K, which is simply outrageous. If you look at an image of the art-deco spire of the '39 World's Fair, you are looking at the structural timber from which my house had been erected in the '40s. The previous owner had worked construction and demolition of the site in those days. He was of meager income and so took all the scrap timber and build the house, which is rather stout, but not fancy. The best feature was the 625 ft.^2 kitchen, in which I spent most of my time when home, which was not often.
Overall, it works for me, and when I retire and the kids are gone, I'll sell it all, buy a camp way the hell up north and be done with it.
Hey, if you can manage it, by all means enjoy it while you can.
We are between a rock and a hard place at the moment. Perhaps I will be able to find a way out, perhaps not. I still cannot reconcile the tax thing, though.
Speaking of criminal taxation - back in the late 70s I was acquainted with someone in Jackson Twp. He had a split-level house on about an acre. Nice, but nothing to write home about. Because Jackson had no "ratables", he was stiffed for $34 THOUSAND dollars per year in taxes. I'd have insured it up the wazoo, burned it, collected, dumped 2000 gallons of transformer oil, and walked away just to screw the local gov. for such evil as this. They should be burned with gasoline until they are naught more than ash, these filthy robbers.