← Home · Methodology · Essentials BenchmarkBenchmark v1.0 · June 2026 · Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Lowell, the East Bay
What a working life costs.
Short version. Before MoneyBadger reads a single line of your paycheck, it prices the essentials where you live: housing, food, transportation, healthcare, childcare, and everyday costs, for your household, from public primary sources. That number is the Essentials Benchmark. Your plan is measured against it, and every line of it can be traced to the government table it came from.
Why it exists
The benchmark comes from outside the paycheck.
Most budgets define "needs" as a percentage of your income. That math can never tell you the one thing that matters most: whether your steady pay actually covers a realistic life in your county, or whether overtime is quietly making up the difference. So we price the county first, from public data. Then we read your check. Then we show you how they fit, as one number and a sentence. Not a grade.
The six lines
Every line, from a named public primary.
Worked example: Philadelphia County, PA. Each line names its source, its vintage, and the arithmetic. The same lines appear in your plan with the derivation one tap away.
HousingHUD Fair Market Rents, FY202640th-percentile gross rent including utilities, so no separate utilities line ever appears. Bedroom count follows your household: one bedroom for adults only, two with one child, three with two or more. Priced by HUD metro fair-market area, not by city name: Chelmsford keys to the Lowell area ($2,351 for a 2BR), not Boston ($2,941). Philadelphia FY2026: $1,520 (1BR), $1,810 (2BR), with the 3BR line on FY2025 ($2,166) until the refresh publishes. New York City $2,910 and Oakland and the East Bay $2,912 (2BR).huduser.gov · FY2026
FoodUSDA Food Plans, Moderate-Cost Plan, April 2026 reportPer-person monthly cost of food at home, summed for your household with the USDA's official household-size adjustments. Example: two adults and one child come to $998/mo. These are national averages; high-cost metros usually run above them, so your real grocery bill wins if higher.fns.usda.gov · Apr 2026
Transp.BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey, metro tables, 2023-24Operating costs only, from each metro's own table (Philadelphia, New York, Boston, San Francisco-Oakland). Philadelphia: gasoline and other fuels ($2,244/yr) + other vehicle expenses ($4,395/yr) + public and other transportation ($1,805/yr) = $8,444/yr, or $703.67/mo. Your real car payment overrides this upward.bls.gov/cex · 2023-24
HealthBLS Consumer Expenditure Survey, metro tables, 2023-24Healthcare spending per consumer unit, per metro. Philadelphia: $6,535/yr, or $544.58/mo; Boston runs highest of the live areas at $622/mo.bls.gov/cex · 2023-24
ChildcareState rate charts: PA OCDEL · NYS OCFS · MA EEC · CA CDSSCenter-based preschool, full time, from each state's own published rates: Pennsylvania $1,337/child (OCDEL chart eff. 2025-01-01, 60th percentile of the 2022 market survey, Philadelphia ELRC Regions 18/19 midpoint); New York City $1,902 (OCFS market rate eff. 2024-10-01, about the 80th percentile of the 2024 survey); Massachusetts $1,771 Metro Boston and $1,352 Lowell area (EEC FY2026 chart eff. 2025-07-01, cost-based reimbursement ceilings that Boston private tuition often exceeds); California $1,588 Alameda (CDSS ceiling eff. 2022-01-01). The California number traces to 2018 market prices and usually understates today's Bay Area cost, and the plan says so right on the line: it is a state ceiling, never a current market price, and a member's real cost always overrides it upward.PA · NY · MA · CA
EverydayBLS Consumer Expenditure Survey, metro tables, 2023-24Apparel and services + personal care + housekeeping supplies, per metro. Philadelphia: ($2,252 + $1,040 + $1,179)/yr = $4,471/yr, or $372.58/mo.bls.gov/cex · 2023-24
| Household | A working month in Philadelphia County |
|---|
| 1 adult, no children | $3,615.31 |
| 2 adults, no children | $3,943.72 |
| 2 adults, 1 child | $5,765.43 |
| 2 adults, 2 children | $7,631.13 |
| 2 adults + 1 child, by area | A working month here |
|---|
| Philadelphia County, PA | $5,765.43 |
| The Lowell area, MA | $6,482.60 |
| Oakland and the East Bay, CA | $7,347.02 |
| New York City | $7,468.35 |
| Greater Boston, MA | $7,491.60 |
Post-tax essentials, benchmark v1.0, June 2026 vintage. Childcare is the swing line everywhere. Households with two or more children need a 3-bedroom rent line, which only Philadelphia carries so far; everywhere else the ratio simply does not render for them until that line is sourced.
The rules
Three rules the benchmark never breaks.
Post-taxTaxes are never benchmarked.
The benchmark is the post-tax cost of essentials. Your taxes are decoded from your own paystub, line by line, which beats any county average. No double counting.
The valveUnsourced means unshown.
If any line in your county cannot be traced to a public primary source, no coverage number renders at all. You will never see a ratio built on a guess.
Yours winsYour real costs override, upward.
The benchmark is the floor of realism, not a cap. If your actual rent or childcare runs higher, your number wins. Lines never adjust downward to flatter the math.
How it's used
One number and a sentence.
Your steady take-home, plus the savings you choose to make from it, divided by the benchmark for your county and household. That is steady take-home coverage. Above 1.15, your steady pay covers a realistic life here and the plan accelerates. Between 0.95 and 1.15, the margin is thin and the plan protects your steady take-home first. Below 0.95, overtime is covering part of your essentials; that is worth knowing, and the plan starts with the moves that close the gap.
Savings you choose to make count toward coverage at their real value, because a disciplined saver should never read as someone who cannot cover their life. Coverage is never shown as a grade or a color. It is a map reference for where the plan starts.
Counties
Where the benchmark is live.
LivePhiladelphia County, PA
All six lines sourced for every household size, including the 3BR line for larger families. The original benchmark, and still the most complete.
LiveNew York City
The five-borough HUD area. Rents vary widely by ZIP here; the benchmark carries the metro-wide 40th-percentile rent and says so, and a member's higher real rent wins.
LiveBoston & the Lowell area, MA
Two separate HUD areas on purpose: a 2BR runs $590/mo less in the Lowell area than in Boston. Pricing by metro alone would miss that.
LiveOakland & the East Bay, CA
Alameda and Contra Costa counties. The childcare line is California's state ceiling, which traces to 2018 prices and runs below today's market; the plan labels it exactly that way.
PartialSan Francisco, CA
One-bedroom rent and childcare sourced; family-size rents not yet pulled, so family households here do not get a ratio yet.
NextSix more fire-first metros
Same recipe, after July 15. A metro goes live only when every line has its public primary on file.
Methodology lineage. The structure of the benchmark, essentials priced by housing area and household composition, is inspired by the MIT Living Wage Calculator's approach. The numbers are not theirs: every line is assembled directly from the public primary sources named above, so each one carries its own citation and vintage and can be checked by anyone.
Refresh calendar. USDA food plans refresh monthly. Massachusetts EEC rates: July 2026. HUD FY2027 rents: September 2026. New York's 2026 market-rate survey and Pennsylvania's 2025 survey: late 2026. BLS metro spending tables (2024-25 averages): about December 2026. California's replacement rate structure is on watch; the moment a current childcare number publishes, it replaces the 2018-derived ceiling.
See your county against your check.
The benchmark renders in your plan before a single number of yours, every line with its source one tap away.
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