A $100,000 salary goes further in Houston than New York or Austin

If you live in Houston and earn a $100,000 salary, you’re doing pretty well, financially speaking.

Or, at least, you can afford a more luxurious lifestyle than you would have in most major U.S. cities, according to a new analysis from SmartAsset, a website devoted to consumer-focused financial information.

After federal and local taxes, the analysis found, a Houstonian earning $100,000 takes home $74,515. Because Houston’s cost of living is just 91.8 percent of the national average, those earnings are worth $81,350, putting Houston sixth on the list of big cities where $100,000 goes furthest.

Memphis, Tenn. ranks first on the list: a $100,000 salary is worth $86,444 in Grind City. Texas cities, however, dominate the top 10, with El Paso coming in second, Corpus Christi in fourth, Lubbock fifth, Houston sixth, and San Antonio, Fort Worth and Arlington tied for seventh.

That largely is because Texas does not have a state income tax, and its major cities tend to have low costs of living compared to New York, San Francisco or San Diego.

In New York City, SmartAsset found, a $100,000 is worth just $35,791 after taking out taxes and adjusting for cost of living. Ouch.

Los Angeles, Boston, Seattle and Washington, D.C. also are among the cities where take-home pay is worth the least.

The only major Texas city that didn’t make the top 10 in SmartAsset’s analysis, which looked at the 76 largest cities in the United States, was Austin. It came in at 24th, with $100,000 being worth $73,777 after adjusting for cost of living.

Note, though: SmartAsset’s analysis does not account for property taxes, a source of angst, as well as financial strain, for many Texans.

The analysis, the SmartAsset explains, was inspired by a recent survey that found more than half of Americans who earn six figures reported living paycheck to paycheck, even though $100,000 is a relatively high salary.

The median household income in the United States is around $71,000 a year, according to the Census Bureau.