I dropped out of college and now earn $159,000 as an engineer. Lifestyle creep left me $30,000 in debt.0

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• August 22, 2026

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation for our Cost of Living video series with Devonte Duncan, 27, a software engineer living in Brooklyn, New York City. It has been edited for length and clarity. When I started making six figures, I remember my friends and I would go out to eat, and the