Goldman Sachs survey: 36% of workers earning more than $300,000 live paycheck to paycheck

Thirty-six percent of workers earning more than $300,000 a year say they live paycheck to paycheck, according to the 2026 Goldman Sachs Asset Management Retirement Survey & Insights Report. That compares with 23% of workers earning $100,000 to $300,000, InvestmentNews reported on Oct. 14.

The survey of 5,106 Americans, conducted in July 2026, also found that 76% of top earners said they had put off a major financial goal.

The share of respondents who increased retirement savings fell to 39%, while the share who reduced savings rose to 14%, up from 8% a year earlier. This publication reported in September that the increase share had fallen from 55% a year earlier, and on Oct. 2 that 37% of respondents earning over $500,000 live paycheck to paycheck.

Brian Baker, a chartered financial consultant at The Baker Financial Group, an affiliate of Strategic Financial Alliance Partners, said a bigger income usually brings bigger commitments that rise just as quickly. Spending less on its own, in his view, rarely solves the problem. "We need to understand where their money is going and make sure their income is being used intentionally," he told InvestmentNews. His starting set: cash flow, taxes, debt, benefits and existing savings. For high earners he puts weight on tax planning — maximizing employer benefits, using tax-advantaged accounts appropriately, weighing Roth against pre-tax savings and being deliberate about where investments are held. Once cash-flow needs are understood and reserves are adequate, he said, there is often more capacity to invest than the client initially believed.

Josh Strange, president and founder of Good Life Nova, sorts spending through a framework his firm calls ELF: essential, lifestyle and fun. Essentials cannot be cut quickly, he said, but the other two categories usually leave room. "When you're in a boat that is sinking, you need to find the hole before you start bailing," he told InvestmentNews. His order of operations runs from identifying where the money goes, to getting a handle on liabilities — including the high-interest credit card balances he says often accompany overspending at high incomes — to maximizing workplace benefits and building a short-term reserve bucket.

Only then does Strange consider the long-term investment portfolio: "I can't tell you how I would build their portfolio because I don't know what they currently have."