With the news that a Sex and the City revival TV series is currently in the works (without Kim Cattrall’s scene-stealing Samantha Jones), fans have been reminiscing on their first impressions of the show when it launched in the late 1990s.
For years, many viewers have questioned how writer Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) is able to afford her lavish lifestyle, complete with nights out on the town, designer ensembles and a spacious apartment in the heart of New York City.
Well, according to budgeting fintech bank thinkmoney.co.uk, her salary would definitely not have been enough to cover it all in real life.
According to the firm, Carrie’s job as a columnist in the TV series would have earned her a salary of approximately £58,137 per year.
However, as per the company’s calculations, the character’s proclivity for fashion, dining out and cocktail evenings with the girls would cost £59,547.82 a year – without the addition of rent and bills.
Take, for example, Carrie’s lack of culinary skills. The character states at one point that she keeps her sweaters in the stove for storage, as she has no other use for the kitchen appliance.
With that in mind, if she were to pay for takeaway meals and restaurant dinners every day for a year, this would come out to over £10,000, thinkmoney claims.
The firm believes that over the course of a year, Carrie would be likely to consume over 250 pricey cocktails, if she and her friends were to go out for a tipple every weekend.
This would amount to more than £3,300 of expenditure, assuming that the cocktails cost at least £12 each.
In Sex and the City, Carrie is famously greatly fond of Manolo Blahnik heels, stating in one episode: ‘You can take my Fendi baguette, you can take my ring and my watch, but please don’t take my Manolo Blahniks.’
If she were to purchase a pair of Manolo Blahniks once a month, this would set her back around £4,700 a year.
While Carrie is thought to have earned the equivalent of £58,137 in her capacity as a columnist, the salaries of her close friends in the show varies.
Thinkmoney states that Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) would have been the highest-earning of the four women, receiving an estimated £96,678 a year as a lawyer.
Samantha would have come in second with her job in PR with £63,746 a year, while Charlotte York (Kristin Davis) would have earned £43,109 per annum for her career as an art dealer.
Commenting on the company’s findings, John Sabinsky, head of communications at thinkmoney, said that it’s ‘important’ not to get swept up in the lives of fictional characters.
‘It’s been fun to look at the findings to see which of our favourite fictional characters could afford their lavish lifestyles,’ he said.
‘But it’s important for us all to not get too caught up by what we see on the big screen. As it turns out, only a few of them could actually afford to live the life we see!’
The original Sex and the City series is available to rent or purchase on Amazon Prime Video.
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