Net worth isn't really built by how much you earn — it's built by the gap between what you earn and what you spend, sustained over years. That gap, expressed as a percentage of take-home, is your savings rate, and it's a far better predictor of your financial future than your salary alone.
Here's a number to aim for: a savings rate of 20% of take-home is considered strong and sustainable for most households. On a ₹60,000 monthly income, that's ₹12,000 a month going toward saving, investing, or repaying debt — every single month, rain or shine. If you're already there, you're doing meaningfully better than most people at any income level.
Why the rate matters more than the rupee amount: someone earning ₹2,00,000 a month who saves ₹10,000 has a savings rate of just 5%, while someone earning ₹50,000 who saves ₹10,000 is at 20%. The second person, despite the smaller paycheck, is building wealth faster relative to their life. Income sets your ceiling; savings rate determines how much of that ceiling you actually keep.
To work out yours, divide what you saved or invested last month by your take-home pay. If it's below 20%, that's not a failure — it's simply your starting point. Even raising it by a few percentage points a year, through automated raises and trimmed autopilot spending (the latte-math approach), compounds into a meaningfully different position within a few years.