I did not use a calculator the first time, but I don’t think I was that far off.

This calculator says that if you live in California making $400k a year, your takehome pay is $238k

You pay like 40% tax at that salary.

That’s like 400k a year pre-tax salary. If they’re making that much and still can’t afford a nice meal, they’ve got some serious problems with budgeting and restraint.