What's average in the US? Are you using dual incomes as in husband and wife in that figure? I live in NJ where everything is more expensive than other states like real estate taxes, car insurance, health insurance and houses. The cost of living is also very different from south jersey to north jersey.
Everything is relative too. In my profession it's common for a guy to make in NJ $110,000 base with 20K plus in over time. A decent house is $300K to $400K. The real estate taxes on the house will be 7K to 10K a year. Car insurance $1600.
In South Carolina the guy in the same job is making $40K with maybe 5K of overtime. Roughly the same size house will cost around 180K with a lot more land. The real estate taxes will be about $1000 a year. I don't know what the car insurance is but I bet it's around $450.