The amount you can create via saving is minuscule compared to starting a business, investment banking, being a lawyer etc. Work creates wealth.

Side note, many of the people I know who are wealthy enjoy spending it which is the antithesis of penny pinching.

1. Have wealth given to you.

2. Live beneath your means (aka save part of your income)

I get "penny pinching" can mean being cheap or something. But ultimately, saving is what makes you wealthy. And it's a much more accessible and in your control than winning the lottery of life by starting a successful business, or being some hotshot lawyer.

Side note: Warren Buffet enjoys not spending his wealth, which is exactly penny pinching ;-)

https://www.scmp.com/magazines/style/people-events/article/2...

This is where your premise breaks down. There are millions of people who do this who are not “wealthy”. They’re just “retired”. Acquiring real wealth requiring vastly more then your means to the point where the ratio of income to expenses doesn’t really mean much.

Even if you consider Buffet a penny pincher that’s not how he created his wealth.

Funny enough, though, Buffet got started working a pretty regular job, saving over a million in inflation adjusted dollars before starting his business.