"Once income and spending exceed this level, taxes must be paid. Unless…

Unless that income comes from qualified dividends or long-term capital gains. In this case, a married couple can have $24,400 a year in income AND $78,750 in investment income, TAX-FREE"

If you can get 78k$ yearly investment income from index funds, you already have a net worth of several million $, and you're thus already among the people that don't need to work (or you had some incredible luck for smaller investments)

But according to that link, all you have to do is choose leisure over labor*

*and have $5M+ in assets

Closer to $2M will do it with a low risk of portfolio failure, $2.5M will do it with almost no risk of failure.

Don't hate the player, hate the game. Capital owners pay far less in taxes than worker bees.