> 1. This is crazy to me. I could maybe cut $3K by taking a huge hit to quality of life (that would probably not be sustainable with a full time job anyways). Getting the other $7K would involve either homelessness or cutting back on eating and visiting family. How do salary earners manage to rack up $10K per year of purely unnecessary expenses?

Cleaning services, vacations, picking the fancy and nice daycare using some trendy educational system (Montessori, unschooling, whatever) instead of the one run out of someone's house in a scary part of town, ordering food delivery, monthly subscription services for all kinds of crap, new car every 2 years instead of a used one every 5 years... the list goes on and on.