Frugal living is for the middle-class and the rich

Frugal living as described here is for the middle-class and for the rich. I hope you all can see that.<br><br>I'm a housing security caseworker, and I have poor clients call me and tell me they are living in squalor because the cheap landlords won't clean up their act. It's sad, because they don't deserve it. They want to end up living in a crappy apartment, but that's still far from what they want to end up with.<br><br>I've struggled with poverty myself. I've struggled for years with it. I don't know anybody who lives in poverty who want to be frugal, live on the cheap, or be minimalist. We want clean homes, clean clothes, clean food, clean cars, clean shelves, clean dishes. If anybody tells you that being minimalist or want to end up living frugal is the best life, they shouldn't be trusted. Minimalist living in the upper classes is a form of fetishization of poverty. <br> <br>There is a concept called the poverty trap. If you end up living in poverty, you might not ever be able to escape it. It's a minimalist lifestyle, but not by choice. If you end up living frugal as an upper-class or middle-class person, it's still a middle-class or upper-class lifestyle, and people who have never lived in poverty don't understand how living in poverty is like. If you end up living frugal or minimalist, you still have a choice to end up living in a clean space, live without hoarding, and live without living in squalor. You still have money to spend on things you want, no matter how much you cut back or how much you try to save, you still end up living with a lot more money than most poor people. It's minimalist, but it's not the same type of minimalist that you end up living in when you end up living in poverty. <br> <br>This is why I end up living on this subreddit. I'm still trying to get out of poverty. I'm trying to escape the poverty trap. I'm trying to end up living in a clean and safe apartment without mold and rodents and without living in a crappy neighborhood. I'm trying to end up living in a space where I have clean clothes, clean food, clean car, clean shelves, clean dishes. I'm trying to end up living in a space where I can keep my minimalist lifestyle, but I end up living in a space where I have money to spend, live without hoarding, live in a space where I can afford to spend money on myself. <br> <br>So, if you want to end up living in a minimalist lifestyle, stop fetishizing poverty. Stop fetishizing poor people. Stop fetishizing living cheaply. Stop fetishizing slumming. Stop fetishizing the minimalist lifestyle of poor people. If you want to end up living frugal or minimalist for real, then don't fetishize it. <br> <br>And if you want to end up living in poverty, then go for it. Go live in a crappy neighborhood and live in a crappy apartment without food or money or a job. Go end up living in a minimalist lifestyle and end up living in a space where you can't afford to spend money on yourself. Go end up living in squalor and see how it is. Go end up living like that for a while. See how it is to end up living without clean clothes, clean food, clean car, clean shelves, clean dishes. See how it is to end up living without money to spend on yourself. <br> <br>That's the reality of frugal and minimalist living.