&quot;A living&quot; is a rather broad concept. Two factors are grossly overlooked: the general standard of living is rising, and much of that rise results from making it nigh unto illegal to live below that standard. Even the &quot;poor&quot; expect easy indoor heat &amp; AC, toilets flushed with city-supplied drinking water, one car per adult, a cell phone per teen &amp; up, etc. I grew up on hand-split wood heat &amp; no AC, well water, one car for the household, wired phones with 4-digit numbers, etc. - and we were firmly one-income &quot;middle class&quot;. Nowadays wood stoves are regulated into near oblivion (near prohibitory particulate limits), heat &amp; AC standards required for &quot;certificate of occupancy&quot; along with high plumbing standards, cars include a plethora of then-unattainable options and must meet very high gas mileage standards, cell phones are a standard welfare item, etc. - all due to well-meaning but subtly devastating requirements to live even in &quot;functional poverty&quot;. Normalization of home mortgages, insurance-paid access to extremely high health care standards, and easy access to crushing loans for education, all seem perfectly justified now yet persuasively &quot;force&quot; people to work more and more &quot;to make a living&quot; which many of us saw as luxurious not all that long ago.<p>You <i>can</i> live well on a whole lot less - as most people did not all that long ago. Ditch the &gt;1000 sq ft homes, instant shirt-sleeve indoor temperatures, waste-encouraging volumes of drinking water, high-MPG with-all-the-features cars, supercomputer-in-your-pocket phones, etc. Get a catastrophic health insurance plan. Pay your way thru college. Downgrade the phone. And elect leaders who seek to make simple living <i>legal</i>, and otherwise decrease burdensome tax rates.<p>Your &quot;living&quot; standard is your choice. Really. Contain your costs, and you can live on a whole lot less. As always I&#x27;ll be derided for these observations, but it&#x27;s what I grew up on.