<< Congratulations! You’re officially poor.>>

Exactly! You can live very well if you learn how to (legally) do your taxes right. It probably even more important than investing acumen.

<< This little exercise in retirement budgeting demonstrates that our official poverty line is a crock.>>

The Federal poverty line is a crock, but not in the direction you likely think it is.

thefp.com - Why do americans feel poor because

My strategy over the last 40 years has been to identify the amount of "skim, scam and fraud" in the system and develop a workaround. For example, if a well-made automobile lasts 20 years or more, and it loses 65% of it purchase price to depreciation over the first 3 or 4 years of ownership (like my 2020 Tesla Model Y), you're better off finding someone else to pay the depreciation and buying it used, i.e. 2020 price $65,000, my 2025 purchase price $21,000.)

intercst