I'd like to be a millionaire, but that is an method to achieve another goal, not the goal itself.

I'd like to vertically farm algae on an industrial scale as an atmospheric carbon sink, and additionally see if there is any way to do so profitably while remaining carbon negative. 1 million dollars would probably be enough to construct a small facility and hire the staff and experts I would need to figure this out.

"Millionare/billionaire" as an identity should be an insult.

Anybody with an industrial mindset will bare minimum want to take any large amount of liquid asset and turn it into production. Build and improve factories, fund research, improve living conditions near your operations. Having money acruing interest can be part of that, but should not be your primary revenue stream.

Nobody wants to enter professions that require hard work because it pays pittance relative to popular entertainers, and traditional milestone purchases have become moving targets, so why not gamble it all?

which is honestly fucking sad, you bet your ass i'd be buying the most expensive shit from the local coffee shop if i had a billion dollars

I don't know avout deserving, cutting back is just something many do to make ends meet. If you have the money for tea and smoothies then I don't see what the issue for anyone would be.

Bring able to save a significant portion of your income more than the US poverty line for 30 years without some black swan life event happening to drain it also partly depends on being lucky or/and not having children. The median US household makes plenty to become millionaires for maintainkng a reasonable QoL if there aren't any such black swan events or children involved.

For my mom, it was a custody battle for children that initially wiped her life savings. She since has often worked 100 hours weeks at a job that pays above average for a blue collar job to make enough to back up to retire (plus happens to have worked at the same company long enough to get a pension, something they phased out for anyone less senior than her), but that's not something anyone should be expected to do be able to retire, so I'm not quick to judge people for not having accumulated money.

But a lot of people waste money on convenience in ways that definitely add up cumulatively over the decades. $5/day adds up to $150k after adjusting for inflation over 30 years. A $10/month subscription is $10k over 30 years. Reducing costs like that in a few places can cumulatively get you to at least theoretically being on track to be a millionaire.

For a sense of proportion, in a housing market where house prices go up 5% a year, a $200k house (which nowadays is cheap), goes up $10k in a year.

So that "trick" barelly slows down the rate at which you're getting further behind on your chance of getting your own place to live, even a cheap on in a moderatelly growing market.

Such barebones saving only works if you're really really close to being able to afford a house, otherwise you're just making your life a bit more miserable for no actual gain as the extra savings are just going to be sucked out in paying for just about anything where realestate costs have an impact (so, not just somthing quite directly affected like your rent, but also pretty much all products and services bought from stores and companies who rent their space).

People seriously buy coffees every day? I like coffee, and I have enough disposable income to buy coffees often outside, but honestly never do it. Maybe it's because I grew up poor but it seems an awfully wastefuk habit. I have coffee at home before work, or in the office (free).

You could try having a trust fund...

Have you tried supplementing your income with fraud?