Reading this makes me feel like I'm from another planet. Most of my family have worked until their late sixties, they never made 40k or went through the horror of a 10 hour coach flight. You make it sound like that's hardship instead of a position of incredible luxury.
My main priority is quitting young (<45) and it's probably going to be on much less than 40k and I'm going to be so glad to be able to finally live a little. I don't expect to live until very old age anyway due to health issues so to be able to be free is going to be so much more important than the option to fly business class.
Yeah, I'm always baffled at the frugality arguments. We live on about $40k right now and we don't want for anything. In fact, I'd say we live a rather clownish lifestyle. It's one of those things where my wife and I don't bother with gifts on special occassions (birthdays, holidays, anniversaries) because if there's something we want, we just get it immediately. I guess the difference between "frugal" people and the general populace is that we just don't have many "wants." Our cars are 7 and 15 years old, our TV is close to a decade old (although we did buy a $100 32" TV last month!), and we almost never eat out at a restaurant.
When I hear about people who save $0, I'm perplexed at what they're spending their money on. We know most of our coworkers make similar salaries, which means a minimum of six figures for a two income household. If I was in Brewster's Millions, I'd be screwed.
I guess normies' "what would you do in retirement?" is the same as my "how do you spend all your money?"