How to live on $432 a month in America

I enjoy the part about "Heat? Well...I'm sure something will happen allowing me to have heat. No need for concrete plans there."

You mean this part?

> as far as heat goes, well, one could either pay a little extra in electric for that — or they could have the Amish deliver their scrap wood from their sawmills to burn in a wood stove, very cheaply.

Those are both vague and completely different ways to handle heating.

Also, conveniently, neither appear to have an associated cost so we don't have to worry about whether the financial math works out.

It's because when you live rural like this, wood stoves are common, and wood is free.

I live in the northwest, so I can't speak to upstate NY, but downed trees on state and federal land near roads is free to take. Every day there's people posting rounds of wood for free to take.

It's hard work, but it's good exercise and rewarding.

There's some upfront investment: $200 chainsaw, an old maul, and an old pickup truck, but those amortized over a decade is practically speaking $0 heat.

To add to the sibling comment, collecting this wood takes time. I've collected wood the forest service takes down for use in a stove I use but processing all that wood takes time. You bring it home, cut it into small bits, keep it in a dry area to make sure the green wood dries out, and then you meticulously rotate older and newer stock to make sure you use the driest stuff for heating.

If you're living on $432 / month and working 30-40 hours at this cashier job then using your off days to grab and process wood is honestly pretty miserable. There are slums in developing countries with higher standards of living because they can heat their "house" (read: tent or hut) with oil.