I feel this argument is taking things to extremes. There are many intermediate states between living in a vehicle without heat and insisting on eating out, buying nice things, having vacations, expensive phones and plans, etc.

I dunno. I can easily give up on ever eating out, buying new things (I rarely do anyway, other than books), going on vacations (I only get a couple of weeks' vacation every year anyway), or purchasing new phones for un-cheap prices (I already keep mine until it breaks each time). Those are actually pretty negligible expenses. If I really want to speed up the trip towards financial independence, I have to reduce my housing and health-insurance premiums.

That's the only place the money can really come from to invest more than I already do.

Do you ever get tired of pushing the trope of "expensive phones and 4k TVs and eating out" ? I'm just curious.

Because the necessities have been going up at a far faster pace than the digital pseudo-luxuries.

Just as an example, my projected health care costs for 2017 went up by an amount that is larger than a nice phone + eating out every other week combined.

That's just the increase, with no appreciable benefit to me in the services provided.

I'm sure many people could provide similar examples with rent or other necessary services.