Financial freedom is a spectrum. For me, when I was working for minimum wage, the equivalent of $3,000 back then meant 3 or 4 or months to find a new job if I g

Financial freedom is a spectrum. For me, when I was working for minimum wage, the equivalent of $3,000 back then meant 3 or 4 or months to find a new job if I got fired, without getting evicted. And it meant if my car broke down, I could either repair it or buy another one instead of taking a loan at a car lot, or relying on public transportation, which would have severely limited my employment opportunities. And it meant having a wider range of places to live since you could afford first, last and security deposit, which almost no one else working for minimum in that time and place could. If you can save $30,000 a year, do that, but in my experience $3,000 was orders of magnitude better then $0.