What does "poverty" even mean in the present-day USA?

Ostensibly, it does not mean the same thing it meant in 200 AD, or 1700, or even 1950. In those times, poverty meant "you and your family might actually starve."

These days, you can buy giant bags of meat for $10, and find dumpsters literally overflowing with excess calories. I consistently see rice for $0.50/lb -- and when minimum wage is $15.50, the math isn't hard to do. Our "poor" people are actually dying from overeating.

By the looks of it, "voluntary poverty" in our era is really just a way of saying "prioritizing subsistence instead of engaging in wealth-and-status-seeking behavior."

And people go apoplectic over that idea because the pursuit of wealth and status is essentially the primary and inviolable religious idol of American society. The idea that it is optional is considered more offensive than blasphemy -- and the idea that it could actually be morally preferable elicits an intense disgust response.

Their revulsion at the idea of "voluntary poverty" isn't the "but your kids will starve!" of the pre-modern era so much as it is a frustrated anger about extremely novel and ultra-modern notions of status.