I think people over state cost of living, or rather cost of living is high for luxuries. You can still buy bulk rice and beans in Manhattan for a reasonable price and live on that. But if you want to eat at restaurants well that's gonna cost. Rent is unavoidable, as are high taxes, fees for things like car ownership and use, and some other stuff I can't think of. But if you simply want to survive off a basic home prepared diet and you can enjoy free or low cost activities like bike riding, lifting weights, video games, etc then you are going to be avoiding almost all of the high cost of living inherent in these places. Cars are absurdly expensive there but you don't need a car. I guess another way to put it is you can choose to downscale your life rather than spend high amounts on the same things you'd have in a low cost of living place.