I've thought long and hard about replying to this thread. I call myself cheap -- I don't care what other people call me. Would you be more comfortable if I said I was poor instead? All I know is for years I've been the "least economically blessed" person (is that better for you?) in any given room I've been in. I feel I can be cheap in my buying habits but still be generous with what I have. I'm too cheap to give away $12/yard fabric (and too cheap to buy it for myself) but yeah, I'm happy to share my $2/yard fabrics carefully gleaned from thrift stores and estate sales. I may not look poor or cheap, but I can tell you my average piece of clothing is used and typically costs $5 or less.
It is because I'm cheap that I was been able to keep my house despite various economic upheavals (plus my own hard work as well as my husband). The costs in buying a house meant that no, I was too cheap to take vacations or do a lot of other things. Too cheap to pay for fingernails or hair appointments or perfumes or whatever. It was luck that I bought in a rapidly appreciating area that let me move after 30 years to a more affordable area and now own a house outright and for the first time in my life have a tiny little nest egg. Knock on wood -- every time before some upheaval would take away everything I had carefully saved and scrimped to have.
It is because I'm cheap that I was able to feed my husband the meat based diet that he lost 200 pounds by buying and eating marked-down meat. Likewise, I am/was cheap by buying "2nd" quality produce at the ethnic markets instead of at the chain supermarkets. Why pay $3.99/pound for a 12 oz apple when I could buy a nutritionally identical but not so pretty apple for $0.99/pound??
During Covid I was very aware that I would have been very cold if I was at home with my school aged child back in the day. We turned on the heat for 30 minutes in the morning and an hour at night. Nice thing about cold is you can put on an extra layer or two -- with heat there comes a point where you can't take off any more. During Covid my house was cold because that was what we could afford, thermostat turned all the way up to 63. Cheap or reality? Does it really matter??
I'm ok being cheap and saying "oh that's not in the budget" or that I can't afford to go out to lunch. Not paying your fair share isn't cheap -- it's theft.