If you’re only complaint is the word “abject”, I encourage you to try to live on anywhere from $7 to $15 an hour, in a part-time job that doesn’t guarantee week to week how many hours you’ll get.

That is a very common reality.

My room mates all lived on slightly above minimum wage with part time hours. They were not in abject poverty. They were just plain poor. They still had cars, phones, video games, food, water, shelter. They each had an ACA plan heavily subsidized and probably were eligible for other welfare but didn’t use it as far as I am aware.

If you remove the word abject, the argument is:

> half of the US is living in poverty

This statement is also false.

> I encourage you to try to live on anywhere from $7 to $15 an hour

That's the bottom quintile, not the bottom half. The Median household income is $83,730, which would be more like $41.50.