Growing your own food is certainly a good start. It saves money, isn't taxable, and produces better food. We tend to think about our activities having some sort of economic value mostly because we need cash for those things we can't produce for ourselves. But we don't really require much cash if we are self-reliant. Earning more puts you on a hamster wheel. Earning more means you pay more in taxes.

A job requires transportation. Now you're putting in miles daily on your depreciating vehicle, buying fuel and paying maintenance costs to get to work. More traffic on the roads requires taxes to maintain the roads. If you have a family, going to work requires paying for daycare, if both parents work.

We have hyper-convenienced ourselves into an economic ouroboros. We save time and effort buying products rather than producing for ourselves. We're still working, just not on the simple things that sustain us. And what do we do with our spare time? We buy more stuff that requires us to spend more money to maintain it.