https://www.npr.org/2024/04/11/1243982287/fbi-agents-housing-costs
"There are multiple stressors that folks experience," said Caroline Otto, assistant director of the FBI's Resource Planning office. "We have heard very compelling and heart-wrenching stories across the workforce in these areas."
Have they tried not eating food?
They definitely are. It's just a question of whether it is worth pursuing over other options.
They really aren't. Between pro-US propaganda and the fact that the good times for these people are in pretty recent memory, pointing out how shit sucks in American now is not going to make most Americans, especially the kind who become FBI agents, embrace international socialism. Instead they'll want to strengthen US hegemony through more blatant imperialism so the treat train can get rolling again. It's why the most popular form of "leftism" in the US Stan's NATO.