I don't know how to say it in Japanese, but it's the idea of making do with very little money.
Eg. if you spend most of your money and there is still a week left until pay day, you might say you were nickel-and-diming it til you get paid again.
It comes from the idea that instead of having (lots of) dollars to spend, you have only nickels (5 cents) and dimes (10 cents) to spend. Not literally - figuratively.