This blog is a re-posting of a blog I wrote back in January, with updated information. For some reason no one has done this yet, so I am offering it again. You can read the original here.
Business Plan: You fix my bathroom window, I pay you.
Business Description: The bathroom on the third floor of my house has a window. The frame of this window is rotted, and does not allow the window to close properly. This allows me to hear conversations from my neighbors who are outside my house arguing loudly even though it is raining, cold, and late at night.
If you can fix it, I'll give you ten dollars. I estimate that you will need to buy about four dollars worth of lumber for this job. That will give you a $6 profit in addition to the rotted wood, which I will let you keep as a reader appreciation gift. You will also need a 40 foot ladder because the rotted frame is inaccessible from the inside of the house, and an umbrella because it is raining. You may also need to hire an assistant to hold the umbrella for you. I estimate that it will take you about an hour, (longer if you fall off the ladder, which I will not help you keep steady) which comes to $6 an hour. Not bad. Many people in China in 1000 BC never even heard of six dollars.
Six dollars can buy you a child bride in Iran, (creepy, not recommended) a house in Zimbabwe, (made of giraffe poo, not recommended) or six "Show your love" poems to any people you name. (Recommended)
Many have noted that this offer from How to Make a Dollar is actually a violation of Federal Minimum Wage laws, which have the minimum wage law at $7.25 per hour. But as always, we here at HTMAD have a way around the law, namely that you're being paid under the table.
ReplyDeleteBut seriously, when you account for FICA, you really would only get to keep $6.64 of that $7.25, and then after Federal Income Tax (assuming you still pay that), you would get to keep at most $5.98 of that. So as always, you come out ahead with advice from HTMAD.
Thanks OFCG, but isn't this more like contract employment? I mean, if the guy takes 10 mins to fix the window then he comes out better than a different guy who takes 4 hours. I think this is more like a contract job. I'm not responsible for how long it takes to fix.
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