by sushi on 7/22/13, 12:30 PM with 164 comments
by Spooky23 on 7/22/13, 1:34 PM
My favorite was an older couple operating a small hotdog stand... they made a ridiculously delicious meatsauce and basically worked a 35 hour week in the summer in the Northeast, and a similar schedule for a couple of months down South.
They owned a nice house in city, were active in the church and community, and were genuinely good people, who made a great living selling hotdogs, mostly to government and Verizon workers.
But... they faced all of the downside risks of small business owners. Rain == slow or no sales. Big vacation weeks for the workforce == slow sales. Get sick? No pay. That said, it's probably still a better gig than being a game programmer.
by JPKab on 7/22/13, 1:27 PM
by parfe on 7/22/13, 3:32 PM
It's nice this person found a profitable niche but the concept itself doesn't lend itself to even linear growth.
by lazyjones on 7/22/13, 2:20 PM
(I don't know why this gets modded down, but let me clarify: his old salary is his personal income. The "doubled" salary is the income from his business, apparently the combined salary of both of them - so it's misleading to say that he "doubled his salary")
by JonSkeptic on 7/22/13, 1:21 PM
>We had no idea that we'd sell so much—we sold 100 shaobings in a day, business is only getting better and better." said the programmer. "We already earned enough for an apartment and now we're saving up more money. We hope to get married next year.
The story has a happy ending. It's nice to see people, if not doing what they love, then at least loving their newfound life. And that's the whole shaobing.
by bearwithclaws on 7/22/13, 6:55 PM
"Nong" means farmer ("Nong Fu"). It implies laborious work.
The closest translation to it should be "Code Farmer".
by dak1 on 7/22/13, 1:36 PM
If they're selling 100 a day, every day, at 2.5元/each, that would be 250元/day and ~7500元/month.
7500元 is only about $1220.
So even if the article is only assuming revenue per month (and not profit), they still have to increase their price or sales (or some combination) by 267% to hit the $3,259/month mentioned.
If you're talking actual profit, which would be a more adequate comparison to his previous salary, then it's probably closer to a factor of 5.
by CitizenKane on 7/23/13, 7:38 AM
Programmers are almost notoriously overworked and underpaid in China. Working 10 to 12 hours a day for $1000 a month is quite common. It's possible to make more money working six hours a day for half a month working as an English teacher.
The view in Eastern Asia is that a programmer is akin to a machine that you hand a specification and code is produced and hence the low pay. You could trade programming in China for a large number of other careers and double your salary. It's not a particularly usual thing.
If you were to trade this for a software development position in the US or Western Europe it's going to be a much different story. Culturally speaking, it's seen much more like and engineer or craftsmen rather than a labourer. Switching from a position like this in the US to selling food is much less likely to see the same kind of return.
by rdouble on 7/22/13, 3:51 PM
by Mikeb85 on 7/22/13, 3:56 PM
Alot of my friends left to start food trucks, street stands, etc... Keep in mind where I live (a cold part of Canada), you can realistically only sell street food for 4-6 months out of the year. They would all make $60,000 to $100,000 in a season, and now a few of them have brick and mortar restaurants to their name.
I worked a street food stand for a festival awhile back, we made $3000 in a day (split 2 ways).
Street food doesn't scale too well, and there are a whole slew of downsides, but if you can figure out an efficient way to make tasty food, you can make a lot of money and there's only a small barrier to starting out (likely less start up cost in China).
by ziko on 7/22/13, 2:08 PM
Mortality is closely connected with the hours we spend sitting each day. So that's one reason.
The other one is that after working so hard and saving up enough for the rest of your life, you need something that is much more stress-free. And selling something so basic as food is exactly that.
by Patrick_Devine on 7/22/13, 4:22 PM
The difference is upwards mobility. It's hard moving up the corporate ladder while flipping burgers. It was not so hard to turn the game programming job into a lucrative career in software development.
by joshuaellinger on 7/22/13, 3:33 PM
It was funny on several levels... if you didn't work there.
by jval on 7/23/13, 1:55 AM
I know that as an early stage founder that I am part of the problem, but I often stop to think about whether what I'm doing is really that valuable or if I should just join another company in growth phase. I think the 100th engineer at Facebook would have had a lot more impact than most of the failed founders today.
I just think that being a founder is a harsh experience that you have to learn from many times over in order to get right, and that even when things go well there's no guarantee of a money pot at the end of the rainbow. I think you really need to have motivations other than cash to truly convince yourself that what you're working on is worth waking up for every day.
I think if you have that motivation inside you then being a founder is a great experience. Thinking you should just leave your job for an instant moneypot is just silly though, IMHO.
by SeanDav on 7/22/13, 2:22 PM
by thenomad on 7/22/13, 1:55 PM
A rare example of an adage which still works when applied literally.
by suyash on 7/22/13, 1:50 PM
by bonede on 7/22/13, 3:28 PM
by anothermouse on 7/23/13, 11:19 AM
I'm a programmer in Finance in London, and a good day rate for a Senior contractor is 600GBP/day. I have a good friend who started out doing "grilled chorizo in a ciabatta bun" at a London market, and easily made 1000GBP his first day. Now he uses employees to man that stall, and has moved on to the next idea, at a different locations doing something different to allow him to do something that appeals during different seasons. By now I imagine he is easily making double what I do.
by tocomment on 7/22/13, 2:13 PM
by netcan on 7/22/13, 2:09 PM
Hearing that a good living can be made selling traditional street food in China is interesting though. That's some sort of sign.
by lcedp on 7/22/13, 2:38 PM
Also, if you click the Chinese link in the article you'll find a video.
by CurtMonash on 7/23/13, 8:30 AM
by INTPenis on 7/23/13, 7:51 AM
Just because you have the logical mind for something does not mean it will make you happy. I often feel like I lack the logical mind for working in IT but I freaking LOVE the work.
by seivan on 7/22/13, 4:18 PM
by tracyma on 7/23/13, 9:05 AM
by mvkel on 7/22/13, 4:41 PM
by knv on 7/22/13, 3:15 PM
by jfb on 7/22/13, 6:46 PM
by scourgen on 7/23/13, 10:01 AM
by mattdeboard on 7/22/13, 4:26 PM
by wxspll on 7/22/13, 2:30 PM
by itsbpk on 7/22/13, 6:46 PM
by LekkoscPiwa on 7/22/13, 2:28 PM
All these smart folks at Stanford are wasting their time studying IT, law or finance. Too much competition. Study agriculture, be rich. Farmers are going to drive Maserati's in the future not successful software developers or Wall Street crowd.