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Living In Tokyo's Capsule Hotels
afabbro writes "Capsule Hotel Shinjuku 510 once offered a night’s refuge to salarymen who had missed the last train home. Now with Japan enduring its worst recession since World War II, it is becoming an affordable option for people with nowhere else to go. The Hotel 510’s capsules are only 6 1/2 feet long by 5 feet wide. Guests must keep possessions, like shirts and shaving cream, in lockers outside of the capsules. Atsushi Nakanishi, jobless since Christmas says, 'It’s just a place to crawl into and sleep. You get used to it.'”
I did 6 months of that multiple times. Its not too bad.
but if it came time to give up luxuries, it would be one of the first to go.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I wonder if Westerners are accepted at these places?
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
especially when you get to pay for the privilege
Oh, yes, it's very affordable. $600+ a month can easily buy you a decent apartment pretty much anywhere else, but here you get a room that's smaller than a prison cell that you can just barely sleep in.
I could see people sleeping in one of these once in a while if they have to pull shift work or if they miss a train, but every day? Even living with your parents would be less degrading than living in one of these as an apartment.
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
I stayed in a couple of capsule hotels during my trip to Japan in 2006. The good ones, such as one I can't remember the name of in Hakata, were great spa-like experiences which were still rather cheap. The worst one was actually in Shinjuku in Tokyo, where the capsules were badly ventilated and the in-hotel restaurant gave me food poisoning (cow-stomach ramen did not go down well in my own stomach, apparently).
Hiro Protagonist's place sounded awful, but much better than this in Snowcrash.
Home of The Suki Series
Off topic? Come on, that's hilarious!!! Posting anonymously to prevent the mod gods from crushing me...
I would get beaten to death by other patrons who didn't appreciate my revving-dirtbike-level snoring.
The fact that Japan's homelessness is large enough to now be visible is pretty shocking. Although as far back as 2001, I saw a few homeless in Ueno park. It's a problem they very much liked to sweep under the rug, but they can no longer. Most Japanese are taught to save as much as we spend, even if you're dirt poor, and that usually mitigates the chances of one becoming homeless, if it is only for lack of a job. But as the person at the end of the article shows, that will only go so far, if you are out of a job for a long time. An increasing disconnectedness in family structure may also contribute to a decreasing natural social safety net in urban areas. The latter is only a guess. There are varying qualities of capsule hotels, and it sounds like the lower end ones are becoming long term residencies.
Wouldn't that be cheaper to reduce the population instead of continually making people live like rats in a cage?
Guess we'll just have to wait for the rest of the world to turn to total shit before living in a storage unit becomes 'appealing'.
Hey what do you know...just like my Carl Fargman drawers back at home.
I do feel for the poor chaps who must do it, but personally, I do this _every_ chance I get. Longest was about 2 weeks. I actually prefer capsules to conventional hotels: nice long saunas, a chance to meet and hang out with interesting people (rather than holing up in a room), it forces you to stay out (again, so you don't stay holed in), and you can't beat the price: $25-$35 a night, right in the middle of all the action.
You could also do pretty much the same at Internet Cafes. I've found the accommodation (couch+cubicle+snacks+internet+manga+games) to be far better than even most first-class flight cabins. You still need your everyday clothes on, so I'd stay there max 2 days.
Tip: best way to visit Japan: travel very light. Buy shaving supplies, soap, t-shirts, etc. at the local combini or 99 yen store. Instead of spend money at a single hotel, spend it traveling to different parts of the country: danjiri festival here, live music there, temple over there, robots over there, party over here. All without luggage to slow you down.
health care is free / payed for by all as well,
So people with out jobs can still get care
When I traveled to Japan I ended up staying in a capsule hotel for one night. The problem (and only problem) I had with them is the fact that they allow smoking. Almost every japanese male (male only btw) smokes, as one of my old japanese coworkers said "You aren't a man if you don't smoke". Well, when you have 510 people smoking in a very very small building it becomes not only disgusting but I got really sick from it. After that day I stopped smoking, and haven't lit up since.
WTF Slashdot, why do I have to login 50 times to post?
What are the chances of any of these guys bringing a real live girl back to their "capsule"?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
By Tokyo standards $640 a month is cheap
(Opinion Alert)
I'd love to see it implemented in the states. We yanks over the pond seem to think the size of your sleeping quarters is essentially proportional to your rank in society, and having this totally alternative means of housing, even for just a short term, could provide a constructive new perspective to a lot of people. Hitting "rock bottom," while still absolutely devastating, would be survivable. You'd have to start from the beginning (and bottom), but for people that fall off the wagon that's usually what they need. These domiciles could also become a sort of luxury for the homeless on particularly stormy days. Since all things age, perhaps in time the older capsule's could be subsidized for permanent homeless accommodation. I just really can't see a downside to these things, and can only see a huge gain for a variety of cultures in the US.
Also, capsules would enable a lifestyle not seen since the 60s and 70s (the most artistically prolific period of the US, IMO, and largely in part of the widespread bohemianism), and it would not be fueled by drugs, an outcasted youth, and war but rather the simple fact that its realistic and safe. It would be possible to live a completely normal life without ever owning a home and just paying your $X to bunk up on whatever side of town you ended the night. Whether or not you choose to accept it, there is a fairly large bohemian subculture in the US and cheap capsule housing could transform the lifestyle into something safer. And like I said before, all of the homeless could potentially take advantage of this. This benefits all of society in a multitude of ways--less people on the streets means less crime, less disease, and prettier cities just to name a few. If you're apposed to bohemianism and alternative lifestyles then think of it this way: we dirty hippies would finally be off of your lawn!
I could keep going on about how profitable this could be for the private sector, and how cheap this would be for the government to utilize (seems like they already do, see Navy post) but I'm pretty high and getting rambly so I'll spare you that mess. I can't wait to read the replies on this story... hopefully there'll be a good debate on whether capsule housing is practical or not.
Craigslist for NYC shows single rooms in sublets or shared apartments at a minimum of $125/week, so it's not outrageous to have your own space with a lockable door this way.
I've been thinking about this since I first saw it reported. I haven't been to Japan in two years, but I did live in central Tokyo for several years and I think I got a feel for the place. I know exactly where this hotel is and walked by it quite often.
A Shinjuku capsule hotels are not the cheapest in the city by any means. A $3 train ride can save you 50%. The only reason most people don't do that is because they missed the last train--not a problem for the unemployed.
And while yes, it is cheaper than a Tokyo apartment, many (most?) people who -work- in Tokyo can't afford to -live- there. They live out in the 'burbs, up in Saitama or down in Kawasaki or wherever, where you can get your own place for a lot less. Sure, it's an hour train ride to work, but in Tokyo that's pretty standard. And you'd get your own place rather than a luxury coffin.
I've talked to my friends who still work in central Tokyo trying to get conformation of this 'trend' but all of them have reported back that this is bogus. But none of them are homeless businessmen, so my sampling is biased.
Even high end spas in the countryside accept westeners with discreet(ish) tattoos. Yes, the official policy is still "100% tattoo ban", but it's not enforced. Hell, some places even let Yakuza in, but maybe those are not the finest of establishments.
On a topic more related to OP: The capsule hotels are not that bad, especially since you have washing facilities and good security. Also, if you have a capsule hotel where you can make a deal not to be thrown out every morning with all your belongings, which is what usually happens, and if you can make it a permanent address for jobseeking purposes, it becomes a downright awesome option for people on the way down or early on their way up.
I'd rather live in a capsule than in a cardboard box in an alley somewhere. Safer, warmer, and more secure.
"If you want to know what happens to you when you die, go look at some dead stuff."
The neuromancer tagline is pretty apropros. It is a shame that stuff like this has to spring up. I feel bad for the economic victims.
Please Mister Smart guy tell us, what are your businesses doing?
For those who don't know, "politics" is the American term for yakuza or organized crime.
Bow-ties are cool.
The capsule motels, despite the cigarette smoke, are actually quite nice inside. The only reason this works is that the Japanese value cleanliness more than most other cultures, and even the perpetually unemployed tend to pick up their own trash. Here in San Francisco, I'm sure the floors would be riddled with needles and the stench would pervade over a 3 block radius.
Also, I'm pretty sure they like to rent out the lower bunks first as I can see major injuries occurring with drunken salarymen trying to get their head into the second row.
They spooked me a bit but then I'm a little claustrophobic. I was doing business with one a company who had developed one and I was given a tour. They also reminded me of the sort of thing William Gibson described in Neuromancer.
ideopath @ play
blah blah blah you too can be an Alpha or a Beta blah blah
Taunting the Epsilons and Deltas is bad form.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
The first began as a web-development company, and has grown to offer corporate solutions via web-sites to allow small- and medium-sized companies to grow without hiring additional staff.
The second, having been spawned from the first, manufacturers a particular type of computer kiosk never-before-seen in terms of format and specifications. Again, to remove the need for hiring human for tedious tasks.
I'm not familiar with "epsilons and deltas". All I can say is that I expended time, money, and effort while most told me not to waste my time, money and effort. Now I get to point out to them that they haven't the foggiest.
Do you know how often people hear that I run my own business, and say "oh, this economy must be hitting you really hard". And all I can say is "yeah, wiht a lot of work and a lot of money".
Modern economies require both employers and employees.
It's a bit of the Cypres experiment from "brave new world" where a society was constructed of only "alpha" class individuals who ultimately degrated into fighting because of their unwillingness to engage in menial tasks.
Japanese culture, especially, strongly contributes to "groupthink" in a way that makes it actually quite a bit harder than it does as an American, to consider something like starting a business.
While I may run several businesses myself, I'm not quite sure I can bring myself to such a pinnacle of arrogance to suggest that any employee who is found wanting work is inherently himself to blame, since I recognize that it is absurd for a post-industrial society to consist of a majority of business owners with little to no labor pool.
So, tell me, was it ignorance of post-industrial macroeconomics or sheer arrogance that prompted this post? :-)
I'm not familiar with "epsilons and deltas".
Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley. You should read it sometime.
Anyway, a world of 3 billion CEOs would collapse as surely as a world of 3 billion followers. Where would your companies be now if you had to do 100% of the work yourself?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
I'm not familiar with "epsilons and deltas".
It's from Brave New World, a classic considered one of the best English language books of the twentieth century. Now that you've successfully made two businesses and have time to insult strangers on Slashdot, you might consider reading it.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
It's the fact that it does force you to really stay out that seems to be the crux to me. It's hard not to practically hemorrhage money hanging out in any large city (I'm sure Tokyo is no exception). I imagine you might start to reach the point of diminishing returns by being out in the city so much and not having a kitchen.
ôó
By Tokyo standards $640 a month is cheap
I don't think the average American realizes just how expensive it is to live in Japan. It makes San Francisco or New York seem affordable in comparison.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
"The fact that Japan's homelessness is large enough to now be visible is pretty shocking"
A lot of things about Japan would surprise people. But this is only going to get worse. I was reading this weekend about just how much trouble Japan is in. IIRC from the newspaper article, their national debt is 212% of the GDP, twice what the US's is. The savings rate for Japanese citizens used to average 10%. As the old have died off, and the less-numerous young entered adulthood, that rate has dropped precipitously to 3%. And there's much less home and real estate ownership on average in Japan than in the states. There may well be an impending debt crisis... some investors are actually betting against Japanese government bonds. So while the US is hurting, Japan is too. They've just done a better job of hiding it, but that's changing.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
It was my general dissappointment in what you would call modern society. By all means, be an employee, if that's what you want to be. I'd never fault anyone when times are good. But the current scenario is one where some crazy huge number of people can't find a job -- and complain. They complain to me that they hate their job, don't have a job, want a job, can't find a job. And it's all a load of crap.
There's nothing stopping the vast majority from from starting their own business. It's effort, time, and money. And it's easy. It's just a lot of work.
As for works of fiction that conclude we need peons for menial tasks, that kind of flies in the face of automation, don't you think?
You don't find people scrubbing clothing today. Instead you find people owning a laundromat.
You're supposed to do the menial task when it's new and infrequent. Then you're supposed to automate it away, work around it, or solve the fundamental problem which is causing the work in the first place.
Washing machines do a great job of that. Calculators do a great job at that. Computers do a great job of that.
It's something that I have to explain to every employee as I shadow them in order to automate their job.
It's not that they'll lose their job. It's that the stupid monkey work will be gone, and they can become actually valuable doing something that requires an I.Q. of more than 65.
What prompted my post? It's definitely ignorance. I've never had a crappy job -- because when I didn't like how my boss did things, I left and started my own business. I still have the list of things that "I'm not going to do when it's my business". And I still folow them. And it works.
So I'm completely ignorant of what it takes to work in a job that you don't like. I can't fathom how anyone would give away so many hours every day to someone else. What for? Why live less in order to have money?
I never chose my career to make money. I did my hobby well enough that now others pay me so I can afford to live well while I do nothing but entertain myself.
I'd be willing to say that with a passion and a talent for anything could be paid to do exactly that. Presuming that they enjoy what they do, and are dedicated to it.
Life's just so damned easy. I don't know why so many people have such big problems. And these days, it seems like way more than 50% do nothing but complain.
I can't be the only one who's happy.
Wow, umm, I never said anything about a CEO. That C stands for Chief. That means there have to be indians.
I'm talking about owning and operating your own business. Where would I be if I had to do 100% of the work myself? Right where I am -- having automated 90% of my routine work.
It's called efficiency. Maybe I'm ahead of myself. 100 years ago was the industrial age. Then the information age. I'm living in the efficiency age.
I spend a few hours, and it's like 10 weeks of my younger self working hard. I get better, my tools get better, and things become easier.
So I get more and more work done with less and less effort. I charge more and more for it because the speed of delivery is valuable to my clients.
So that's where you'd be if you ran a business for 10 years all by yourself. It's not hard at all. It's just a lot of work, and a lot of time.
And I love every minute of it. It's easy. It's fun. It's entertaining. There's no pressure. No stress. And lots of money.
But it's easy for wimps to wimp-out. And it's easy for people who have never tried to do something themselves to follow advice given from works of fiction.
The problem in Brave New World is that the work-place was evolved from employees to CEOs -- I presume to showcase people's desire to always be promoted.
But I'd never want to start at the bottom and move up. That's how buildings are built. You start with the foundation, and you build one floor at a time.
I want to start at the top and keep going up. That's how trees grow -- from the top. And that's how my companies have grown. With me becoming way more efficient.
I've read it. A very long time ago. And I'm not insulting anyone. I'm being dissappointed in them because they are complaining about something without doing anything to solve it themselves. They are not only waiting for someone to solve it for them, but they feel entitled to the solution as well as to the service, and they expect me to pay for it.
And since they aren't paying any taxes anymore, and I'm paying more and more every year, I'm the one paying them to not solve their own problems.
When it was my problem -- when I didn't want to work the way I was working -- I solved the problem myself in under 1 year. And I had to fight everyone to convince them that it was the better option.
I've now watched them each fall down.
Nowadays, if you're willing to stay even just a little bit outside of the Yamanote loop line, and if you know where to look (hint: online, especially if you can read a bit of Japanese, in which case Jalan.net is the place to go), you can get small hotel rooms for the same price as capsule hotels in Tokyo.
I should know: I'm sitting in such a room right now. The place where I'm staying has weekly rates which rival the cheapest apartment room rentals -- which usually have the inconvenience of requiring upfront monthly payments, deposits, and often "key money" and "gift money" (unless dealing with special agencies like Sakura House who specialize in housing foreigners, the first month of rent can easily cost you four times the normal rent, and we haven't talked about the utilities yet)
Since this is /. : did I mention that my room has top-notch Internet connectivity? I was downloading stuff from my Montreal-based "home" server at over 50 Mb/s yesterday night! You get an Ethernet jack in the room, and the place is blanketed with free wifi. (Of course you still end up behind a NAT, but I don't think I've ever seen a hotel handing out public IPs...)
The hotel is split in smoking and non-smoking floors, and there's even a women-only floor. There's a coin laundry on the first floor, nice bathing and toilet facilities (cleaner than most 6000-8000 yen/night downtown Shinjuku business hotels I've stayed in), microwave ovens and hot water on each floor... With convenience stores and 100yen shops close by, it makes it really easy to live on a shoestring budget even in this supposedly extremely expensive city.
And this place is far from unique: hell, there's another one just like it right across the street.
Did I mention the best part yet? Unlike most budget hotels... there are virtually no noisy foreigners here!
Which is why I won't tell you where it is ;->
"Words have meaning, and names have power." -- Lorien
"Atsushi Nakanishi, 40, is out of work in Japan, where unemployment has hit 5.2 percent."
i'll admit i laughed when i read that. 5.2%? really? that's considered a pretty ok economy over here (u.s.). now i don't know who i feel sad for.
There's nothing stopping the vast majority from from starting their own business.
Sure there is - a lack of customers.
I'm talking about owning and operating your own business.
Very well, 3 billion presidents, or owners or whatever you wish to title yourself. Either way, even with all the productivity and efficiency improvements of the past millenia, a single person alone doesn't get very far. My own company consists of an office manager, a salesperson, me and an assistant coder. If I had to stop everything and make angry calls every time a client forgot to pay their bill or dress up in a suit and drive around town for daily product demos, nothing would get done. I provide my employees with value commensurate with the value they provide to me. 'Round these parts we call this Capitalism.
I don't laugh at my employees for failing to start their own business, having done it myself I'm solidly convinced it's not something that everyone is capable of doing, nor is it some kind of failure on their part for not doing so. Numbers back me up on this: 55% of small businesses close in 5 years. I doubt that those who failed didn't work "efficient" enough, no matter how efficiently one might produce rat oilers, if there's no market for your product you're going to fail.
The problem in Brave New World is that the work-place was evolved from employees to CEOs
In Brave New World, people were created "CEO"s: the Alphas. And people were created to be employees: the Deltas and Epsilons. Thus my admonition: a Delta or Epsilon are incapable of advancing beyond what they were created to be. Within the book, Alphas and Betas are taught to be grateful that the Deltas and Epsilons are there to do all the hard work, just as the Deltas and Epsilons are grateful that Alphas and Betas are there to make the hard decisions.
And that's how my companies have grown. With me becoming way more efficient.
Great, glad you've achieved that. All I ask is that you recognize that you're atypical. You were able to find something that you can sell to others, something that very few people ever achieve beyond the old standby of selling their time and labor. Not only that, you've apparently been blessed with sufficient talent to produce, market and sell it yourself without assistance.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Umm, learn this quickly: every business has zero customers before it starts.
Second, you don't have to pick quantum mechanics or colonizing Mars. "Create a need and fill it." is more challenging than "Find a need and fill it."
Pick something that you can do, that you can do better than someone who doesn't do it ten times per week.
That's all it takes. You get to charge for that -- not because they can't do it themselves, but because they don't want to be responsible for doing it themselves.
The biggest thing about owning a business, the thing that most people find completely unacceptable, is being responsible for someone else's benefit. But that's what people pay for. With the exception of rocket launches, nuclear explosions, and large financial institutions, nothing you can do actually has any serious consequences.
So you don't have to worry about failure. Worst case: you lose the one customer. You have ten more.
See, you're an ass. You've said what so many others say -- but you should know better.
You've said that busineses fail because there's no market for their product. You've said that not everyone is capable. You've said that I'm atypical. And worst of all, and this is what makes you the ass, you've said that I've been blessed.
What you've done there, and especially at the end, is to quite squarely place the credit for my success quite distant from me. In truth, none of that is true.
I worked damned hard. I fought everyone I know for years. I had zero support in my ventures, and loads of experts explaining why I shouldn't do it. When my market didn't want my product, I changed my product or I changed my market, or I changed the way I presented my product to my market.
I'm directly responsible for all of it -- good and bad. And that's why it's all been good.
I've had to learn absolutely everything from scratch. Programming, web-development, metallurgy, metal-engineering, graphics, everything. Not one thing was taught to me in school nor anywhere else -- including how to run a business.
I'm not atypical. I'm just someone who decided to go for it. And this is what it looks like when someone -- anyone -- goes whole-hog after something they want. They get it, they get it the way that they want to get it too.
And at no time did anyone bless me with anything. I wasn't even given access to the government laws that I am obligated to follow -- because they aren't published. I had to demand them, and fight to get access to copywritten documents referenced in the electrical code. That's right.
And that's why I've focussed on my own efficiency, to such a great extent. I've found suppliers who operate the way that I want them to operate. And when they didn't exist, I found suppliers willing to learn to do things my way. In some cases, I revolutionized their businesses so that they could meet my needs.
I've orchestrated a business with approximately three-dozen loyal clients, one-dozen active at any given time. It churns but sustains itself -- now for over a decade. And I'm about to take the next step. I've designed a new product/service that can scale to hundreds of clients still with only me at the helm. They aren't as big as my current loyal clients, but they are as big as my loyal clients from five years ago when I only had ten. So I'm jumping to a level approximately twenty times my former one, and without losing my current larger clients at all.
If you're at all in the same position as I am -- having started a business of your own by quiting high-paying jobs and dropping out of school -- then you'll understand the fighting I had to do with family and friends.
I spent three years hearing nothing but "you only have six more months of university. you should get your degree so you'll have something to fal back on."
It took me those three years to compose a response to shut them up. I publish it here for those who follow in my footsteps.
"I fall forward."
That's all it takes. You get to charge for that -- not because they can't do it themselves, but because they don't want to be responsible for doing it themselves.
And what if you can't find anything you can do better than someone else ? Or enough someone else's ?
That's all it takes. You get to charge for that -- not because they can't do it themselves, but because they don't want to be responsible for doing it themselves.
Perhaps you can highlight how this strategy is any different to finding a job working for someone else, and thus support your original criticism of people who aren't their own bosses ?
The biggest thing about owning a business, the thing that most people find completely unacceptable, is being responsible for someone else's benefit. But that's what people pay for. With the exception of rocket launches, nuclear explosions, and large financial institutions, nothing you can do actually has any serious consequences.
Maybe not for them. For you and possibly your family, however, the consequences of screwing up can be vast - especially in countries like the US where the social safety net ranges from dismal to nonexistant.
So you don't have to worry about failure. Worst case: you lose the one customer. You have ten more.
You still haven't explained how your strategy guarantees that first customer, let alone ten of them. Nor how "start a business" is any more valid a solution than "find another job".
In the West there are all sorts of protection for people who are unemployed. Employment insurance, welfare, etc. Even in the US.
I haven't spent all that much time in Japan but have heard enough about it and have visited there enough to know that being out of work is far more disastrous than it would be in our countries. Not only would you be homeless, but you'd have no protection whatsoever (hence the homeless part) and you'd also have to deal with a great amount of shame from both your family, your compatriots and the greater society at large. That is why, in a decent economy, Japanese employers really shy away from firing people unless absolutely necessary. Why do you think Japan has the highest suicide rate in the entire world? Many people throw themselves infront of a train when they lose their job.
The times are a-changin'.
"Find another job" requires that someone else not be capable or willing to do it on their own. It requires that someone else to be willing to bet that you are worth more than your salary. Typically, employees are charged out at three times what they are paid -- to cover general business expenses, supervision and waranty, some profit for the company, and of course the actual salary.
So if you want to make, say a modest $30'000.00 annually, you need to be worth $90'000.00 to someone else. And they have to think that ahead of time. And you have to convince them of it.
But if you're running your own business, you simply have to convince your clients that you're worth $30'000.00. Maybe plus a little overhead to cover the other business expenses. But there's no convincing yourself, there's no supervising yourself, there's no waranting yourself. And your additional time is at zero cost to pass on to customers.
More than that, you're not asking one client to pay $30'000.00. You're asking each to pay $3'000.00, or maybe only $300.00 depending on the industry and the manner by which you approach it.
As for losing a client, you aren't losing your job -- you're losing one client out of ten, or one hundred total.
When you work for someone else, and they lose 10% of the clients, they fire 7% of the employees. When you work for yourself, and you lose 10% of your clients, you make 7% less money. That's way less drastic. And you had the control to maybe manage it, or to at least see it coming most of the time. And it's often your own fault for screwing up the job. It happens, and it's perfectly normal. And you learn to get over it, and to grow from it.
As for your first question, you don't have to do anything better than someone else. You can be a 14 year-old, with $5 in your pocket, and zero skill. No you won't be able to sell stock portfolios nor investment plans. But you can sell painting services.
What you don't have is the respect of your potential clients, nor their confidence. Big surprise, no business has that without a popular brand. Every business has to sell themselves every single time. In my industry, even IBM has to compete with me -- and I win way more than I lose. They simple try way more often than I do.
Painting interiors of homes is something our 14 year-old could do. Because those customers aren't expecting you to be the best painter in the world -- tehy're expecting you to do hte work that they don't want to do. You'll use their ladder, and in the paint industry, the client pays for the paint -- always. A $20 deposit will buy the brushes if you can't borrow them from a friend, or don't want to beg a professional painter for some quick help.
Such a client is expecting to pay for an extra can of paint. And they are expecting our 14 year-old to charge about a tenth of a professional painter's job, and to take at least three times as long to do it. They are expecting the walls to be covered with paint, not the floors, and for most of the paint to not drip or streak.
Our 14 year-old needs only to spend the time until it's done. That will earn the pay check. Caring enough to fix a mistake will earn the referal to the next customer.
A $5 flyer in the lobby of an apartment building advertising young effort to paint whatever room you like will earn dozens of quick, dirty, and cheap jobs that aren't worth doing. And that's exactly how you start. A lot of work, very little money. That results in a lot of experience in everything from painting to dealing with the customers, and a whole whack of proven and qualified referals. You avoid beverly hills so there ain't that much that could be damaged.
Within six months, our 14 year-old, now 15 years-old, will be able to do twenty rooms per week. A few tools and techniques later, and that can double to forty rooms per hard week. At a minimum of $50 per room of profit, that's $100'000 per hard work year.
Hiring student employees -- exactly what he was, but now with supervis
i didn't know that. thanks for explaining.
We are 6.7 billion and counting. Japan itself has 1/3 of US population in an area of a single state. If they want more people, all they need is issue some immigrant visas to residence of somewhat less affluent (but not necessarily dirt poor/crime riden) countries. The way the world is now there is absolutely no reason to push any woman to have more children.
I agree with the GP: you are atypical. I'm confused as to why you think that's a bad thing.
No matter how hard I work, I will never be able to run a four-minute mile. There are people who can do that, but it's a combination of working hard and having the innate ability, not just working hard.
Intellectual achievement is no different. I got where I am through hard work, but also because because I have a knack for what I do. Other people work as hard as I do (and harder), but they won't enjoy the success I've had, because I have some skill and I've been lucky. Such is life.
All people are not created equally. However, they should all be treated equally under the law. Big difference.
"Nothing shocks me. I'm a scientist." -Indiana Jones
Not that much smaller than the sleeper berth in a truck. Or as my brother referred to it when he saw one "a prison cell on wheels".
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
This "innate ability" of which you speak is nothing more than having already worked hard in the past.
Four-minute mile is, I presume, something like 99.9%. I can agree with you that not everybody can become the best in history at everything.
But certainly anyone who puts in the effort can become an 80% runner -- whatever that is. More importantly, anyone who puts in the effort can become a 90% something. I refuse to believe that there are people who simply suck at everything and never have a chance to succeed.
Ive stayed in one here, and the reception girls are way too friendly and theres free champagne, snacks, chitchat, the occassional cleavage for the claustrophobia to matter. But they seem to have the capsules bugged with mics - I once dropped a glass and shattered it. The front desk promptly called to check if everything was ok. Since the doors are thickly padded and the seams are sealed, hey couldnt have heard the sound unless theyd a mic inside. Freaked me out. But for EU30, it was a decent deal.
simply suck at everything
Very few people suck at everything, and nobody here has made that claim.
You're insisting that nobody sucks at starting and running a company, and that if people just thought harder, they'd be able to invent the next must-have widget, start a company to produce, market and sell that widget, and furthermore: do all of this all by themselves.
Working hard until you're 80% gets you a rat oiler. If you walked up to the average person on the street and demanded that they invent something right this second, you'd get a blank stare.
Do you know how I did it? I worked for someone else for years, and during that time I was exposed to a particular piece of software that was utter crap yet had been one of the top contenders in the industry. I realized I could do better, did so, and my former employer became one of my first clients. Had I worked in some other industry, perhaps I'd never have found that necessity (the mother of invention) and continued to be "just an employee" or worse: thinking I could set out on my own and blowing my savings trying to sell rat oilers.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Dunno about the Navy. Marine paychecks are issued to the " Mens Dept. of the Navy"
This being the case, what makes up the other dept.s of The Navy?
Those look eerily like the sleep cabins in the ship that Korben Dallas took to the resort ship in Fifth Element...
Just sayin...
I'm not saying they need ot invent something new at all. I'm saying that they can do themselves exactly what they'd do for someone else. It doesn't have to be a new product. They simply need to do it themselves.
There are many benefits to working in a multi-tiered company. Every one of those benefits is to those higher-up. The employee gets none of that. Especially in any country with universal health care.
So you're always better off doing it all yourself. It's way more work. It's more money. It's way more control. It's way more secure. It's way better.
"Find another job" requires that someone else not be capable or willing to do it on their own.
So does "start a business".
But if you're running your own business, you simply have to convince your clients that you're worth $30'000.00. Maybe plus a little overhead to cover the other business expenses.
Er, no. If you want to run your own business and earn the _equivalent_ of a $30k salary, you're going to be charging your customers as if your salary was more like $50-60k/yr. Not only to cover all those expenses that would otherwise be covered by an employer, but to allow for the times when you have no revenue coming in.
When you work for someone else, and they lose 10% of the clients, they fire 7% of the employees. When you work for yourself, and you lose 10% of your clients, you make 7% less money. That's way less drastic.
Not if you're in the 93% of employees that aren't fired. Which is better odds than being in the 50%+ of small businesses that fail within a year or two of starting.
Incidentally, losing 10% of your customers could mean losing 1% or your revenue, or 50% of your revenue, depending on which 10% of your customers you lose.
And you had the control to maybe manage it, or to at least see it coming most of the time. And it's often your own fault for screwing up the job. It happens, and it's perfectly normal. And you learn to get over it, and to grow from it.
All of which applies equally to being an employee. When employers go downsizing, they don't just throw darts at a list of names.
As for your first question, you don't have to do anything better than someone else.
Your words, not mine:
Pick something that you can do, that you can do better than someone who doesn't do it ten times per week.
You can be a 14 year-old, with $5 in your pocket, and zero skill. No you won't be able to sell stock portfolios nor investment plans. But you can sell painting services.
That lack of 15 year olds - or, indeed, typical unemployed people - earning $100k/yr painting rooms demonstrates how specious your example is.
Also, one person painting forty rooms a week is a massively optimistic number. Assuming 12 hour days, that's 90 minutes to travel, setup, paint, clean and pack up. Not forgetting having to actually find 40 people every week who need a room painted, and aren't having it done by next door's kid for half the price, or themselves for "free".
You are trying to handwave away the single most important - and difficult - parts of running your own business: identifying a market, then finding and retaining customers. There's also the other big problem that most new businesses have - staying solvent - but that's relatively minor.
Making a blanket assertion these things are "easier" than finding a new job, is drawing a very long bow indeed. Especially since they require skills that probably have nothing to do with our hypothetical unemployed person's area of expertise (especially on Slashdot).
First, I said 40 rooms painted per week. Not 40 customers. And that was after two years of experience and good tools. I can do one room in 15 minutes with an industrial paint gun. And when you're the 17-year-old, you do it in an apartment building as I said, where there is no additional travel. And it's residential, so there is no travel in the first place -- your market is your geographically-chosen region.
Regarding all of your other thigns, you are mixing up two sets of people -- employers and customers. You have to do something better than your customers want to do -- you do it ten times per week, they do it ten timse per life-time. They don't want to do it it all. You don't have to be better than your competitors at the actual job. You have to be better at one single thing of the entire business. Maybe simply availability, maybe only cost, maybe just the guarantee, or just the tools. Sometimes just your race or religion is enough.
The lack of 15 year-olds with real jobs and careers they've started on their own is a factor of pressure from adults who never tried. I was 14 when I started. I had a business making me $18 after take per hour when I was 15.
Whatever you're doing for someone else, they make more off of you than you get to take home. Simply because they have admin work to keeping you. You can do it yourself if you're willing to do the work. And you don't have admin work on yourself.
And, by the way, you pay way less tax for your own business, as is compared to being an employee. WAY less.
First, I said 40 rooms painted per week. Not 40 customers. And that was after two years of experience and good tools. I can do one room in 15 minutes with an industrial paint gun. And when you're the 17-year-old, you do it in an apartment building as I said, where there is no additional travel. And it's residential, so there is no travel in the first place -- your market is your geographically-chosen region.
Wow. You're suggesting a sustained rate of 40 rooms/week for multiple years, within a geographical area small enough that travel time is irrelevant, is easy ? Where do you live ? An Arcology ?
Regarding all of your other thigns, you are mixing up two sets of people -- employers and customers. You have to do something better than your customers want to do -- you do it ten times per week, they do it ten timse per life-time. They don't want to do it it all. You don't have to be better than your competitors at the actual job. You have to be better at one single thing of the entire business. Maybe simply availability, maybe only cost, maybe just the guarantee, or just the tools. Sometimes just your race or religion is enough.
Which, again, applies equally if you're trying to find a job working for someone else. You don't need to be the best at the job, you just need to be better than the other people applying, in some way the hirer cares about.
The lack of 15 year-olds with real jobs and careers they've started on their own is a factor of pressure from adults who never tried.
And a factor of there not being a need for a business to satisfy. Where do you think all these customers and their money are going to come from ?
I was 14 when I started. I had a business making me $18 after take per hour when I was 15.
So what do you think was the biggest obstacle to the other fifty kids who lived within a stone's throw of you doing the same thing ? Lack of interest, or the fact you had all the customers ?
Or look at it from the other direction. If the fifty kids around you had all been doing the same thing you were, do you really think you'd still have been making the same amount of money ?
How much were other people making ? What was their relative amount of free time ? How reliably could you make that $18/hr ? Were you paying the requisite levels of tax ?
And, by the way, you pay way less tax for your own business, as is compared to being an employee. WAY less.
However, you sustain many other expenses you don't as an employee - health insurance, working space, tools, communications infrastructure, legal support, insurance, etc, etc.
Running a business is not an easy thing to do, especially when your expertise is not in how to run a business. My father did it quite successfully for decades. I have many friends who have been doing it successfully for years, but also many who have failed miserably. Having been witness to these things, I find the idea that starting a business being easier than finding a job, to be laughable.
oh, it's not easier to start a business than to find a job. Not at all. It's easier to keep a business that you've started than to keep a job. It's easier to grow a business than to get promoted. It's easier to live with a business than with a job. It's certainly a long-term investment. And it's a great one.
My friends didn't do it because they listened to parents and teachers, and aren't willing to take risks or do anything different from the crowd. None of them know how to react to failures -- a skill that makes taking risks completely not risky.
If all of my friends, and everyone around me had done what I did, I'd be making more money, not less. Because they'd be either clients or allies. I do have two friends that did what I did -- I convinced them a few years back. And now we all work together in a contractor/affiliate/associate/referral kind of way. And life gets really easy. We provide free value-add services to each other, and offer easy paid direct-value contracts to each other. life's good.
40 rooms, at 15 minutes per room, in five days per week yields 8 rooms per day or 2 hours of painting. That means sustained it's 4 hours of painting plus prep is an 8 hour day maximum. And remember, that's with really good tools.
I do live in an archology. My city has 7.5 million people. Residential areas have MDUs -- multiple dwelling units. That means condos, and apartments. So it's easy to find 40 rooms in the same building -- that's like 10 customers. That's a week per building. A 60 minute driving radius yields 8.5 million people over 40'000 square kilometres or 14'400 square miles. That covers about 75 home depots and 80 canadian tires.
we're talking abotu painting residences here. people re-paint every ten years. and they also re-paint every time they move -- which averages every 5 years in the city, and every 15 years out in the suburbs.
And when you get moving, how long do you think it'll take before you paint the home of someone who runs a business and has an office on the 87th floor downtown. If you get into office towers, they repaint every year -- sometimes by law. And they spend real money on real paints for real reasons.
I don't have to have every answer in the beginning. I have to be able to jump hurdles when I get to them, not when I'm still far away, and not all of the hurdles on the track all at once.
In the end, if you're too scared to be responsible for something on your own, then you need someone else to hold your hand to to hand you a paycheck. But that's your fear, and lack of confidence or self esteem. It's not reality.
And when it comes to having to make $50 to get $30, wow you've missed the big part.
I learned this lesson a while back when I took home $40'000 after taxes. I thought hey, it's not bad, I'm not rich, but that's a respectable number. Then I remembered: the company paid for the car, the gas, the insurance, the life insurance, the desk, the office, half the home mortgage (home office) the landscaping, meals with clients, travel to vacation where I visited a client too, movies where I entertained a client, jazz clubs, theatre tickets.
In the end, I had $40'000 in my pocket for the year, and had to pay only half a mortgage with it, and groceries. Everything else was written off.
My employer pays for my cell phone, car, travel and many of my living expenses including all of my health insurance. I take hope about 75k after taxes.
In all it's a huge raise from when I was running the same sort of business and I enjoy my work much more. Here I don't spend half my day doing sales calls and accounting and talking to lawyers. Instead, I get to pursue my passion and the sales employees keep a constant streamof work in the pipeline that is far more interesting and focused than I could possibly get on my own, all while removing stress in having to deal with legal issues and such.
I use my spare time to work on passive investments. But I think you have had too much of the "rich dad" koolaid.