Curious about side hustles around here.

[Mad Mike]

if it was $128k a yr I could not drive a school bus.
Well I could , just not with all those little booger eaters in it. Or the miserable parents picking them up.

I could drive a school bus. I've worked with kids all my life and have no trouble managing a rabble of them. Kids are like a puppies -- if they are not subject to rules and discipline they will forever chew up your slippers and piss on your carpets.

Three things all kids need to know. 1) What are the rules? 2) Who enforces them? 3) Are they enforced? Make sure these are crystal clear and it's pretty easy - if it's not clear they will make the rules, they will enforce them, and they decide when they are enforced.

 

[nakkers]

Fortunately, I drive high school students. Earbuds and eyes closed the whole time. Easy breezy. Elementary kids are the worst. Fight, cry, throw stuff, jump, runs, tattle, yell, talk etc.

When you make nice with the route coordinator, you get to cherry pick routes.


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[nobbie48]

The question for me has always been is the additional income worth the time put in? Assuming the full time gig provides the income and benefits, you will spend time away from your family for the extra funds that can provide you and the family with additional discretionary funds.

Does your spouse or anyone else have to pick up the slack while you are doing the side hustle?

Is there opportunity with your primary employer to focus on career development or with the side hustle limit your ability to do that?

If the side hustle becomes enjoyable as well as profitable, will you become less vested in the regular job?


My wife had 3 jobs at one time. After evaluating everything she was doing and the total income, we both discovered she could focus on one and earn as much, if not more doing one job and enjoy it and have time to enjoy hobbies, the kids and some time with me. Lol.

Full disclosure, I drive a school bus in the mornings. The wage is peanuts really but, I do it early in the morning and done by 9am to start my day job. It’s not really a side hustle but, it’s enough for me to buy more motorcycle gear and parts and gas for the season etc.

And I find it fun. When it loses its lustre, I’ll likely call it a day.


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A friend got married and when kids came along they calculated the cost of his wife continuing working. With one income the income tax was lower, no day care and lower food costs because they would be buying less prepped stuff. She became a stay at home mom. She may have day cared a kid or two. Less stress and more germ control.

 

[GreyGhost]

A friend got married and when kids came along they calculated the cost of his wife continuing working. With one income the income tax was lower, no day care and lower food costs because they would be buying less prepped stuff. She became a stay at home mom. She may have day cared a kid or two. Less stress and more germ control.

If there are three or more kids or wife is below median income the math starts to work out. With only one spawn or the wife makes much over median wage, daycare comes out ahead. Makes a bunch over median wage and two kids or more a nanny makes financial sense.

 

[Hack]

I'd like to work with unwed mothers...
You know, just giving them their start.

 

[crankcall]

your side gig is managing a strip club? cool

 

[backmarkerducati]

A friend got married and when kids came along they calculated the cost of his wife continuing working. With one income the income tax was lower, no day care and lower food costs because they would be buying less prepped stuff. She became a stay at home mom. She may have day cared a kid or two. Less stress and more germ control.

A word of caution on this approach. If the mother (or father) that becomes stay at home has/had an actual professional career, well after 15 years or so at home that ship has usually long sailed. As the kids get older they have less use or that parent. Once the last kid hits 13 or so they will have little need for the stay at home parent. Now that person that gave up a career has nothing to do and it is an epic journey to get back into it. Resentment and feeling useless will quickly follow, this can be a big load on the relationship in general. BTW, MLMs prey on this group as they talk a big fantasy story about potential earnings that usually don't pan out. I have seen this over and over with lots of regret. Some careers will be harder than others to get back into.

When the kids were toddlers in the most expensive care we pretty much broke even with my wife working (for a few years), she had romantic thoughts of being stay at home at the time but she is extremely happy we did not go that route today.

If they worked at the mall, etc. well that is not a career and they will not have a big problem getting back to into it. Some just end up being "busy" spending all (and maybe much more) of the household's spare money to fill the time.

 

[Baggsy]

You can perform a task very well, but if you can't explain to someone else how to do it, then you're a poor candidate to be a teacher.

You can be an expert performer, but if you have poor observation skills and can't spot what a student is doing wrong and then coach them properly, then you're a poor candidate to be a teacher.

It is entirely possible to be skilled in the area of performance, but unskilled in the area of rapport, encouragement, patience and all the other qualities that make a good instructor. Typically, this comes through as, "Look, I can do it. It's *SO* easy. Why the hell can't *YOU* do it?!?"

I've found some of the best teachers are the ones who have struggled through the learning process themselves. They understand where all the pitfalls to advancement are at every stage, so they can anticipate, explain and coach around these stumbling blocks. If someone picks up a skill quickly due to natural ability, they never experience these roadblocks themselves and are less capable at identifying them, and coaching around them.

Teaching and performing are two very different skills. Not mutually exclusive. But different.

To add onto this, you need to be able to ride at slow speed in a slightly exaggerated manner, doing things methodically, while keeping key points in mind.

Head turns are exaggerated, eyes are always up, looking where you want to go, knees into the tank, arms relaxed, hands & feet off of controls when not in use, using all fingers on the levers, etc. etc.

You don't have to be perfect, but you need to be willing & able to learn. If you do something wrong, it can be a teaching moment for the class. I can talk them through it. Even with the crash that Evoex witnessed. "Did you see what he did wrong there? Don't grab the front brake while you're turning a sharp corner. Keep your right hand on the bar, and control your throttle." But if you have trouble with several things at the same time, over and over again, it becomes tedious. Some of the students need to see what you're doing for it to click in their minds.

As far as coaching. A lot of that comes with experience. Where we are, we teach in tandem, one demos, one teaches, then they'll switch. They group the newer instructors with the older ones. You can learn a lot just by listening to how others coach, and if you have a problem figuring out what a student is doing wrong, you can always ask.

Our place recruits every two years, and I think the average instructor lasts something like four or five before life gets too involved to keep it up.

Edit: Think about it this way. What's the sequence for shifting from first to second? What does one need to keep in mind while doing so? Why do you need to do it? What's different when shifting from second to first?

 

[meme]

I lasted 15 years before I had enough.

It was my "fun" job, paid **** and hours were terrible. No pension fund or benefits. Like the above analogy to the mall store worker it was a job, not a career. At 30 running around a lot putting cones down, picking comes up, picking bikes up, mechanical of trying to keep all the poor beaten bikes running was easy.

At 45 I said so long and thanks for all the fish!

 

[Mad Mike]

A friend got married and when kids came along they calculated the cost of his wife continuing working. With one income the income tax was lower, no day care and lower food costs because they would be buying less prepped stuff. She became a stay at home mom. She may have day cared a kid or two. Less stress and more germ control.

That's always a tricky thing to evaluate. My wife stayed home, as did many of the young moms I knew when my kids were born, many of these moms were able to do so by taking in a couple of kids for home daycare. It was a great system -- moms could stay home with their kids by supplementing their incomes with daycare, families that used these services got them in their communities, at extremely affordable rates -- $100/week for preschoolers and $40-50 week for elementary school-aged kids.

The McGinty/Wynne govt's of the day were losing manufacturing jobs in Ontario at unprecedented rates, their solution was to increase gov't hiring and create new jobs through regulation -- home child care was a victim. A centuries-old system of delivering in-home childcare was dismantled in favor of institutional-style child care. The new system created gov't jobs, tons of low-paying child care worker jobs, but doubled the cost of childcare for young families.

 

[Mad Mike]

If there are three or more kids or wife is below median income the math starts to work out. With only one spawn or the wife makes much over median wage, daycare comes out ahead. Makes a bunch over median wage and two kids or more a nanny makes financial sense.

As I mentioned earlier, my wife stayed home. She left an evergreen IT contract with IBM that paid 6 figures in 1990. After 3 kids and 12 years focused on raising kids -- her skills withered and there was no chance of rekindling her old career. The same thing faced many of the moms on our circle of friends - bankers, programmers, marketers, stock brokers - after 10 years raising kids they were back competing with new grads for entry-level positions.

 

[Scuba Steve]

My wife has stayed home as well I would be shocked if she ever went back. She is a P.eng and PMP.

Sent using a thumb maybe 2

 

[nobbie48]

As I mentioned earlier, my wife stayed home. She left an evergreen IT contract with IBM that paid 6 figures in 1990. After 3 kids and 12 years focused on raising kids -- her skills withered and there was no chance of rekindling her old career. The same thing faced many of the moms on our circle of friends - bankers, programmers, marketers, stock brokers - after 10 years raising kids they were back competing with new grads for entry-level positions.

A friend was in the computer industry and had a client that desperately needed staff and would pay well. The problem was he was locked into an ancient system and potential hires were afraid that having it on their resume would make getting a future job very difficult. It might as well have been Commodore 64.

 

[backmarkerducati]

As I mentioned earlier, my wife stayed home. She left an evergreen IT contract with IBM that paid 6 figures in 1990. After 3 kids and 12 years focused on raising kids -- her skills withered and there was no chance of rekindling her old career. The same thing faced many of the moms on our circle of friends - bankers, programmers, marketers, stock brokers - after 10 years raising kids they were back competing with new grads for entry-level positions.

And that is the core problem if the stay at home person had a career.

The other aspect is how many years/decades of income is now lost once the kids no longer need the stay at home parent. Very hard to get back into the old career and possibly high six, low seven figure of lost money (after tax) over those years. Really depends if someone has kids in their late 20s vs almost 40....

 

[GreyGhost]

A friend was in the computer industry and had a client that desperately needed staff and would pay well. The problem was he was locked into an ancient system and potential hires were afraid that having it on their resume would make getting a future job very difficult. It might as well have been Commodore 64.

Or the alternative. By doing what nobody wants to touch but that is required to be done, you can set your price. A friend of a friend makes dumptruck loads of money flying around the world to keep some cobol systems running. He thinks nothing of popping three or figure bottles of wine for dinner with friends.

 

[Baggsy]

Or the alternative. By doing what nobody wants to touch but that is required to be done, you can set your price. A friend of a friend makes dumptruck loads of money flying around the world to keep some cobol systems running. He thinks nothing of popping three or figure bottles of wine for dinner with friends.

I should do that. Problem is, I hate COBOL, although Screen COBOL is worse.

 

[Mad Mike]

And that is the core problem if the stay at home person had a career.

The other aspect is how many years/decades of income is now lost once the kids no longer need the stay at home parent. Very hard to get back into the old career and possibly high six, low seven figure of lost money (after tax) over those years. Really depends if someone has kids in their late 20s vs almost 40....

I never looked at the income as “lost”. For us it was a non-monetary investment into our family. I ended up with three independent and successful kids who act like adults. A much better return than a bigger house or faster car my friends bought while a daycare service raised their still needy children.

 

[backmarkerducati]

I never looked at the income as “lost”. For us it was a non-monetary investment into our family. I ended up with three independent and successful kids who act like adults. A much better return than a bigger house or faster car my friends bought while a daycare service raised their still needy children.

And the stay at home parent vs working likely had little impact on that. People either bring their kids up right or not.

One could also argue that a working mother leads by example, respect for women and showing daughters they too can have a career it is not all about the man being the bread winner.... but in reality it is still mostly brought up right or brought up wrong.

 

[GreyGhost]

I never looked at the income as “lost”. For us it was a non-monetary investment into our family. I ended up with three independent and successful kids who act like adults. A much better return than a bigger house or faster car my friends bought while a daycare service raised their still needy children.

That also requires the remaining salary to be sufficient to keep the ship afloat (or access to sufficient credit so you can refloat the ship in the future). The last house jump pushed us into the position of needing both salaries to keep things going. Daycare was expensive but cashflow was still up substantially from a stay at home parent

Our kids ended up going to four different daycares for various reasons. It was an overwhelmingly positive experience for us and them (other than the expense) with them learning a lot and being well socialized. That can happen with a stay at home parent too if they make a conscious effort to keep the kids meeting and interacting with other children. If they just stick around home, the kids have a tendency to become monsters. Friends of ours have noticed a huge difference in kids that have been at daycare through the pandemic and kids that have been at home. The stay at home kids are possessive, unwilling to share, not interested in playing with others, etc. I suspect much of that is likely due to the stay-at-home kids likely having two working parents and childcare by netflix. If our kids watch too much video they become uncontrollable demons.

 

[Mad Mike]

And the stay at home parent vs working likely had little impact on that. People either bring their kids up right or not.

One could also argue that a working mother leads by example, respect for women and showing daughters they too can have a career it is not all about the man being the bread winner.... but in reality it is still mostly brought up right or brought up wrong.

I agree with what you say, you can bring them up right while using daycare. You can mess things up if there is a stay at home parent too.

As a side note… Its not about men being the breadwinner, three guys In our kids circle stayed home - wives were bank exec, judge, and veterinarian.

My point was simply a counter to your statement that staying home was a monetary loss. I look at it as an investment.