One thing strikes me: you appear to be supposing that apart from how much money is involved, every possible activity per hour is equally valuable to you in itself.
No, I am not supposing that. Let me clarify. Consider the example of me walking to pick up food instead of ordering it. Suppose it takes a half hour and I could have spent that half hour making $50 instead. The way I phrased it:
Option #1: Spend $5 to save myself the walk and spend that time freelancing to earn $50, netting me $45.
Option #2: Walk to pick up the food, not spending or earning anything.
The problem with that phrasing is that dollars aren’t what matter, utility is, as you allude to. My point is that it still seems like people often make very bad decisions. In this example, the joy of walking versus freelancing + any productivity gains are not worth $45, I don’t think.
I do agree that this doesn’t last forever though. At some point you get so exhausted from working where the walk has big productivity benefits, the work would be very unpleasant, and the walk would be a very pleasant change of pace.
even if it’s just a small scale local business.
Tangential, but Paul Graham wouldn’t call that a startup.
You can’t do it part time or even ordinary full time, or it will very likely fail and make you less than nothing.
I disagree here. 1) I know of real life counterexamples. I’m thinking of people I met at an Indie Hackers meetup I used to organize. 2) It doesn’t match my model of how things work.
No, I am not supposing that. Let me clarify. Consider the example of me walking to pick up food instead of ordering it. Suppose it takes a half hour and I could have spent that half hour making $50 instead. The way I phrased it:
Option #1: Spend $5 to save myself the walk and spend that time freelancing to earn $50, netting me $45.
Option #2: Walk to pick up the food, not spending or earning anything.
The problem with that phrasing is that dollars aren’t what matter, utility is, as you allude to. My point is that it still seems like people often make very bad decisions. In this example, the joy of walking versus freelancing + any productivity gains are not worth $45, I don’t think.
I do agree that this doesn’t last forever though. At some point you get so exhausted from working where the walk has big productivity benefits, the work would be very unpleasant, and the walk would be a very pleasant change of pace.
Tangential, but Paul Graham wouldn’t call that a startup.
I disagree here. 1) I know of real life counterexamples. I’m thinking of people I met at an Indie Hackers meetup I used to organize. 2) It doesn’t match my model of how things work.