[hunter-gatherer]

Didn't feel like a misdiagnosis to me. My spouse around 2017 was one of those that got sucked into a course to earn income with an Amazon store. As I read the article basically every point resonated with my experience.

The dog walking business example was also appropriate in my mind. My spouse fortunately broke even, minus time, on her attempt with drop shipping garbage nobody really needs. Now she makes decent money with her oil paintings. Not "passive income" but real money and profit. Not enough to retire (that's what I am for!) but actual money nonetheless.

[nyantaro1]

Would you mind sharing a little about how your wife does business? Like, are her clients regular people or art shops? How does she put a price on her work?

[hunter-gatherer]

I'm the least interested person in art you'll ever know, so how she prices her work I'm not sure. I know she doesn't go by time spent on a piece, but instead how good it turns out. I think she just casually looks at other art for sale that is around the same quality and prices accordingly. After so many rounds of that I think you just get a good intuition for it.

She also has a few art shows she applies to and goes presents at those. I think this is where most of her recurring customers come from honestly, and not Instagram. Though she has had a few commissions from Instagram.

A side note on those looking to buy art, you might refrain from asking for a custom piece. If you see something you like, there's a good chance you don't know why you like it even if you think you do. So when you give the artist a picture you want them to translate into something like oil, it'll probably disappoint. The frustrations I've seen my wife go through trying to get a commission right is tiring.

[hn_throwaway_99]

I'm not in any way doubting that lots of people were swept up in Amazon drop shipping scams. My argument is that this was not some sort of unique "passive income trap that ate a generation of entrepreneurs".

Years before your spouse enrolled in that Amazon course, people were spending tens of thousands of dollars on Trump University. Many years before that I had a friend that got sucked into the Equinox International MLM scam. Point being those types of promises of easy money after paying for a course, or outright scams, are not something new or unique.

[bombcar]

I think this kind of "get rich quick" scam has always been around (MLM is a perfect example) - the interesting thing about the amazon drop shipping one is that it did actually work for a bit for quite a few people - until China realized they could cut out the middleman and drop ship directly (and things like Temu and friends came into view).

The vast majority of people who fall for things like MLMs will continue to pursue similar scams and never graduate to "real entrepreneurship" even when there's obvious and not terribly difficult paths (most anyone can become a realtor and at least not lose terrible amounts of money, even if they never get to "full-time job" levels).

[nunez]

Dropshipping was also MASSIVE in /r/startup at around this time. I even got caught up in it: I spent a spell on flipping designer clothes found at thrift stores on eBay (overall lost more than I made, though not by much. Surprisingly intense business; definitely not passive.)