From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months • Hacker News Board

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#41

Post by ricardobeat » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:06 AM UTC

cynicalkane wrote: post #35

ricardobeat wrote: post #7

It's a nice personal achievement, but I can't help myself cringing at business models of this kind. It's plain old extraction of surplus-value, adding very little to the economy as a whole. The workers would be better off operating as a cooperative, I wish they had the education to know that from the outset, and the means to implement it.

Be careful about confusing what you want people to value with what they actually value because that's how you get Marxism. I hired a cheap startup cleaning company (an internal startup within a larger organization). Flaky, unprofessional management; cleaners who sucked at their jobs... going by my and my friends' experiences, finding a good cleaner is pretty hard and (this is a big 'in general') the more expensive on…

> that's how you get Marxism

Is it a disease? :)

Did you mean communism?

> Information, quality assurance, and good management are all scarce

I acknowledge that. Read my comment below - these skills are picked up on the go by startup founders, the same way those in a cooperative could. Professionalism is unrelated to having one head or twenty at the top.

> For instance, most programmers are content to work for the Man

Most workers in any field are "working for the Man*, not just programmers. The adoption of the agency model varies across the economy, but is less common as you go higher (think doctors, lawyers, architects, etc). We could get into a yearlong discussion about distribution (or concentration) of wealth, but I don't think this is the place and I'm not that qualified.

> I think you're being down voted because all this is probably common knowledge on a forum for smart, startup-minded hackers.

Isn't almost everything common knowledge in a community like this? I don't think that's the reason, downvoting for simply disagreeing is becoming increasingly common.

> When you talk about "extracting surplus-value" there are prominent members of this community who do that for a living.

So? I'm not picking a fight or attacking anyone, just musing on capitalism. Is it taboo? I'm sure they don't feel the need to justify what they do.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#42

Post by guynamedloren » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:06 AM UTC

turkeyman wrote: post #39

guynamedloren wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmmm... that's an interesting (and scary) point. I wonder if it would make sense, from the business owner's perspective, to shuffle the employees around between clients to decrease the chances of this?

That seems like it would just delay the inevitable, he needs to find competent cleaners that are unwilling to strike out on their own. If he manages to keep the cleaners as contractors, then his future will be absolutedomestics.com.au. They have done incredibly well for themselves and have set themselves up exactly as this guy has. I'm thinking it must be more profitable making a decent profit while losing clients an…

> I'm thinking it must be more profitable making a decent profit while losing clients and cleaners, than taking a smaller profit and retaining clients and cleaners.

Can you explain the difference in profits? Why would there be smaller profits in retaining clients and cleaners? I'm missing something here...

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#43

Post by grey-area » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:09 AM UTC

gojomo wrote: post #19

dangrossman wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't read every comment he's made yet, but skimmed many of them... Why can't they be contractors? He said they're providing their own transportation and supplies. So he's just handing them clients and appointments, and a checklist of cleaning tasks to complete and a few limitations on the supplies used. Isn't that analogous to handing a contracted software developer a requirements document and a deadline?

It's possible if he does everything right. But the presumption by determining authorities seems to be in the 'employee' direction, so it's very easy to slip up. Does he tell them when to work? Employee. How to do their work (a checklist)? Employee. Provide supplies? Employee. Do they wear a 'Maid In Black' uniform? Employee. If he were a matching service, it might be easier. But, he's extending his brand/guarantee/mo…

I imagine initially both sides would be happy to treat the relationship as contractual. It's a great way to start when you are not sure of demand, and the cleaners you employ have other clients anyway (I'd say that makes them definitely not employees unless and until this is their main income). The ones who have now quit other jobs to work with him are of course de-facto employees, and he'll have to treat them as such long-term.

However He sounds like he would be happy to treat them as employees long-term anyway (if they agree to it of course), but then that's a good problem to have, and really starting with employees from day 1 would have made this far harder to get off the ground, so he's gone about it the right way, he just has a steep learning curve ahead.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#44

Post by ricardobeat » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:10 AM UTC

viandante wrote: post #34

ricardobeat wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know, and I don't mean to put down his effort (as I said below, there is some value added). But they are just being exploited by a smaller company - it's the same. edit: what is with downvotes lately? This is not a contest, feel free to join the discussion.

Workers are not pointed a gun to do the job. Given the opportunities they have, they are choosing this specific opportunity. This means that this service is increasing their expected value from the job. I don't see how this can be bad.

Read comment below for my take on that. I'm not blaming anyone or saying it's morally wrong, just exploring a different arrangement.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#45

Post by grey-area » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:12 AM UTC

ricardobeat wrote: post #7

It's a nice personal achievement, but I can't help myself cringing at business models of this kind. It's plain old extraction of surplus-value, adding very little to the economy as a whole. The workers would be better off operating as a cooperative, I wish they had the education to know that from the outset, and the means to implement it.

The value he is providing is a booking service, dealing with complaints, etc, no more, no less. Turns out lots of people value that quite a lot; almost as much as the cleaning itself.

I don't think you can really argue that this adds no value to the transactions - he is finding these cleaners more work than they would otherwise have had.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#46

Post by ricardobeat » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:15 AM UTC

mseebach wrote: post #40

ricardobeat wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly what my last sentence is about. The extraction of surplus-value comes from having an economical/power/knowledge advantage: in my pretty ideal world the workers should have enough of those skills, or the ability to subcontract them. If everyone was well educated and had the means to set up a business they wouldn't need someone else to seize the opportunity for them. The whole startup spirit is that of g…

> The extraction of surplus-value comes from having an economical/power/knowledge advantage Yes, this is called the division of labour. When not everybody has to know how to do everything, more things can be known and more things can be done. Making a marketing plan and a website sounds easy to you, but why don't you argue that they are being exploited by the vacuum cleaner or detergent manufacturers' economic and kn…

That's not what I meant. There is a gap in knowledge and economical power (and probably willpower/culture too) that "prevents" the workers from setting up their own business or marketing themselves more efficiently, it's not directly related to the division of labour.

btw I have a Communication Studies/Advertising degree and work as a front-end developer, so no, that doesn't sound easy to me ;)

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#47

Post by turkeyman » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:22 AM UTC

guynamedloren wrote: post #42

turkeyman wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems like it would just delay the inevitable, he needs to find competent cleaners that are unwilling to strike out on their own. If he manages to keep the cleaners as contractors, then his future will be absolutedomestics.com.au. They have done incredibly well for themselves and have set themselves up exactly as this guy has. I'm thinking it must be more profitable making a decent profit while losing clients an…

> I'm thinking it must be more profitable making a decent profit while losing clients and cleaners, than taking a smaller profit and retaining clients and cleaners. Can you explain the difference in profits? Why would there be smaller profits in retaining clients and cleaners? I'm missing something here...

Based on the situation my ex went through, to retain the clients and cleaners they would have to take a smaller cut from the hourly wage they charge the clients. I'm not sure if it applies in his case, it depends on what percentage he is taking. Reading back on my previous post, it doesn't make much sense haha.

Edit: I'm mainly talking about my experience with absolute domestics. They took something ridiculous like $5 an hour which is why they had these issues.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#48

Post by mseebach » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:31 AM UTC

ricardobeat wrote: post #46

mseebach wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The extraction of surplus-value comes from having an economical/power/knowledge advantage Yes, this is called the division of labour. When not everybody has to know how to do everything, more things can be known and more things can be done. Making a marketing plan and a website sounds easy to you, but why don't you argue that they are being exploited by the vacuum cleaner or detergent manufacturers' economic and kn…

That's not what I meant. There is a gap in knowledge and economical power (and probably willpower/culture too) that "prevents" the workers from setting up their own business or marketing themselves more efficiently, it's not directly related to the division of labour. btw I have a Communication Studies/Advertising degree and work as a front-end developer, so no, that doesn't sound easy to me ;)

Cleaning a one bedroom flat in one hour to a standard that people will pay well over $100 for is a specific skill set.

Building, marketing and running a company is a different specific skill set.

How is that not division of labour?

> so no, that doesn't sound easy to me ;)

Presumably a lot easier than building a vacuum cleaner.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#49

Post by ricardobeat » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:41 AM UTC

grey-area wrote: post #45

ricardobeat wrote: post #7

It's a nice personal achievement, but I can't help myself cringing at business models of this kind. It's plain old extraction of surplus-value, adding very little to the economy as a whole. The workers would be better off operating as a cooperative, I wish they had the education to know that from the outset, and the means to implement it.

The value he is providing is a booking service, dealing with complaints, etc, no more, no less. Turns out lots of people value that quite a lot; almost as much as the cleaning itself. I don't think you can really argue that this adds no value to the transactions - he is finding these cleaners more work than they would otherwise have had.

I didn't say it adds no value, but that's a lot of assumptions.

Re: From idea to replacing full-time salary in 4 months

#50

Post by ricardobeat » Mon, Apr 16, 2012, 11:49 AM UTC

mseebach wrote: post #48

ricardobeat wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what I meant. There is a gap in knowledge and economical power (and probably willpower/culture too) that "prevents" the workers from setting up their own business or marketing themselves more efficiently, it's not directly related to the division of labour. btw I have a Communication Studies/Advertising degree and work as a front-end developer, so no, that doesn't sound easy to me ;)

Cleaning a one bedroom flat in one hour to a standard that people will pay well over $100 for is a specific skill set. Building, marketing and running a company is a different specific skill set. How is that not division of labour? > so no, that doesn't sound easy to me ;) Presumably a lot easier than building a vacuum cleaner.

The main difference between a standard business and a cooperative would be the sharing of profits - there's still the need for management/marketing/etc, which can either be done by one of the cooperatives or subcontracted, it doesn't disappear. That the maids don't have the skill set or the means to acquire it is exactly what I commented on originally. That is the gap. The extraction of surplus-value comes from having an economical/power/knowledge advantage.

If I had the means to build a vacuum cleaner (not that hard, you know software can be way more complex than that), but instead sold my project to Dyson, because they have the means to produce and market it, yes, I'm setting myself up to be exploited. It's an option. (drifting off-topic, but crowdfunding is changing that too)