THE Post Peak Employment Thread (merged)

[bromius]

I have not studied the topic of permaculture at school. Some of that might be covered in the urban forestry classes they offer, but I have not taken any of those. I don't want to be an arborist, I want to be a true forester. That was my attitude for a long time at least. Now I'm not quite as sure of that stance.

I'm sure in many ways using trees to produce food is similar to growing a forest for wood production. I'm sure great attention still needs to be paid to factors such as soil type, fertility, depth, drainage etc. Climate is important. So are pest issues. I'm sure there are some unique aspects as well. I will soon know what I don't know, and hopefully relate some of that here as well, because I'm going to buy the book that Skyemoor and DaveP mentioned. I found the set used for about 45 plus shipping on amazon.

This got me thinking about a business a person could offer. Call it Edible Landscapes or something like that. Offer a landscaping service to homeowners that focuses on the planting of species that would work as landscape plants, but also produce edible food. Seems like this wouldn't be a hard sell since a lot of fruit bearing plants seem to produce flowers at some point in the season as well. I think the time might be right for such a thing. People may not be fully on board with PO and transitioning into a totally different lifestyle. However, this could be a good way to make some money personally as well as help build some food producing capacity into the community.

[Ludi]

Call it Edible Landscapes or something like that. Offer a landscaping service to homeowners that focuses on the planting of species that would work as landscape plants, but also produce edible food..

I think that's a really great idea!

Google "edible landscaping"

[Bytesmiths]

You don't want a PO job. You want PO jobs.

A career is the fiscal equivalent of monoculture. Previously, you studied for a career, got a job that if you didn't foul up too badly or too often, you could count on until retirement, at which point, your company or your savings would pay for the rest of your life.

I submit that not only are jobs no longer secure, but neither are careers. You can learn and plan all you want, but if the supporting infrastructure for your career goes away, where does that leave you?

Become a generalist, a jack-of-all-trades. If you have a specialized career, broaden your field to include similar opportunities in unrelated fields.

A career is fiscal monocropping. Diversify!

[ReverseEngineer]

There are only a few identifiable categories of jobs for the post Peak Oil scenario. Being able to fulfill multiple roles better insures your value to the society.


Food Producer- Food producers are involved in farming or fishing and hunting.

Protector- Protectors are military or police

Child Raiser/Domestic- Nurturing the youngest children and taking care of the domestic chores of living from cleaning to cooking

Teacher- Passing on the knowlede necessary for survival from one generation to the next, from the age around 5 to around 15

Medicine Man- Spiritual and Physical health advisors.

Toolmaker/Builder- Producer of hardware for all the other Professions

Entertainer- Musician/Actor/Writer/Artist

Prostitute: The Oldest Profession

Scientist: Investigator of the Unknown

Chief- Arbitrator of disputes, Pathfinder for society


I personally can fill about 6 of these roles pretty well. I'd like to be of value as long as possible. When I can't fill any of them and become a burden to the community, I will give my guns and my bow and my books and my tools and my writings to my heir, and then I will walk out into the woods and give myself up to the Bear. I will not live as a burden to my community.

Reverse Engineer

[Loki]

I think it's important to diversify our incomes, at least for us wage slaves. I don't want to put all my eggs in my employer's basket. I'd like to be self-employed, at least for part of my week.

The idea of a home-based microenterprise appeals to me. Market gardening, and possibly value-added food products, is what I've been thinking the most about, but I'd like to hear what other folks think about the microenterprise idea. Could be anything from home gunsmithing to knitting.

Do you have a microenterprise / small home-based business? What have been the challenges you've faced?

[oowolf]

I'm propagating fruit/nut trees and smaller plants like currants, gooseberries and blueberries. Anyone with a backyard can do this and we all know plants that produce food are going to become very popular real soon. Forget about investing in gold, etc; get some cuttings.

[gollum]

My wife cleans houses, I was thinking of taking on some plowing in the winter with my ATV and small plow if it does well I may buy one for the truck. We are also starting to raise turkeys.

[alokin]

owolf, I just begun to do the same, it's awesome!
the only backdraw: we might move.
You must think of the pots, it will be a problem.
Were do you sell your plants?
Our backyard and our car is pretty small so I must adjust to this.
Do you do grafting?

[Loki]

I'm propagating fruit/nut trees and smaller plants like currants, gooseberries and blueberries. Anyone with a backyard can do this and we all know plants that produce food are going to become very popular real soon. Forget about investing in gold, etc; get some cuttings.

Not a bad idea. I'm doing a horticulture program at a local CC, so this would fit right in with my current path. I actually happened upon a residence a couple months ago where it looked like they were propagating nursery crops. Whole yard was completely full of little ornamentals---didn't look like decoration, more like a production operation. This was right in the middle of the city.

[alokin]

but PO you must solve some problems:
1. pots
2. transport
3. potting mix (I propagate seeds i coir/sad) and if you take your own compost you will miss it in your veggies.

[patience]

Loki,

I like the home based enterprise enough to try to work it into being my job. Yes, it worked, but it doesn't pay as well as my old corporate job in engineering. However, my old job isn't there anymore, with the auto industry in free fall. So, I'm ahead of many of my old coworkers.

A wise old friend of mine endorsed the value-added idea saying, "if you raise wheat, sell bread". That is, get the most you practically can from value added.

I've learned a lot (the hard way) starting a business. Even with some knowledge from previous endeavors, it was hard, and took more time than I would have like to make it pay. You can start small and work it part time, which helps, but you soon hit the decision point where the business demands more time in order to grow toward full time. That, of course, requires capital to invest and live on until the venture can make you a living. Most people borrow that capital. We did not, but did it with savings. My wife worked to provide a living while I began to make the business pay something. It is still not equal to what she makes, after 5 years, but it is sustainable to a greater degree. Having the business debt free, and having reinvested a lot of its' earning has made it viable today. If It had debts at this point, there would be no future in it with a declining economy.

On the face of it, my venture looks like a poor financial decision. We have been vindicated to some degree by seeing my old job go away as we predicted it would. But that satisfaction won't make you a living, so if you go this direction, look hard and realisically at how much it can make. If you stay part time, that decision must come at the expense of growth, eventually.

From a strictly part time view, which I think you are considering, the solvency thing must still apply. Over the years I have turned several hobbies into part time ventures, some more successful than others. Some things I learned:
1) My woodworking hobby, when turned into a business, had to compete with WalMart furniture, although I made high-end quality stuff. But there was no local market to pay for high end stuff, so we couldn't charge enough to make it worthwhile. To compete on a price basis would mean creating a factory for high vloume production. Check your market!
2) When I tried weekend photography, using equipment I already had, it paid well enough, the market was there, but it was too small to become full time, and seasonal. Another drawback was the one-shot nature of the market. People only have wedding photos done one time (per marraige, anyway). So, I had to keep finding new venues to sell the service.
3) Hand-crafted items have a very limited appeal in our mass-production world, because of the labor cost in them, and the trendy nature of most of them. "Cute" items are the first to go in a tight economy. Witness all the small wood items at flea markets.
4) It is hard to compete on foodstuffs, due to the labor cost. When things get tight, you will be competing on price, not quality, and the factories will win.
5) Search for a venture that HAS NO COMPETITION. If you can do something that is not available otherwise, you have a lock on the market. Unfortunately, you will still have to compete with the alternatives--such as satisfying the need another way (bake their own bread), or do without bread.

6) Leverage is the only way to make bigger money than you can with your own labor. That is, you can exploit the labor of others, or you can exploit cheap energy, or cheap money. In the absence of those, one can only work so much. When you hit that wall, you are maxxed out, without leverage, be it gasoline fueled garden equipment, borrowed money for facilities and equipment, or hired help.

My business is repair work, of farm and other equipment. We shy from "custom built" projects because the alternatives are always cheaper. In a few cases, we can compete with manufactured stuff, but almost always, we are limited by the cost of repairs, versus the cost of a new item. This puts a lid on the prices we can charge. Sometimes we can charge an "emergency premium", but that often entails working hard, and late into the night.

We are presently looking at alternative energy, with the idea of making such things as solar window box heaters to order, solar ovens, etc. Much to learn about there, though. I do believe that will be a growth area, but, again, you compete with the other means of satisfying those needs.

Look hard at the money flow. If it's a hobby, you do it for fun. If it's a business, you do it for money, or its' equivalent. Best of luck!

[Bytesmiths]

Interesting stuff, Patience! I do have a few nits to pick, though. I think a lot of your thinking is based in cheap energy, and that some of the advice you give won't be true in a low energy future.

My woodworking hobby, when turned into a business, had to compete with WalMart furniture...

Perhaps you were making things that were indistinguishable from Mall*Wart stuff. Perhaps you were selling in the wrong marketplace. Artistic embellishments and selling in arts festivals and Saturday markets might differentiate you from the the Mall*Wart stuff and separate you from the Mall*Wart crowd.

When I did art for five years, no one who bought from me would ever admit to even going into a Mall*Wart!

Plus, really stress the local nature of the work, and the fact that they can make a local call and get a human on the phone if there's a problem.

Good local service is going to come back big-time when cheap plastic crap from China is no longer so cheap. And there are plenty of people out there who already appreciate that!

Photography... paid well enough... but it was too small to become full time... People only have wedding photos done one time... I had to keep finding new venues...

Small incomes are a gift! A single job is "fiscal monoculture." I'm happy to have diverse income sources -- and photography is one of them.

Also, photography is such a huge field, and there are many people chasing the same market. Look for niche markets, especially ones you can combine with some other venture. Selling woodworking at art fairs? How about photographing other artists' booths and their work for their applications to other festivals? And unlike weddings, this market has a large repeat business factor.

It is hard to compete on foodstuffs, due to the labor cost. When things get tight, you will be competing on price, not quality, and the factories will win.

Again, focus on niches. Sure, you can't afford to make strawberry jam to compete with Smuckers, but you can be sure it is prominently labelled as "locally-grown" and "organic" and perhaps put something in that makes it special.

We make a lot of jam. The plain stuff just sits there, and we end up eating it or giving it as gifts. But we added lavender to blackberry jelly, and couldn't make enough of it! Plus the labels: "Organic Salt Spring Blackberry-Lavender Jelly" had all the right buzzwords in there. We get $4 a jar for what fetches $2.79 at Mall*Wart -- plus a $1 deposit for the re-usable canning jar and lid ring, which gives them incentive to come back for more when they empty it!

In a future of declining globaloney, localize!

I also always take the opportunity to emphasize figuring out how to live on less. Grow food! Make energy!

Two of us have been living on $12,000 to $14,000 for ten years now. It's not hard to come up with that kind of money. And that's after expenses -- although we are officially below the poverty line, our computers, cameras, and other "toys" are legitimate business expenses. Plus we grow a lot of our own food and produce a lot of our own energy.

I don't want to tout my own life-style as some goal for someone else to reach. We all have our own situations to live with. But if you take voluntary simplicity as a challenge, as a process to enjoy and constantly improve, rather than an unattainable goal to achieve, you'll be doing fine.

[Loki]

A wise old friend of mine endorsed the value-added idea saying, "if you raise wheat, sell bread". That is, get the most you practically can from value added.

That's my thinking, too, though it's all theoretical at this point.

Thanks for the details about your ventures. A lot of it reflects what I was already thinking, but it's good to hear some first-hand experience. It all seems to boil down to having a market.

I have two ideas in mind, (1) tree work (pruning, planting, pest treatment, etc.) and (2) market gardening. I'd like to eventually do market gardening as a half-time job, and tree work as an odd jobs kind of situation (though it's my full-time job right now). Community-supported agriculture (CSA) is the niche I'd like to exploit for market gardening. Most of the CSAs in my area have waiting lists, so the market isn't saturated yet.

When I posted my post about microenterprises I was thinking mostly about crafts, but I can see how it would be exceedingly difficult to make that into a paying venture. Woodworking would be nice, but as you said, seems like it would be difficult to compete with mass produced stuff. And I don't think that'll be going away any time soon.

After researching a number of different options (renewable energy installation, woodworking, gunsmithing, bicycle mechanic, yoga/martial arts instructor, etc.), I think I'll be putting most of my eggs in the horticulture basket. I think it's possible to make a semi-independent living doing hort work, though I am certainly not expecting to get rich. I'm working full-time in the field right now and doing a hort degree program, plus gardening as much as I can (have 1000+ square feet right now), so it seems like my best option.

[Bytesmiths]

Woodworking would be nice, but as you said, seems like it would be difficult to compete with mass produced stuff.

It all depends on how good you are, and how much you can tolerate piece-work.

At the Eugene festival, we were always next to a wood turner, let's call him "Bruce" (since that's his name). He had it down so he could turn out little wooden tops in under five minutes. He sold them for $10. That's $120/hour, gross.

That sorta work sure doesn't appeal to me, but it's fascinating to recall when someone decries "competing with mass production."

The way to compete with "mass production" is to do mass production, while knowing that your skill and working out of your garage makes your costs less than even a Chinese factory (plus the increasingly large bite from freight), and that your specialized, local market makes your income higher than what Mall*Wart (et. al.) can get for a similar item.

Plus, there's attitude, folks. Let's start out all defeated and ride it down from there. :-) If you love doing something, especially something that will be more useful in a reduced-energy world, and you can differentiate in a local market, you've got a job. Do everything yourself; avoid paying for anything you can do. In fact, take whatever they tell you in business school (such as avoid doing whatever you can pay someone to do), and do just the opposite. The MBA way is predicated on cheap energy.

Now go out and get two more similar jobs, preferably with synergy with your fist job, and you'll be set.

[alokin]

I agree, if you start slowly there are many things you can do with little money. Instead of borrowing money it is better to earn money and with the money earned investing little by little.
All is heaps easier if you have one fixed salary (and/or live in a house which is yours).
Most of this self employed work is quite manual and maybe in your old job you did mainly brainy work ,but that's the future anyway.

Do you do good bookkeeping? I guess that this is not my favourite, but necessary.

[Bytesmiths]

Most of this self employed work is quite manual and maybe in your old job you did mainly brainy work, but that's the future anyway.

Not necessarily. Most of my income comes from information-related services. Perhaps that will change over time, but the point is there is probably time to transition your "brainy" work while picking up a manual skill.

Do you do good bookkeeping? I guess that this is not my favourite, but necessary.

I don't have to; that's one of my spouse's revenue streams. :-)

[patience]

Bytesmiths,

I agree 100% with what you said, and yes, my thinking there was based on the present day situation. Yes, it will change dramatically with post-peak society. Yes, doing your own mass production works. We do that at any opportunity at present. (My background is in high speed automation for auto manufacturing.)

The trick is to apply the correct approach at the correct opportunity. Slow, painstaking handcrafting won't compete head-to-head with mass production NOW, but it WILL pay when the world begins to operate diferently. I think it is all important to position for both situations. Being nimble about how you do things is the great advantage of the small operation, as contrasted to mass production that is well-nigh impossible to change direction quickly, sort of like an aircraft carrier, compared to a person walking. If we master both sorts of skillsets, and apply them appropriately, we can win every time.

I guess I sounded too negative in the first post, which was not my intent at all. I think you hit an important point with small income streams. An example of that which makes us a few bucks is prowling the junkyard for old tools, such as shovels, axes, sledgehammers, picks, etc., with broken or missing handles. I have a process for rejuvenating these, since there are wood handles available to us as seconds from a local handle factory. First, remove all the old handles, and rivets, doing them a batch of them all at once, to save time. Derust them all with a wire brush on a right angle grinder, and paint them all, hung on wire hooks to dry. Collect handles to suit, and spend a morning installing about 20 of them. The finished tools are stacked in a corner of the shop tagged for sale, at about half of new price, and sell fairly quickly.

Gardening tools done this way have been VERY popular this year! I've known people who specialized in refurbing bicycles and others who did used lawn mowers, and made decent money at it. Even if it is only a single item to sell , like the old farmers' adage, "have something to sell every week". It works. Just because our primary business is welding and machining does not mean we should not make our slack times productive with such things. A winter of salvaging things to sell has paid us well in spring when the outdoor season begins.

[Loki]

An example of that which makes us a few bucks is prowling the junkyard for old tools, such as shovels, axes, sledgehammers, picks, etc., with broken or missing handles.

That's a very cool idea. My workplace has tons of old tools that need to be fixed up, and I'm the only one who cares about such things there---it'd be a good way for me to learn how to do it right. What kind of junkyards do you go to?

As for the woodworking example, I can see how some folks could make a go of it, but my problem is that I don't actually have any woodworking skills. I'd have to learn from scratch and invest in better tools, then try to find a market. Only so many hours in the day and dollars under the mattress. Better to focus my energies on market gardening and tree work, and maybe odd projects like tool renovation. As much as I'd like to pick up some craft skills, I think they'll have to be limited to stuff I use at home rather than stuff I produce for the market. At least for now.

[Bytesmiths]

... prowling the junkyard for old tools, such as shovels, axes, sledgehammers, picks, etc., with broken or missing handles. I have a process for rejuvenating these, since there are wood handles available to us as seconds from a local handle factory...

Ah, I love it! That's a fantastic example of what I rather ineptly tried to describe.

Thanks for taking my posting in good cheer, Patience. Looking back, I could have been more diplomatic than to start out by saying I had "nits to pick." Successful self-employed people need to be good diplomats.

Gotta go now... one of my multiple, tiny "revenue streams" just called: a lady wants some VHS tapes put on DVD.

And that brings up networking -- if word gets out that you're handy in certain fields, especially in a rural area, they'll think of you before they go to Radio Shack or some "brick-n-mortar" store. This is a person I had in my photography class, and she'd rather pay me to do something like this than pay some stranger.

[criticalmass]

This is why I like these forums... I would have immediately chimed in with "junkyard miner" but it's been mentioned 5 times or more in this thread. Had this conversation come up almost anywhere else, I'd have struck people with awe at such an answer