The funny thing about the story is that the tradesmen that show up with an investment property isn't doing that well either. Even though in the story the locksmith asks for $750 - he's only taking home $25-35/hour. The check/card is for the company he works for. And that money will be paying his salary for a few days until the next uber expensive lockout.
In no reality is someone going lock-out to lock-out making $750 for themselves. That business, like software, is also captured. Captured by capital in advertising no individual can match.
It's just like a BTC miner. Very few people on HN will go out and buy a BTC miner box hoping to get 1 BTC in a few days - the competition is maximized to a point where each earned BTC just barely paid for all the upgrades. The fact is, that most of the BTC is mined in China and so it's just a giant siphon of money.
In no reality is someone going lock-out to lock-out making $750 for themselves. That business, like software, is also captured. Captured by capital in advertising no individual can match.
It's just like a BTC miner. Very few people on HN will go out and buy a BTC miner box hoping to get 1 BTC in a few days - the competition is maximized to a point where each earned BTC just barely paid for all the upgrades. The fact is, that most of the BTC is mined in China and so it's just a giant siphon of money.