Side hustles. These two words have become increasingly popular and the pandemic brought them to a crescendo.

Funnily enough, most of the voices who promote side hustles as the way to your dream life are also trying to sell you their courses on how to make money in their side hustle of choice.

So naturally, if you spend any period of time online, be it on Twitter, YouTube, or even Instagram, side hustle culture makes it seem like everyone needs to start an online business.

These internet marketers talk about the absolute need to create multiple streams of income. They title their videos “why you need to start a side hustle today” and promote side hustles as the way to wealth.

But they are hardly discerning arbiters of truth.

A discussion of the downsides is barely present or is simply used as a way to dismiss legitimate concerns as “challenges” that need to be overcome by hustling more.

Whereas in reality, the question of whether side hustles are “worth it” is much more nuanced.

Side hustles for the money

According to the Federal Statistics Office, the salary of an average Swiss corporate employee is about 75,000 CHF. Even in Switzerland, this salary is more than enough to live a comfortable life.

But maybe you want more so you decide a side hustle is the way to go to generate some additional income.

However, the problem that many of these side hustle promoters fail to mention, is that building an online business to the point where it actually generates real revenue, takes a long time.

Expect to spend at least two years working on your blog or YouTube channel, posting content consistently, before you are even able to start monetising it.

It takes even longer, a viral moment, or simply good luck, to reach a point where your blog or YouTube channel starts to make a proper profit.

Moreover, most side hustles are not the easy gigs that they are advertised as.

They require you to put in work consistently, writing and promoting your content and then sending it out to what feels like no one for a long time.

Now, contrast that with your day job.

You are a good worker who is valuable to the company, so you ask for a modest pay rise of 5%. Your boss agrees and grants you 5% more, which on your 75,000 CHF salary, amounts to approximately 3,700 CHF more.

This is an almost immediate increase in income that you receive for job that you are already doing.

But let’s say you are a bit more ambitious, maybe you’ve been taking on additional responsibility at work and your salary should be increased to reflect that.

So you ask for a 10% raise.

This would amount to 7,500 CHF more per year.

Unless you are extremely lucky or incredibly talented, it is highly unlikely that your YouTube channel will net 3,000 CHF in your first year.

This is important to realise because there is a strong element of survivorship bias present in hustle culture.

Everyone knows a YouTuber or Blogger that made it big and now has made millions from their platform.

But what these examples don’t show is the thousands of people who tried the same thing and didn’t succeed.

To succeed in your side hustle you need two things: 1. consistency 2. endurance.

You need to consistently post content for months on end. Even when it feels like no one cares.

You need to continue to post this content for a long period of time before you can expect to gain any traction at all.

Most people give up before they ever reach this point.

Because the truth is that most people who try and fail, lack the consistency and the endurance to be successful.

Doing it for the money, is the most surefire way of ending up in this group.

My advice? Don’t do it for the money.

What side hustles can give you

The word passion is overused and honestly you don’t need to be passionate about your side hustle.

But it should be related to something you are interested in.

Not many people are passionate about dropshipping (apart from those annoying YouTube infomercial guys) but maybe you like interior design and dropping shipping furniture is one way for you to pursue this interest.

Or maybe you are interested in the social media marketing side of starting an online business.

Many a hobby has started from a desire to learn more about a subject.

A side hustle is a great, low risk avenue to explore your interests.

Worst case scenario, if your podcast ‘fails’ and no one listens to it, you can abandon it and move on to something new.

Side hustles are an excellent way to gain new skills and explore your interests.

Moreover, through trying and testing what works and what you are interested in, you will gain valuable experience, regardless of how ‘successful’ your business is.

Starting a side hustle requires learning how to set up and maintain a website. It will teach you about SEO and creating a mailing list.

You will gain insight into the backend of industries that you previously only interacted with as a consumer.

The new skills and the experience gained, are incredibly valuable.

Through learning by doing, you will have hands on knowledge that you cannot lose, even if your online business isn’t successful.

It is in this sense, that I say side hustles are completely “worth it”