So I can't speak to the putting earnings in to or being financially stable because I'm a broke student self learning software development while bleeding savings. I have however been looking for casual work "getting my hands dirty" as you put it. Something physical and outdoors to unplug while I earn some money, and there's either basically none or its not listed on regular job boards.

This has been at a time where Omicron is ripping through my country[0] to the point where there's apparently such massive staff shortages that businesses are having to temporarily close because either they or key suppliers don't have enough staff to run. Possibly the greatest employee shortage in decades and I cant find anyone who needs manual labour.

I believe the shortage is there. At least as much as it's possible for such a thing to exist and not just mean that wages are too low. But my nerdy ass can't find the dirty hands stuff. Coming from a background in sales I know I could start lining up sales job interviews today if I wanted to go back in to that because I have people I can reach out to. Coming from software sales specifically and also just having good friends who are experienced software developers I'm confident I will be able to line up interviews once I and they feel I'm ready. But for getting my hands dirty? I don't know anyone. I'm sure there are people nearby who are wishing they had someone to lug fence posts or throw bags of potatoes, but they're not posting on job boards. They're mentioning it to people they know, which doesn't include me.

This is relevant because generally step one to starting a business is working in that kind of business. Maybe not when that just involves coding up a software product yourself on your weekends but definitely so when buying physical assets and new skill sets is involved. You spend time as a barista before you drop bank on buying a cafe. Or at least you should. I can't imagine farming is any different. In fact it's probably far more important. You can burn yourself if you don't know what you're doing as a barista. You can kill yourself in a hundred different ways if you don't know what you're doing as a farmer. Or just ruin your land or tractor, or kill your livestock or find out you've had them walking around in pain this entire time for X reason you didn't know to check for.

I'm not sure there is a fix to this because it's the same root cause as much bigger employment issues than software developers not getting a chance to take a break doing some physical work. Hiring decent people is hard and relying on referrals from mutually known third parties is the best tool there is for making it easier. Labour is the greatest expense for any tech company (except Netflix?). Any efficiency gain they can get there is far more important than shaving the equivalent percent off their compute needs. And the best they've got is still asking employees for referrals, paying employees for referrals, and weighting referrals heavily in the interview process. I don't blame the guy who needs someone to throw sacks on/off a truck a few times a week for not bothering to post on indeed and instead just letting it be known amongst friends and family that he could use a hand until someone offers up a nephew. I'm certain it gets better results and saves him a lot of headache. I know it did for me the times I've been in a position to hire people.

[0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/australia/...