I have been a pretty outspoken advocate over the last year for powering up for future benefits and at times, I have been criticised for not being sensitive to the life situations and needs of some. It is because of these situations and needs that I have recommended powering up.
I wrote a piece last night on how I see the future of Steem and some predictions as to where I see it going. In essence, it will be more earners, earning less which means, unless one has built a healthy community support base or holds Steem personally, getting a viable return is going to be difficult.
What always surprises me is that the people who claim to need to live off of the earnings didn't have this option available to them even a few short months ago yet, now rely heavily upon it. That is a risk. The other thing is that they seem to take all earnings out without leaving even a small percentage to keep their own account clicking over. 10 - 20% would be a small price to sacrifice now to invest in potentially very large future positions. There is risk in long-term thinking of course but, there is a lot of risk in thinking short too.
If you think that 1000 SP votes at about 19 cents currently (~1.90 a day) what does that 1000 vote at when prices are 10 times as high? Yes, there will be larger pulls on the pool and less Steem paid but, the value of 1000 SP would be highly significant to many of the users here. For those struggling now but not powering up, they are always going to struggle and likely increasingly so as prices increase and onboarding continues.
Rather than building a nest egg, they have created a job for themselves with a weekly paycheck but, no fall back position. A change to the code, a shift in social preferences, a lockout through communities and, they are back at zero. Unemployed. Even if they are earning, the pressure to continually perform, chase, stress will go on indefinitely and they will never get a chance to rest, take a day off, a holiday.
Plus, earning and holding a little SP now creates more than voting power in the future, it creates a nest egg that can be liquidated if necessary. 100 Steem at 30 dollars is worth 3000 and if a dollar a day matters, that is enough for 8 years of mattering. A power down of a few SP can tie one over for a long time.
There are going to be ups and downs in the markets but, earning Steem through content creation will never be much easier than it is now and as competition through mainstreaming increases, the chances of increasing rate of earning goes down. Unless of course, one holds Steem power to use to earn upon and support others.
As I have said many times before, I am investing myself as heavily as I can now and doing all the work I can so this isn't a job but a preparation for a different life in the future. I am tired of living month to month, paycheck to paycheck, hand to mouth as, it is no way to actually live. Life has a lot more beauty in it than most of us experience while we go about trying to make do on the scraps thrown from employers and governments alike.
The beautiful thing is that not only can we work toward our own freedom here, we can be a part of helping many others too. Well, we could be, if people chose to create a community of free thinkers instead of a group of short-term maximizers and extractors.
This place is going to evolve in many ways and be influenced in many more both internally and externally. My hope is that improvement behaviors are incentivized, harmful disincentivized and those thinking long will get rewarded for their effort and consistency.
A long way to go and so much to come.
Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]