I’ll add another reason why these scenarios are ridiculous: they assume that the time that goes into the side hustle is “free” and that it’s impossible to advance any faster in one’s “primary” career. I don’t know how things work in medicine, but in software engineering at a high-level tech company a bump up in pay grade blows away the $250/month you’d make fiddling with a vending machine. And wasting time on the vending machine makes it that much harder to get the vastly more valuable promotion.

I wonder if these stories are appealing because it seems like an “easy” path to wealth, whereas “work hard at a demanding job” seems hard.