Paying for the Priceless

In times of plenty, when there are lots of good business ideas, there is often money available for good ideas that don’t generate their own money. There are muses for creativity. Golden ages. 

Something may be incredibly valuable and hard to quantify, but still have costs that are very real, very grounding, and very countable. There is magic that happens between the inputs (what something costs) and the outputs (that we value). Directly marrying inputs and outputs in a money dance is stifling. 

Some creative, exciting companies, will have at their core a very boring business that generates cash. That provides the money for the angels, moonshots, and unicorns. The money for research and development. Management could easily sell those businesses separately, but don’t... because they need the cash! 

Newspapers made money because they sold advertising. The ads paid for the investigative journalism. Adverts that make the advertisers money mean they are happy to spend $1 if they are confident that will make them $2. 

Is the journalism worth that same $1? Harder question. What do you find interesting? What do you want to read? Are we better off if we have intelligent people asking difficult questions? Search and social media muted Newspapers' cash engine. 

Theoretically, you can put a price on anything, but that requires a buyer and a seller to agree on that price. It is easier to price things you can count, compare, and control. 

Then pay the costs for the priceless.

Achievements in Golden Ages

Decision Maker with Money

A good idea can be impossible to make money out of. Impossible to contain. It can be incredibly difficult to quantify and control qualitative value creation. 

That becomes a “cost centre” which needs money to be spent on it, but does not generate money. A “profit center” explicitly pays for itself, and generates cash beyond its needs. Profit centers don’t need much justification. 

In fact, they may need strong arguments why they are not good ideas despite making money. Maybe the costs are felt by others. Maybe the qualitative consequences are not worth the cash. Maybe the cash will come in the short term, and the costs... even ones you can count... will come later. 

A cost centre generates something that doesn’t work according to the rules of money, but is still worth doing. A job that doesn’t pay enough to cover your basic living costs. 

Perhaps it is work that pays nothing at all. Care work. Perhaps it is something beautiful where the line between work (is it only work if you get paid?), play, and creative exploration blurs. 

These endeavours don’t need a price if they have a believer. They just need a decision-maker with money to say yes.

Getting Paid

Your Own Believer

There are a limited number of jobs. There are a limited number of employers. Many of the jobs that people currently do are being mechanised and automated. This means that however you go about planning your career, you have to think about what it would look like as a business. Employers are a middle man between you and clients. The key to every business is identifying the needs of decision makers with money. Solving decision makers’ problems. You can divide work into the categories of cost centres and profit centres. Cost centres are things that don’t finance themselves. They can be very valuable, and even foundational to profit centres, but they don’t make money. They need money. Quality Content is a cost centre. Advertising is a profit centre. Without advertising, print media started dying. Cost centres need believers. Not all good ideas are good business ideas. Good business ideas make money. Fortunately, that doesn’t have to trap us in profit centres. Gradually we can reinvest money in profit centres, and turn ourselves into decision makers with money. We can be our own believers.

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