Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by mesothelium

Tonight's dessert courtesy of GrabFood

mesothelium — Mon, 30 Aug 2021 18:56:24 +0800

Got some dessert for tonight as well as some ingredients to make herbal soup at home.

In before...

Not for 1 person eat
Yeah I'm kinda fat
Yada yada yada

Calvin support Foodpanda, I support Grab

mesothelium — Sun, 29 Aug 2021 17:12:25 +0800

For dinner today. Sorry, not helang level...

I have lost all hope in Malaysia

mesothelium — Thu, 08 Jul 2021 17:39:27 +0800

Once I'm vaccinated and the world starts to open up, I'm out of this country. I feel that anyone who is in the position to start a new life elsewhere should seriously consider the same.

I don't feel there's any more hope for Malaysia. Nowadays, there is zero pretense that the leaders are doing anything for the rakyat. More like doing everything for their positions and throwing a few crumbs every now and then to keep you all quiet.

Even if I take out the political issue, life in Malaysia is still shitter than it was 15 years ago. Pay is stagnant. Stuff is more expensive. Quality products are less and less available; instead, we get more shitty but overpriced products.

If you have to be here because of family, friends, etc., I wish you all the best.

But if you have no circumstances tying you down, why not consider moving?

Focus on growing your income not cutting costs

mesothelium — Tue, 29 Dec 2020 22:07:54 +0800

Three months ago I decided to start a side hustle by monetising my free time. I spend between one and two hours a day writing blog posts on Medium.

Income-wise, the first month seemed like a waste of time. $2.38 over the whole of October. But, by December, this has risen to nearly $75. Still not huge money but at least it's headed in the right direction.

I'd be interested to see how much I can scale this in 2021.

I'm not saying that what I do is extremely sophisticated or anything, but if you're looking for a potential source of scalable income, you could do a lot worse than online content creation.

I joined up with Gatita and Pui Yi

mesothelium — Sun, 15 Nov 2020 18:12:14 +0800

... by setting up a side business distributing and selling content over the Internet.

No, not on OnlyFans, because nobody is going to be paying a cent to buy semi-naked pics of my fat ass.

Plus, putting down the thousands for surgical procedures would hardly constitute "enhancements" on my part.

Instead, I am taking what I know best - writing - and trying to see if there is a popular market for my writing.

All respect to the ladies mentioned in the title, creating content, marketing it, distributing it, and selling it, is hard work. In my first month, I made US$2.38 for my efforts. Hardly what you would call a "worthy effort", seeing that it took me an extra 1-2 hours every day to make that $2.38.

Now, halfway through my second month, I've pulled in US$3.64 already. $0.76 (~21%) of this revenue actually came from content I wrote last month, which validates my initial rationale for taking part in this experiment, i.e., I am trying to see if I can create digital assets that people would pay for. So far, it's heading in the right direction, but I need to keep playing around to see if it really works out or not.

Say what you want about Gatita, Pui Yi, or Zern Tan... chow ah beng/ah lian la, scammer la, but they are clearly better at this "building and marketing digital assets" game than I am.

Sekian

Selangor state government is in the dark

mesothelium — Mon, 19 Oct 2020 17:15:50 +0800

From Malaysiakini.

Short version: the Selangor COVID-19 task force alleges that the MoH has stopped sharing critical data on positive cases with it, hampering the state government's efforts to track and trace.

Full article below.

https://www.malaysiakini.com/news/547174

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Malaysia's poor health literacy

mesothelium — Thu, 08 Oct 2020 11:44:48 +0800

I guess people are really slacking on the SOPs these days. The so-called Bah Puchong cluster was started when someone returned from Sabah, was on home quarantine, and his relatives came to visit and stayed over in his place. Now everyone's ended up in hospital.

https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/...eak-in-puchong/

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The Post-GE15 Dream Team

mesothelium — Thu, 21 May 2020 19:19:06 +0800

We need out-of-the-box thinking to get out of the stalemate between PH and PN in deciding who should rule Malaysia. I view this as a contest between "old Malaysia", i.e. the conservative forces who have decided how Malaysia has been run for decades, and "new Malaysia" who are driven by the forces that want things to change.

Maybe one strategy is to give the old Malaysia guys exactly what they want? A complete reversion to the old days of BN rule. As a thought experiment, here's a potential Post-GE15 Cabinet lineup.

Minister Mentor: Tun Najib Razak (he should be exonerated and elevated to a Tun-ship some time between now and GE15)
Senior Minister: Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin
Prime Minister: Dato' Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi
Deputy Prime Minister: Dato' Seri Azmin Ali
Finance Minister: Datuk Seri Panglima Abdul Azeez Abdul Rahim
Minister of Economic Affairs: Datuk Seri Utama Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor
Minister of Home Affairs: Dato' Seri Abdul Hadi Awang

Further down the list, maybe Papagomo as Minister of Youth and Sports to elevate him to a higher level of Malaysian politics.

Run this for 5 years and Malaysia might (i) either soar to unprecedented heights or (ii) people would be so sick of the lot of them that we'd get rid of them for good.

Either way, no more stalemate.

What do you think?

Penang vs Pa Hai

mesothelium — Mon, 04 May 2020 17:11:43 +0800

Don't be triggered, guys

Penang island 13 days streak

mesothelium — Tue, 28 Apr 2020 16:52:18 +0800

13 days streak for Penang island. For the rest of the updates, you have to wait for your usual source.

Penang once had a secessionist movement

mesothelium — Sun, 26 Apr 2020 18:22:05 +0800

Not many people know this but, prior to independence, Penang actually had its own secessionist movement. That fizzled out pretty quickly because there wasn't support from the British to allow a small island like Penang to be an independent country given the Communist threat at the time. So, you know, there is a history of Penangites seeing themselves a bit differently from the rest of Malaysia.

The Penang secession movement was led by the Penang Chamber of Commerce,representing European business interests in Penang, and included organizations such as the Settlement of Penang Association, Penang Eurasian Association, the Chinese and Indian Chambers of Commerce, and the Penang Clerical and Administrative Union. Some of these organizations were driven by economic interests, others by a yearning to return to their pre-eminent status in pre-war days, yet others by a fierce, if parochial sense of ‘Penang patriotism’. But the fact that only 212 persons were present at the meeting to launch the movement indicated the movement’s lack of mass support and mobilizing skills.

During this period, some Straits Chinese began taking an active interest in local politics, especially in Penang, where there was an active Chinese secessionist movement. They identified themselves more with the British than the Malays and were especially angered by references to them as pendatang asing ("aliens"). They avoided both UMNO and the MCA, believing that while UMNO and the Malay extremists were intent on extending Malay privileges and restricting Chinese rights, the MCA was too "selfish", and could not be relied on to protect their interests.

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From http://teochiewkia2010.blogspot.com/2010/0...-1948-1951.html

In 1946, the Straits Settlements were dissolved, with Sir Shenton Thomas being the last governor, and Penang became part of the Malayan Union, before becoming in 1948 a state of the Federation of Malaya.

The Penang secession movement was led by the Penang Chamber of Commerce,representing European business interests in Penang, and included organizations such as the Settlement of Penang Association, Penang Eurasian Association, the Chinese and Indian Chambers of Commerce, and the Penang Clerical and Administrative Union. Some of these organizations were driven by economic interests, others by a yearning to return to their pre-eminent status in pre-war days, yet others by a fierce, if parochial sense of ‘Penang patriotism’. But the fact that only 212 persons were present at the meeting to launch the movement indicated the movement’s lack of mass support and mobilizing skills.

During this period, some Straits Chinese began taking an active interest in local politics, especially in Penang, where there was an active Chinese secessionist movement. They identified themselves more with the British than the Malays and were especially angered by references to them as pendatang asing ("aliens"). They avoided both UMNO and the MCA, believing that while UMNO and the Malay extremists were intent on extending Malay privileges and restricting Chinese rights, the MCA was too "selfish", and could not be relied on to protect their interests. They had already raised their ire in the late 1940s, when the government proposed to amend the Banishment Ordinance — which allowed for the exile of Malayans "implicated in acts of violence" — to permit those born in the Straits Settlements to be banished to their ancestral homeland. This was a revolting idea for most of the Straits Chinese. They were also uncomfortable about the merger of the Straits Settlements with Malaya, as they did not feel a sense of belonging to what they considered a "Malaya for the Malays", where they were not considered bumiputra ("sons of the soil"). One Straits Chinese leader indignantly declared, "I can claim to be more anak Pulau Pinang [a son of Penang] than 99 per cent of the Malays living here today." The secessionist movement eventually petered out, however, because of the government's stout refusal to entertain the idea of Penang seceding from the Federation.

A motion for Penang to secede from the Federation and to join Singapore as a separate British crown colony was narrowly defeated 15 votes to 10 in February 1949, mainly by the use of British official votes(Christie,1996).

On 31 August 1957, Penang formally became part of the newly-independent Federation of Malaya (Persekutuan Tanah Melayu) and in 1963, also became a member state of Malaysia.

Don't turn Rohingya away and leave them hungry

mesothelium — Thu, 23 Apr 2020 19:25:45 +0800

The former Leader of the Opposition has spoken.

https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/202...nd-leav/1859572

The government should not turn away Rohingya refugees and leave them hungry, PKR President Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim stressed today as Malaysians on social media continue to hurl spite against the persecuted minority.

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Anwar, in his daily live session, said it is saddening to hear the news that Malaysia turned away a boat full of Rohingya refugees from Malaysian waters last week, even as Umno and PAS had previously held a mega rally in support of the Myanmar outcasts.

“I saw this political party, before they became the government, they used to say this is for the Rohingya and all that. Now we send home drowning and hundreds of people are dead. So I think we should safeguard our humanity.

“As we guard our borders, we cannot let people die, moreover they are the victim of tyranny by their own government. Then, when the run was stopped by this so-called Islamic country, [and] they ended in a big tragedy,” he said, referring to the Rohingya.

“I hope the government will consider keeping them in the form of limited controls but not evict them until they drown or leave them starving,” he added.

In a tweet with the video of his remarks, Anwar also lamented that recent arguments against the Rohingya slant towards hatred, signalling a loss of empathy and humanity among critics of the ethnic group.

On April 18, the Human Rights Watch reported that the Royal Malaysian Navy turned back a boat carrying about 200 Rohingya women, men and children, while reportedly providing food to those on board two days prior.

Representative of Malaysia to the Asean Intergovernmental Commission of Human Rights Eric Paulsen criticised Malaysia and Thailand’s authorities for refusing entry for the boat as reports on 20-30 of them died at the sea emerged.

The European Rohingya Council Ambassador to Malaysia Tengku Emma Zuriana Tengku Azmi has also on April 22 called on governments in the region to allow them immediate safe disembarkation, especially Asean members to urgently agree to emergency measures to prevent another humanitarian crisis, while accommodating governments’ existing Covid-19 restrictions at their borders.

Meanwhile, Umno deputy president Datuk Seri Mohamad Hasan claimed Malaysia has “far exceeded” its capacity to host refugees as some parts of Malaysian cities have become “too concentrated with refugees” and resources to take care of their welfare have been depleted.

The issue was also being debated in Malaysia’s social media with xenophobic and racist comments emerging against the Myanmar Ethnic Rohingya Human Rights Organisation Malaysia president Zafar Ahmad Abdul Ghani and the community.

In addition, there is also an online petition campaign urging the government to ignore tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees affected by the movement control order.

Should we go for herd immunity?

mesothelium — Wed, 22 Apr 2020 17:23:04 +0800

There are some suggesting that India should try it. 93.5% of India's population is younger than 65 so mortality rates are fairly low. The idea is to let out most of the population younger than 60 to resume their normal lives. Older people remain at home. Encourage social distancing, masks, and still restrict large gatherings.

Malaysia's population is also young, perhaps this might be the only way to balance between further economic damage and controlling COVID-19?

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/p...ow/75285241.cms

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Controversial given the high risk of deaths, a coronavirus strategy discarded by the U.K. is being touted as the solution for poor but young countries like India. The herd immunity strategy, which would allow a majority of the population to gain resistance to the virus by becoming infected and then recovering, could result in less economic devastation and human suffering than restrictive lockdowns designed to stop the virus’s spread, a number of experts have begun to argue in the nation of 1.3 billion people. “No country can afford a prolonged period of lockdowns, and least of all a country like India,” said Jayaprakash Muliyil, a prominent Indian epidemiologist. “You may be able to reach a point of herd immunity without infection really catching up with the elderly. And when the herd immunity reaches a sufficient number the outbreak will stop, and the elderly are also safe.”

A team of researchers at Princeton University and the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, a public health advocacy group based in New Delhi and Washington, has identified India as a place where this strategy could be successful because its disproportionately young population would face less risk of hospitalization and death.

They said allowing the virus to be unleashed in a controlled way for the next seven months would give 60% of the country’s people immunity by November, and thus halt the disease.

Mortality could be limited as the virus spreads compared to European nations like Italy given that 93.5% of the Indian population is younger than 65, they said, though no death toll projections were released.

The radical proposal underscores the challenges that poorer developing countries -- including nations like Indonesia and some in sub-Saharan Africa -- face in curbing the epidemic using the lockdown measures that have been adopted by advanced economies.

The impossibility of social distancing in crowded living conditions like in many cities and villages in India, the lack of testing kits to detect infections and the human suffering that occurs in lockdowns suggests a different path may be needed in these places.

To do this, the Princeton and CDDEP team recommends lifting India’s strict lockdown -- which has been extended to May 3 -- and letting most of the population younger than 60 return to normal life, though social distancing still would be encouraged, masks would be required and large gatherings would be banned. The reopening would be accompanied by an effort to test as many people as possible and isolate confirmed and suspected cases.

The government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has given no indication it plans to adopt such a strategy.

Yet the government has laid out criteria that effectively rations coronavirus tests, limiting them to the very sick or most at risk. Critics who suspect the disease has spread much more widely than the official numbers suggest say the government’s restrictive criteria amounts to allowing the disease to spread.

“In some sense, you are saying, we will let them get infected and recover, and take care only of those who are sick,” said T. Sundararaman, the New Delhi-based global coordinator of the People’s Health Movement, a public health group. “That’s the policy, that’s what it amounts to.”

The government has maintained its testing criteria gives an accurate tally of India’s number of cases, and says the disease is not spreading untracked in the community. Nevertheless, as India has ramped up testing, it is finding more cases each day, bringing the nationwide tally to 18,658, with 592 deaths, as of April 20.

But if questions remain as to the extent and severity of India’s outbreak, the costs of the government’s lockdown are clear. Local governments have had to set up camps to house 1.25 million migrants who left cities when they lost work, while food camps feed 7.5 million daily wage earners also rendered destitute by the lockdown. There are already signs these stopgap measures are starting to fray.

“We’re dealing with a trade-off against starvation, hunger, all this other stuff,” said Ramanan Laxminarayan, the director of the CDDEP and a Princeton researcher. By allowing the coronavirus to spread in a controlled way, “undoubtedly there will be deaths, but it will be much smaller this way, and it opens us up for business by November,” he said.

Fresh grad and experienced salary

mesothelium — Tue, 21 Apr 2020 20:15:26 +0800

Seems like salary chat always gets a lot of hits. I don't mind sharing a bit about my career history so here goes.

2000: Graduated with a computer science degree.
2001: Got my first job offer with no work experience. Accenture offered RM3,500/month. Turned it down because got an opportunity to work in IT in an investment bank in London. Starting offer was £35,000 a year. Bonus was 2 months.
2003: Came back and worked for 6 months with a local IT consulting firm. Offer was RM3,000/month. Left because I had to do business analysis and programming which I felt was way too much work. Nothing wrong with them, just too few decent programmers.
2004: Worked for 9 months for a telco software company as software support (now a subsidiary of IBM). Offer was RM4,400/month but with shift bonuses, it went up to RM5,200+/month. Left because I got burned out from working with computers all the time.
2005-2006: Finished Masters in Financial Management. Good times.
2006: Worked for 1 year with a local systems integrator. RM4,500/month. Left because company fell on hard times and was going to shut.
2007 onwards: Freelancing.
2008-2011: About RM60,000/year because had to take a lot of time to build contacts and reputation.
2012: RM70,000/year
2013: RM100,000/year
2014: RM110,000/year
2015: RM120,000/year
2016: RM150,000/year
2017-2019: Back to RM60,000/year because I had a lot of family issues when my dad had cancer.

Aiming to go for RM180,000 this year.

My learnings:
1. Don't stick to the discipline that you studied for, you need to be developing multiple skills so that you can move to where the opportunities are.
2. Always be improving your efficiency. I have been able to earn more partly because I learned how to be more effective when I work, i.e. doing the same amount and quality of work in less time.
3. Earnings can't increase too much when you are in a service industry because the output depends on you. I have been thinking of developing a product but I haven't put in the time to do it just yet. I was supposed to start this in March but coronavirus makes me think I should build up my savings a bit more first..

DAP was the best party

mesothelium — Mon, 20 Apr 2020 19:34:25 +0800

OK, since you clicked, sorry for the clickbait title.

I'm not so much a fan of "party A" or "party B" as all the parties have their problems. The real issue, I think, is that we have too many oldfags in Malaysian politics. And these oldfags are mostly interested in berebut kuasa rather than leading the country where it needs to go. This applies similarly to Bossku Najib, Mahathir, the "TNB meter reader" (remember that?) Muhyiddin, and the eternal "bakal PM" Anwar. No comments about "always failing" Azmin.

I think Tony Pua of DAP had the right idea but tried to do it in a party too full of oldfag "veterans" who finally had enough of him. Tony Pua brought in new blood into the party like Ong Kian Ming, Teo Nie Ching, Hannah Yeoh, Yeo Bee Yin, who really pulled their weight in the previous cabinet.

This country needs more young professionals with visionary ideas who can push Malaysia ahead, and not so much of party hacks who are only good at playing political games. Over the years, some names who I think would be a good dream team include:

PKR - Nurul Izzah Anwar, Rafizi Ramli, Fahmi Fadzil, Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad
DAP - Tony Pua, Anthony Loke, Gobind Singh, Ong Kian Ming, Teo Nie Ching, Hannah Yeoh, Yeo Bee Yin, Syerleena Abdul Rashid

I hesitate to mention Khairy Jamaluddin, I think he has some good ideas but the guy is too much of a political player.

A lot of the older bunch should probably retire. They have tried so much but it's clear they're just not cut out to bring Malaysia out of the middle income trap.

Azmin Ali screws up again

mesothelium — Sun, 19 Apr 2020 11:38:15 +0800

This is from the Tanah Rata ADUN Chiong Yoke Kong's Facebook page.

TLDR: Logistics companies need approval from Azmin Ali's MITI to be able to transport vegetables. The supply chain has been disrupted because transporters have been turned away for not getting MITI approval even though they had been approved by the Cameron Highlands' district police chief and the Department of Agriculture.

Is there nothing that Azmin cannot f*** up? This actually reflects very poorly on PKR and Anwar too, actually. Anwar should have known Azmin was a clueless idiot all along, yet he kept him by his side all these years.

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As MCO Phase 3 began, Malaysia’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry's (MITI) recently announced that logistics companies will have to apply for MITI’s approval, thus bringing about disruptions to the essential services sectors that have just returned to their normal operations.

I would said MITI’s directive as an attention-seeking measure that created market chaos.

I received complaints from many vegetable transporters yesterday morning that they were stopped by police at the Kulai Toll Plaza of NSE Highway.

The police officers said that MITI’s approval was necessary and turned away the approval letters issued by Cameron Highlands’ district police chief and the Department of Agriculture.

I was too perplexed after receiving such complaints. During MCO Phase 1 and 2, the government had clarified that logistics companies can deliver goods once approval letters issued by the Department of Agriculture and local district police headquarters are obtained. Why would another ministry intervene when we are now in the third phase of MCO?

My doubts were finally answered when MITI issued an official statement on Facebook at 3pm yesterday.

MITI’s official statement on Facebook states that even though transportation of goods by land, sea and air are listed as essential services during MCO, MITI’s latest approval obtained by logistics companies will assist police to verify whether their services are categorised as essential.

Local essential services providers have experienced a monthlong “unrest” and could finally return to their normal operations under strict monitoring.

If MITI intends to allow more sectors to resume their operations gradually, coordination with various key ministries such as the Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer as well as Ministry of Health is necessary.

MITI should not overturn everything and ask all sectors, particularly essential services providers, to reapply in order to resume operations.

MITI’s attention-seeking intervention has created market chaos and brought about disruptions to essential service providers.

It clearly reflected the lack of coordination between various ministries as different ministries issued their respective directives without due consideration.

Businesses have been disrupted by many ambiguous guidelines and instructions to resume operations as well as standards provided by different ministries that are inconsistent with one another.

Let the SMEs die?

mesothelium — Tue, 31 Mar 2020 11:20:32 +0800

Seems like there are a lot of people here who have the attitude "let the SMEs die, they have been profiting for so long, can't take 1-2 months of losses?"

Many SMEs are run by people who are doing this to support themselves and their families. Your uncle selling chicken rice or your kedai runcit owners - those are considered SMEs too. These are the guys who are going to be hurt the most by the MCO and the slowdown in spending that will likely ensue when (if) the MCO is lifted on April 14.

Key point from the article in the spoiler tag below: These individual shop owners are most likely to be cash-strapped due to the MCO. Most of them live hand-to-mouth. Staff account for about 30% of retail business expenditure.

Article is from https://www.thestar.com.my/business/busines...close-shop-soon

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Makcik Kiah - example of the failing economy

mesothelium — Sat, 28 Mar 2020 12:36:44 +0800

[twt]https://twitter.com/khalidkarim/status/1243717454628438016[/twt]

Got a good point here. Pensioner still needs to be an e-hailing driver and Makcik Kiah still has to sell goreng pisang and rely on PPR to survive?

Anwar and LGE arrive at PMO

mesothelium — Mon, 24 Feb 2020 10:12:55 +0800

Mahathir knows this is a waste of time, that's why he's just letting them sit around and wait for him.

QUOTE

Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has arrived at the federal administrative capital to meet with Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

The PKR president was seen entering the Putra Perdana building which houses the Prime Minister's Office at 9.26am on Monday (Feb 24).

However, Dr Mahathir has not arrived at the office yet.

It was understood that Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ibrahim had arrived several minutes earlier.

Also seen going to the Putra Perdana building is Finance Minister and DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng.

It is understood that Defence Minister and Amanah president Mohamad Sabu will also be making his way to see Dr Mahathir.

https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2020...g-arrive-at-pmo

AMA Freelance market research analyst

mesothelium — Wed, 10 Apr 2019 15:14:04 +0800

Since 2009, I have been making a living working from home writing market research reports. Ask me anything you like! Where possible, I'll try and edit this post later on to reflect my answers to good/popular questions. A few Q&A type questions to get the ball rolling.

WTF do you actually do?!
There are broadly two types of jobs that form the bulk of my work which depends on the types of client I get:
(i) Research agencies want high level reports, e.g. "Retailing in Malaysia 2018" or "Oil and Gas Malaysia 2018". This involves looking for a lot of information from the press, databases, etc. and compiling them into a report. The idea is that the reader will be able to get a high level view of what Retailing in Malaysia looked like in 2018 after a quick read through of the report.

(ii) End clients have more specific requirements. For instance, a client might have a business idea, e.g. "I want to set up a cafe on the 1st floor in Cheras" and then I would might do some of the ground work to help the client decide if they want to take the idea further or not. I also get foreign clients who want to bring a product into Malaysia and want to know what the market is like, e.g. "What is the market for Korean strawberries like in the Klang Valley?" Again, it is about presenting the information to them to help them decide whether to take it further.

Are the hours flexible?
Absolutely. This is one of the pros of this line of work and exactly why I got into this gig in the first place. My clients generally do not care if I put x number of hours into their project per day, or that I must be at the desk from 9-5. What they would like to see is updates every 1-2 weeks and progress towards the end deliverable.

How do I get started in this business?
There is no great secret in getting into this business: apply! In my case, I had a friend who was in this line of work and who was exiting the business. She recommended me to Euromonitor International who tends to specialise in FMCG research. They still seem to hire freelance in-country analysts, so if you want to look for an excellent place to learn and have a look at how the business works, Euromonitor might be it. Otherwise, you might look at other market research agencies that produce reports of the same nature. Names that spring to mind include BMI Research, and the Economist Intelligence Unit. Contact them to see if there are any opportunities available.

Do I need to learn any special software to do this work?
In some cases, software helps to speed the work up but it is not necessary. For a freelancer, speed is everything (obviously the quality must be there). Faster writing means more revenue per hour. Excel skills are a must because you will end up doing quite a bit of number crunching. I have used SPSS in the past to do a lot of bulk statistical calculations but I can count the number of projects where I have needed to use SPSS on the fingers of one hand.

Most important /k question: can make 20k?
It is possible but you have to be able to work fast and work a lot. When I started this line of work, I couldn't even come close. But as I became familiar with the tools of the trade, and with what readers and editors are looking for, earnings went up. I could probably have hit the 20k per month mark but this has always been a side gig for me so I've not put in enough hours to regularly make a 20k/month income. For someone who wants to do this more diligently, it is completely possible.

But how much can you really make?
It depends on how much time you are willing/able to put into it. I have found I can make about 8k-10k per month for what is a part-time gig, i.e. 60-80 hours per month. Your mileage may vary - higher if you have some real specialist skills, lower if you're totally new to the business. I've not tried to go for the 20k per month from this job, so I'm not sure if that will really work. Going to 20k per month means (i) putting in more hours (obviously) and (ii) finding more clients. The second part arises because it's unlikely there is going to be a single client who will have enough capacity to give you 20k per month worth of work.