Before I get to this week’s topic a brief update on previous week’s writing. First of all, the smoke situation is hardly getting any better. Some days it’s really bad. On Monday the smoke in Helsinki made the city look like it’s covered in fog. I’ve read in today’s papers that a garbage dump is on fire near Viipuri in Russia. Great.

But drinking and drowning even tickeled your fingers and I’ve received a few emails. Most of you thought it’s quite tragic, but nevertheless found it to be amusing. According to statistic which has been kept since at least 1990, when the air temperature rises a single degree, the amount of deaths caused by drowning rises by seven. This year alone, as of mid-August, 82 people have died. I vote for cold and sunny weather.

Now let’s move on to business.

Getting rich on the stock market is so late 90’s. Selling Microsoft, buying Google? Get a life. What’s hot and hip now is getting loaded on the commodity markets. Stop following the London Gold Fixing twice a day and forget about oil. The bullion of the future lies in plastic, glass and aluminum. And there ain’t any better place to get rich by trading these right here, in Finland. No provisions, no taxes, pure hard Euros.

Why don’t I just keep my mouth shut and get filthy rich? Now, I sure thought about this too. But, I’ve gathered that most of you live some place else, and then again, I thought, there’s plenty of room for high profits for all those whomever decide to move here. Interested?

At the moment especially aluminum is highly profitable and there’s nothing to lose, thus no need for any day trading skills whatsoever. And the best part is that the market is still in the expansion phase. The aluminum market alone will grow more than 15 million Euros next year. Think about it, all this cash might be mine. Excited? I sure am, but unfortunately it ain’t as easy as it sounds since the competition is, well, quite competitive (and there are other hidden traps I’ll reveal later).

An ounce of aluminum is worth 0,30€ (10,58/kg). OK, not that much, I hear you saying, for a metal that is light and hard to get. But what if I tell you that you can find aluminum at that price laying around all over Finland (especially in the summer in populated areas) in the form of cans. That’s right, after consuming their favorite beverage 99% of consumers politely place their canisters onto a curb or on top of a trash bin for others to collect. And you can cash in each can at 0,15€ in any practically any grocery store. Yes, these people do pay for what you then collect.

And the best part is that when you collect the money, you also collect the 22% VAT that someone else paid to the state. And guess what, the same goes for almost all plastic and glass beverage bottles. Quite nifty I say.

Although everything seems really simple when you do the calculations on your napkin, it is a tad bit different when you’re on the streets trying to realize your well crafted business plan. First of all you’re not the only one who thought about doing the same thing. Which means that you have to have sharp vision and be agile. Then you have to know where people drink and at what time of the day. Because if you’re five minutes late, you’re late and, bang, the treasure has been already collected by the tölkkimummo (or the “can grandma” as they are called around here). Capitalism and communism all in one; I can see Marx and Weber in ecstasy. And then there’s the butterfly effect: if the weather turns sour, so will your profits.

In spite of the huge opportunity to get wealthy waiting for you to come and get it, you have to do your homework first. Here are some tips from the experienced tölkki collector:
- begin running and learn how to snatch;
- eat lots of carrots for sharper vision and get night-vision goggles for the night shifts in the spring and fall seasons;
- survey the hood, even better, acquaint yourself with the whole city;
- learn where the teenagers hang out;
- carry lots of large disposable plastic bags;
- if you see lots of goods, run for the most valuable ones first, i.e. cans and plastic bottles, pick glass bottles last;
- get a bike;
- do not fear tölkkimummot, rather befriend them, they can be real comrades when not on duty.

If you want to make a living in Finland, you probably won’t make it, but you can make a decent amount of money without much effort (as in pocket money). I’ve decided to jump into the commodity market for a month and give it a shot. Here’s the outcome. I worked 15 hours during that month and earned 55€, which translates into 3,6€/hour. Bad? Depends! In Slovenia one is usually offered only a few cans’ worth more for jobs that demand exponentially more skills, challenges, responsibilities and intellectual agility. So, if you live there, forget about that lousy job at a software company coding your eyes away and come here and collect cans for the summer and earn something. But if you’re a Finn, well, then the job is not really in the upper earning scale and you might want to get a job.

May the harvest be plentiful, tölkkimummot of Finland.

Mladen

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 23rd, 2006 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Culture, Finland. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.