According to a cracked article (I didn't check their sources, and comedy does trump accuracy there, so take these with a spoon full of salt), begging, busking and dumpster diving are pretty lucrative. I believe it was a top 5 or 6 article, but I've since lost the link and don't remember the others off the top of my head. (I'll edit it in if I can find it...)
Edit: Here it is. The others were sperm/egg donation and participating in scientific studies, both of which are pretty hard to get into in the US (demand for sperm donation is apparently much higher in other countries). Dumpster diving is quite unreliable, but skilled beggers have been known to make as much as skilled programmers, if this article is to be believed. (But once again, comedy--they do cite examples, at least.)
If there's a nearby plasma bank, plasma donations can pay around $20, a couple times a week. Not a lot, but pretty easy/low-stress if needles don't freak you out too much. To make it go faster, be sure to drink plenty of water fluids and don't eat too much fatty foods.
TL;DR: this is a repository for discussing income generation strategies optimized for free time
I hope I'm not cluttering up LW but maybe enough people are also interested in this? I graduated high school about a year ago.
I have a lot in common with Will Newsome's self description in this post
http://lesswrong.com/lw/2qp/virtual_employment_open_thread/
But it's a dead thread, and there's been some interest in early retirement extreme, (http://earlyretirementextreme.com/) and having repositories for stuff.
The upshot of it is that I want to optimize for free time and mobility. Need about $2,000 to live (1600 expenses 400 savings/buffer) 2nd EDIT: no I don't, I must have screwed something up when I was adding this it's more like $1600. ($1300 to spend $300 buffer). A 20 hour workweek or even shorter is what I'm going for here. Right now I'm barely functional. Even that much is a bit of a stretch for me as I am now. Plenty of advice abounds on optimizing my health and squashing akrasia though, and I'm sure that if I implemented it I could get to the point of handling part time work. But I think I would always find being a 9 to 5er unappealing.
I'd value spending that time reading texbooks or walking around town or lazing around on the beach more than I'd value extra money. I'm also interested to hear about some more conventional part time jobs if they pay enough. I'm ok with doing somewhat boring work if the hours are light and I have time to think.
I've generated some candidate strategies if anyone here has experience at these. I don't have much knowledge of what they would entail or how to break into them. Or they might give someone some ideas I dunno but anyway:
4hww style dropship business (but success at that seems hard to set up and sustain)
freelance work at a site like odesk or elance
Own a popular app or forum
Push carts at wal mart part time (but I don't think that pays enough)
Self employment doing massage therapy (I can set my own hours but I'd need to invest time and money to get trained)
Tutoring (I might like this one. Do I need a college degree? Can I make enough with part time hours? Is it hard to find leads for clients? How would I do that?)
Online poker (but it seems kinda hard)
Does anyone here live in a yurt? And has anyone tried living in other countries to cut down expenses?
edited to add: Did I make a mistake including numbers? They're what would be ideal for me, not strict requirements. I can work a little more or spend less. Err on the side of posting ideas, I'm sure some other people are interested in low stress work but don't value free time *quite* as much I seem to