Many people are starting to believe that they can live off SteemIt, let me tell you that this will not be possible for everyone, and the reason is very simple, there is not enough buyers of STEEM currency and incentives to do so.
The actual daily volume of STEEM trading is 300 000 USD only. It seems like a lot but if you take into account the number of people actually using SteemIt and the people who are just trading STEEM to make a quick buck, it's really not that much. Also, some bots are trading between themselves to make the volume go up making the illusion of activity into the market.
300 000 per day is 9 000 000 USD per month. To live off Steemit depending on where you live you would need between 1 to 3K per month. Let's take a small figure of 2K USD.
With the actual figures you might think that 4500 people could live off SteemIt cashing out 2K per month. But that's not really how the system works, if those people were really cashing out the price of STEEM would go down and down and then less and less people would be able to live off the platform.
What is the incentive to buy STEEM currency ? Powering up only. You can power up with bitcoins too. The real incentive is no-existent to buy STEEM currency.
Let me ask you, what would happen if people started to power down and cashing out their coins ?
I haven't yet seen a good explanation on how this platform will sustain such goals of paying everyone for blogging.
Once people will start making posts and money their first reaction will be to cash out some or all of that money at the nearest ATM. What if the price of STEEM start to collapse ? People will panic and sell their coins, dragging the price of STEEM down with them. And people who were living off SteemIt will now be under pressure without any income or much less income.
I think it's dangerous to think that you can live off this platform and you should just use it for fun and if you make money (a little or a lot) just take it as a bonus and keep your normal job.
That's why I buy steem. To powe-up and help Steemit grow
I think taking Steem too seriously at this stage is a mistake. Sure the early adopters have certainly made a lot of Steem Dollars but who knows where this will lead. Just have fun and enjoy.
I agree