Earlier this month, I visited a hilly corner of North Carolina to spend time with family friends. As we sat around the kitchen table, a former musician whom I shall call Dave revealed that he had recently started an entrepreneurial sideline to supplement his meagre family income. During part of the week, he works in a local pawnshop but he does not lend out cash. Instead, Dave fills out application forms for people who want to buy firearms — but cannot read or write. He only charges a few dollars for this but the service is so popular that it provides a steady income. “Lots of people round here can’t read and write,” Dave told me with a rueful laugh. “But they all want guns. So they pay me to do that — I use their driving licences to get all the details.”
本月早些時候，我去了美國北卡萊羅納州一個多山的地方探訪親友。就在我們圍坐在廚房桌子邊時，一位曾經的音樂人（姑且叫他戴夫(Dave)吧）說，爲了貼補微薄的家庭收入，他最近開創了一項副業。每週部分時間裏，他在當地一家當鋪工作，不過並不是在那出借現金，而是幫那些想購買槍枝卻不能讀寫的人填寫申請表格。他每單隻收幾美元，不過由於該服務大受歡迎，這項業務爲他帶來了穩定的收入。戴夫苦笑著對我說：「這裏許多人都不會讀寫。不過他們都想買槍。因此，他們付錢給我讓我做這事——我用他們的駕照得到所需的所有具體資訊。」