Teachers are paid so poorly in the US that one in five has a second job. Silicon Valley firms, such as Uber and Airbnb, feed off and fuel this demand for an additional income. However, it is less obvious why leaders in that same technology sector feel the need for their own “side hustle”.
It is certainly not the money. Teachers are looking to supplement a salary that might be $30,000. Marc Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce, earns that in a couple of days. And that is without considering his $5bn slice of the $115bn software company he created.
But Mr Benioff has several side hustles. He has just bought Time magazine for $190m. He has aspirations in both global and local policymaking, chairing the tech offshoot of the World Economic Forum and fighting homelessness in San Francisco. At the same time, he runs a company that employs 33,000 people and adds new staff at a rate of 20 per cent a year, while splashing billions of dollars on acquisitions and trying to maintain spectacular sales growth.