When I was new to article writing, I heard about writing for passive income.

That was the reason many writers gave for joining writing sites, such as Helium, Hubpages, Associated Content, Triond and Bukisa.

The reason those writers said about writing for passive income was that the articles could generate income for a long time.

In fact, writers for article marketing also mentioned about passive income.

At first, I agreed with the concept of article writing and passive income.

An article posted years ago could generate income for the next ten years. However, is that passive income?

When I give deeper thoughts to the matter of passive income, I find that article writing does not result in passive income.

After all, article writing is a mentally draining work. Article writing is not passive. Article writing requires time and effort.

There is nothing passive about article writing. That is why I do not associated article writing with passive income anymore.

The way I see it is this: you write an article today for page views, you will receive the money later. That is not passive income.

Most working adults work and get paid at the end of the month or the week. It is always a matter of work first, pay later.

The same thing with article writing. You write first, and get paid later. However, the payment for article writing is spread across many years.

For example, you write an article about forex trading. This article generates an average of 3 page impressions for the next five years. This article generates a total of 5,400 page impressions in five years time.

If the payment for page impressions is $3 per 1,000 page impressions. This article will produce an income of $16.

If you take 30 minutes to write an article, that means you earn an hourly rate of $32.

That is not passive income. You put in the hard work, and harvest the returns across a period of five years.

The problem with article writing is that you do not know which article earns more money in the long run.

Some articles generate a few thousand page impressions in the first week, and no more page impressions after that.

This is more like earning money as an employee, since you get payment almost immediately.

Most articles do not work in this matter.

That is why I do not consider article writing as a form of passive income anymore. I do not even think of it as investment. I view article writing as a form of work first, get paid later scheme.

I know that the earnings will snowball until the monthly earnings exceed a hundred dollars. That is provided I have done everything correct to make the articles searchable in the Internet. That is provided I write consistently and persistently.

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About me:

Scheng1 is a passionate blogger from Singapore. Rich in every sense reveals my deep desire in enjoying life, and be rich in every possible ways. Personal Finance is about money, from making money to investing money