I’d never consider crypto a substitute for a real job, although the marginal contribution to one’s income is going to vary noticeably from individual to individual (depending on their skills and capabilities) and country to country (average income, regulation, taxation). Ofcourse there will be professionals or early adopters that make it their profession, but I don't think this is the scenario we are on about here.
For people from some of the poorest countries, crypto likely seems a potentially easier way to gain more than the average salary, especially if they are capable of performing tasks that don’t require a tangible investment other than time (i.e. campaigns). It could play out for some for a while, but there is no way to predict how this is going to go, and seriously relying on income from crypto is likely not a good move unless proven otherwise.
Even so, one very important factor to consider is how to cash out. We’re still in the era where crypto needs to be converted to fiat to perform day to day purchases, so the conversion procedure is key. That is normally going to entail having to go through the tax procedure the country at hand (for those that want to be legit), and this varies from one to another and, in general, it seems that tax offices do not have a perfectly mapped roadmap of how to deal with regular cash outs. It can get tricky to justify the income, and even turn into a bit of a nightmare for some if called to an inspection (by likely an inspector who knows little at best about crypto).
There is a whole childboard on related legal matters (see
Legal), and a specific interesting thread on
Signature Campaigns taxes which is interesting to read). Many people seem to hodl rather than cash-out for now, until they see a crystal clear path to do so without having legal/taxation issues.
