What would you do if you had pizza money?
A fun thought experiment around finances, time, and what you are or aren't willing to sacrifice for financial independence.
OK, here’s a fun hypothetical situation. Someone offers to pay you $1,000 per slice of pizza that you eat in one year. You have to decide upfront how many slices you’re going to eat at the beginning of the year. How many slices would you choose and why?
Clarifying details: If you eat less than your designated number, you have to pay $1,000 per slice that you didn’t eat. It can be any type of pizza you want, and can be different each time, but needs to be a standard large slice size. You have to be the one to eat it. The slice emerges magically whenever you want to eat it.
Wait! Take a few minutes to really think about this before reading the rest of the post.
After seeing this on the hypothetical situations subreddit a few months ago, I’ve been asking everyone I know this question. The responses are fascinating, insightful, and surprising.
First, my own answer was immediate and felt like a no-brainer. I’d sign up for 365 slices, averaging one a day — significantly more pizza than I eat currently but easily doable (so low risk of having to pay for uneaten slices). It would also make enough money to cover all my expenses and more. Financial independence on only one slice of pizza a day? Count me in! I bet a lot of people said 365, I thought naively. Boy was I wrong.
The reddit comments were wild.
My friends’ responses were also surprising.
It seems like there are two extremes in responses to this question.
The first extreme looks like “Well, I probably have a pizza dinner about once a month and eat 2 slices, so I’d probably say 24.” Do you not like money and pizza?? This was an interesting mix of people who seem to not mind their jobs, really dislike pizza (or pizza seriously disagrees with their digestive system), people who really did not want to feel the stress and inconvenience of centering their life around pizza consumption, and perhaps people who are already financially independent.
The other extreme looks like my friend’s husband, who supposedly said, “I’d eat 5 slices for breakfast, lunch, and dinner…and then work out an hour a day.” Basically amass as much pizza wealth as possible in a year, health be damned.
People honed in on very different parts of this hypothetical situation.
Some people focused on their current life and didn’t want to inconvenience themselves or feel the pressure of hitting a certain number by the end of the year (and not wanting to be shoveling pizza in their mouth on New Year’s Eve).
Others were thrilled at the convenience of instantaneous pizza delivery for themself at any time. Delivery fees are expensive!
Some people focused on the pizza money, taking the opportunity to amass the most wealth possible, beyond what was needed for financial independence. Generational wealth! Wealth to fund worthy causes!
Someone else focused on culinary access, asking if they could summon their favorite but no longer existent pizza slice.
Another friend, an engineering leader who has clearly negotiated many vendor contracts, started probing at all the edge cases: “What happens if I eat more than I committed to?” “Can I outsource the pizza eating and pay someone $10 and pocket $990?”
Many people asked clarifying questions that toyed with the tradeoffs between money and health — can I throw up the pizza after eating it?
Almost everyone I asked surprised me in some unexpected way with their response.
Pizza Twist
Even more interesting was a follow-up question: what if the offer was only good for a year?
For some people, this pushed them to even more extremes. Some didn’t want to change their lives at all if they couldn’t rely on this income long-term. On the other extreme, eat as much pizza as humanly pizza to make a lifetime worth of money to never have to work again.
One person said, “I’d earn a huge lump sum the first year just within the boundaries of health. Which was my ____ job in a nutshell,” which pointed to a tradeoff that people conscious or unconsciously take on with certain jobs, especially at high-growth startups.
Personally, I’d be willing to go from a modest 1 slice to 3 slices a day — still achievable, but would definitely be more challenging.
Absurdity brings Clarity
On the surface it seems like this question is basically the same as “What would you do if you didn’t need to make money,” but something about the absurdity of the hypothetical situation lets me actually think about this more clearly. Perhaps it’s the fantastical nature of the situation that lets me put aside the practical realities of financial demands and really think about what I would do with financial independence.
I learned a lot about my friends these last few months with this question, and it’s also been quite insightful for myself as well.
With my 365 slices / $365k number in mind, and in the midst of having space to figure out what’s next for me career-wise, I find that I keep coming back to this question:
“What would I do if I had pizza money?”
Or when contemplating different projects, “Would I do that if I had pizza money?” and the answer is often a very clear yes or no, or yes but maybe I’d approach the project differently.
The clear yes or no has also helped me clarify what’s important to me right now. Spending time with my kids and family, soaking in these precious baby and tween years. Creative projects. Helping other people create space for career and life changes and creative pursuits.
Returning to reality, I don’t actually have pizza money, but I constantly aspire to be doing more of the things I would be doing if I had pizza money, and fewer of the things I wouldn’t be.
Life goal: pizza money life alignment!
One of the creative projects I’ve been working on that definitely falls in the I’d do this even if I had pizza money category has been developing a course on creating space for what we want. I’ve been collaborating with Buster Benson over at 750 Words to bring this course to life, and will share more about it in a few weeks! If you’re someone who enjoyed this pizza thought experiment and is curious about being in a more expansive place in work and life, stay tuned!
If you can’t wait, check out 750 Words. After years of sporadic journaling in physical notebooks, this simple digital tool helped me build a consistent daily writing habit—one that has deepened my clarity, creativity, and sense of direction in ways I never expected.
For whatever reason, I didn't consider the possibility of eating pizza every day to maximize wealth. My initial thought was to figure out how many times a week I could eat pizza and not hate it after a year. I came up with 3-4 times a week. I figured that it would give me plenty of money to do things I enjoy, while staying within the bounds of good health. At this point in my life, health and sanity matter more than maximum revenue. I know so many people with health problems! This was a fun thought exercise on values.
On a side note, I just tried out 750 Words. Thanks for the suggestion! I've struggled to keep a consistent writing habit and hoping that this helps. I look forward to hearing about the course that you are working on.
It is interesting you didn't mention the risk aspect here.
What if the day after making the deal I'll have a car crash, break my jaw, and can't eat pizza at all?
I can be in serious debt...
So for me, this is also about balancing the risk.
In a way, health issues can also be seen as a risk to be balanced.
I would probably commit to a lot of pizza (I don't see a reason not to bank on this opportunity for a year or so) but would also look to buy specialty insurance against unforeseen events.