Do you think its actually possible to start a real honest business in 2026?

I actually and sincerely believe that is peoples' best shot at employment in this economy, if you don't want to work as a carer. Identify things that actually need done in your community and do them, eg. pest removal, hazard clean up, painting, roof replacement, etc.

There's a bunch of mobile car diagnostic guys on YouTube who specialize in diagnosing issues that other shops can't figure out. There's also local managed service companies who do it for local businesses and install things like cameras. There's tons of local business opportunities that aren't completely scummy but they're usually extremely niche. And yes there's still engine shops that are extremely busy especially in farming areas where equipment gets repaired instead of thrown away.

A CNC shop wouldn't start because someone decides "I want to start a CNC shop".

It would start cause some guy has a mill and a lathe for hobby stuff, and does some work for a mate or a local business.
And then gets more work, and gets work that requires CNC, and gets more work than 1 person can deal with, and then needs more machines and machinists and CAD tech and designers and so on.

Yeh, a business could get something from PCBway or whatever. But maybe they need it by the end of the day, or maybe they need an opinion on something, or maybe they can't do the actual technical document production but can provide some measurements and a rough sketch.

Apply that to anything.
The UK Army's L96A1 was made by 3 guys in a shed.

The Ministry of Defence wanted Accuracy International to submit an entry, but when they won handily, suddenly the three men in Mr Walls’ shed were charged with producing over 1200 rifles and all of a sudden needed to prove they could make that many weapons.

What they did was rent out a workshop for a day and filled it with all of the guns they had made in the shed up to that point, claimed the rest of the staff were out to lunch and later found out when they went to eat with the requisitions lieutenants that the inspection was purely to ensure the operation was not just three men in a shed.

Yes, it is actually possible in the United States to start up a small business and actually make money. Now how much money is always the question. Some of that comes down to luck. Some that comes down to just having a really good idea. I just started a business not too long ago. Actually now that I think about it. It’s probably about four years ago. But nonetheless, I’ve made some money on it. Not as much as I would want. Part of that is actually my fault for not working on it as hard as I should’ve. There are plenty of options in the United States to make money. At the risk of oversimplifying it it’s pretty much just a case of pick something. No, where did I get the money from.? Simple I’d save up over a number of years and I use that as the start up capital. No, I did not have millions of dollars to start. I didn’t even have $100,000 to start. I think honestly I had about $50,000 cash to start.

Well sure. I started a mobile auto repair business. That's a field that is rife with incompetents, junkies, and straight up scammers. It's the Wild West as far as businesses go.

Unlike most of the mobile guys in town, I went all in on the professional front. Had a webpage, business cards, uniforms, took CC on the spot or online, emailed pdfs of estimates, diagnostics, and invoices, etc.

By the time I wrapped it up, I had a huge roster of clients. Years later I still get calls. I did it simply by being honest and trying to make sure my customers interests were also my interests.

I turned down work if it was outside of my abilities, I never upsold, if I broke something I paid for it out of pocket, and tried my very hardest to not recommend any repair without solid diagnostics first.

Had I wanted to keep going, I could have easily hired a crew and expanded. Once your name gets out, there's more work than one person can shake a stick at. And expanding means transitioning from laborer to manager. Then it's on to franchising.

When you get an LLC, the banks will throw money at you. Even without collateral. What ever you are being offered in personal loans now, times it by 10. Show a years worth of growth and reasonable fiscal management and they'll give you a key to the vault. No joke.

So, yes, if you have a skill, you can do honest business and turn very little into a lot.

I know a lot of people doing it, so like, yes by example.

Haha that story is amazing. Do you have a link to more info? I’d love to read up on the whole thing

In the USA you need hardly anything to start a company. A sole proprietorship is literally just a person saying “I am a business” and that’s that. If you’re going to sell stuff you need a state sales tax number, if you’re going to employ people you need an EIN from the IRS. Otherwise you just…start a business. Whatever that business is decides your costs. You want to clean houses? You need a bucket of cleaning supplies maybe (maybe your clients just need a helping hand and they already have the supplies!). You want to start a construction company? You’re gonna need a lot more. I’ve been trying to start my own company and honestly the hardest part isn’t the money, it’s how much stuff you have to do to get a website running and looking good, to make sure your product is good, to try to find places to sell, business cards, marketing, etc.

Same attitude as Carroll Shelby driving early Cobras around town for a week and then having them repainted for the next week so it looked like there were more of them being made

It's cheap and easy as fuck to start a consulting business. Whether or not you'll be successful with it is an entirely different question. Especially if you're honest about not knowing fuck about shit. :p

Depends, is it an AI-driven protein business with dynamic pricing that donates 200% of its annual revenue on purchasing a used inventory of trump branded elementary school textbooks?

I'm, for once, jealous of the USA.

Here in Spain to open a business is bureaucratic hell.

Before doing anything you need to register in several administrations, not one, several. Once registered no matter you have sales or not, you have to pay a monthly social security quota. Several hundred euros a month even if you are not yet made a sale.

Then even if you don't sell absolutely anything, because your business was shit or whatever, you have to present sale tax models, even if they are at 0.

And there's no minimum, you have to do all this even if tou just want to sell one cool t-shirt you made for 1€.

At the end even the smallest business end up hiring some specialized person just to handle the bureaucratic mess for them, which add up to the monthly cost of having a business opened.

Oof. I’m sorry.

It's pretty easy in Norway too. "I am a business"-scale is registered online, and there's a miniscule fee, and after a few days you get the paperwork in the mail confirming it.

If you're very low volume and revenue, that's it, basically. Above a certain level you need to file for a VAT number, but it's pretty simple. And scaling up as you need to is no biggy.

Source: I'm kind of a business owner. Revenue: around 400$ equivalent last year.