Ask HN: What are the problems that are willing to pay more than $1000 to solve?

When my phone rings I want to know, with a high degree of confidence, who is calling me.<p>The only way I can think to do this well is by giving everyone a different phone number, like many of us do with email addresses. Implementing this would require a way to create and vend phone numbers quickly, similar to creating a password with a password manager. There would need to be a way to associate each number with who I gave it to. When my phone rang that identity would need to be surfaced in some way. I would need a way to make outbound calls using these numbers.<p>I&#x27;d happily pay $100+&#x2F;month for &lt;some number of&gt; phone numbers (50-100?) plus $x&#x2F;month for each number above that. If the service was metered by call minute there would need to be a generous number included in the monthly flat rate and excess minutes should be inexpensive.<p>I imagine the user experience would be similar to what Sidecar&#x2F;Flyp&#x2F;Cloud SIM deliver.

Living in a US city that has no cars for personal transport

- Fully-guided health plan: diet, supplements, exercise, preventative measures, etc... SelfDecode gets very close, but I&#x27;m thinking of those reports analyzed by an assistant that would schedule and plan medical interventions, meal plan, provide accountability, be an advocate, etc.<p>- A system to build knowledge more effectively than whatever it is that people do now. This would go along with some sort of training to improve idea synthesis, factual integration, etc. Basically, activate my inner savant for the low, low price of $999.99.<p>- Direct training-to-employment pipeline: Employers provide the service a list of skills they need, the service generates a training plan, the employer approves the plan, vetted students pay to join with a guarantee of employment if they meet some milestones, successful students are refunded then employer pays the service a commission.<p>- A car service that shows up to do routine maintenance, clean your car and track major issues

Dating app that actually lead to dates. Preferably with people who are of interest to me and of who I am of interest to. Dating has been an issue my entire life - I’ve only ever managed to be in one relationship and that wasn’t until I was 26 (I’m 31 now). I’ve never even really had so much as a conversation on a dating app and I’ve used them for years!<p>It’s not like I do well in real life either - it’s ultimately that most dating apps just amplify what I already experience in real life. I’m not physically attractive (5’10”, 120-135lb) and so I have always had a very large uphill battle trying to combat traditional western beauty standards. But if someone could figure out an app that got me out on dates - I’d pay that $1000+.

Electrician work, plumber work, mechanic work, tree trimming, etc.<p>Skilled trades where once you need them, they have you over a barrel!

I&#x27;d like to not deal with recruiters and middlemen, at all (excluding the HR department of the actual company that is hiring).<p>Just this week, I had a recruiter tell me that they won&#x27;t tell me the end client, until after the interview happens. They are expecting candidates to interview with them, without telling them who they would be working for (also, pay is shit).<p>Another recruiter sends a ridiculous legal document that I am supposed to sign (it was a long, scary document, I didn&#x27;t understand most of it), before even revealing who they are hiring for. Yet another recruiter wanted to edit my resume and lie, before they&#x27;d proceed with the process.<p>Those are just a few examples. In case you are wondering if these are for high level positions, they are not. These are run of the mill, ordinary developer jobs.<p>I do not want to deal with recruiters, <i>at all, ever</i>. Even a 5 min phone call with these upstanding people is enough to ruin one&#x27;s day.<p>So yeah, I&#x27;d pay for this &quot;privilege&quot;

Great question!<p>Some mechanism to significantly improve intelligence. This could be in any form: book, coaching, game, etc. Some examples of benefits:<p>- Avoiding making mistakes that cost time among other things (an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure). Programming bugs are on my mind at the moment but could be in other areas as well.<p>- Make faster decisions with more confidence<p>- Crush programming interviews

Completely getting rid of online ads for life.

A retail level device capable of seeing inside one&#x27;s body.

A wearable head massager&#x2F;tickler. It&#x27;s possible to buy head massagers which are hand-held, but that completely defeats the purpose. I&#x27;m aware this is a male-dominated community, but as a woman, I know other women would pay a LOT if this product existed.

A branch and bound solver framework that accurately measures the impact that one component&#x2F;heuristic has on time to proof of global optimality and any time behaviour under the optimal portfolio of those components and builds portfolio solvers

Diseases, wars, pollution, hunger, crime, mental illnesses, racism, mobility&#x2F;passports that suck or give you access to practically nothing, terrorism, poverty. The list goes one.

I would pay that much for a programmable automated refactoring tool that actually worked on real code bases (I suspect some ppl would pay even more)

Antiquated real estate agent system and realtor (TM) guild.

Something to fold the never ending chore of laundry.

Solving one of the Millennium Prize Problems would pay $1000000

Never having to do paperwork ever again.

I have to get a bunch of data into prod.