I don't know if there's any expectation that someone will actually hire them. I've written the same thing before. Sometimes you'll get requests to do custom wor

I don't know if there's any expectation that someone will actually hire them. I've written the same thing before. Sometimes you'll get requests to do custom work. For instance, I've had grad students see something I've posted online who've asked me to do X, for some X that would take hundreds of hours. "Sure, I'll be happy to do it for $150/hour" is more polite than saying "Do your own research".