You’re probably starting to recognize a motif here: if there’s a way to make money, people in this Chinese city of Anhai are going to find it.

The next evidence:

Anhai apparently has some of the better elementary and middle schools in the region, and people from elsewhere are eager to have their children attend them, even though they don’t live in these school districts per se.

That has spawned a bit of a cottage industry in the past few years, a new twist on the private boarding school concept, where people in these large, multi-story homes near the schools are setting aside a room or two to serve as student dormitories, taking on 5, 10, or more students, providing their room and board (with bunks stacked three high, just like they’ll encounter later at the university), and the “best” ones charging a premium fee to provide evening tutors for the students.

Many of the customers, I’m told, are families in the countryside or smaller towns who have themselves gone into business independently, made some money, and want to provide their children with a better chance of getting into a university later on.

One of my Wife’s Cousins, in fact, is housing 20 elementary school-age children and providing two evening tutors to help the students review and expand on their lessons. They’re charging 900 RMB a month per student–we’ll call it $112 U.S. dollars–for a take of U.S. $2240 a month before expenses, which include food and a cook, cleaning and housekeeping help, and the evening tutors, none of which cost very much here.