Am I being used? Feel like I'm back on the chopping block

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Since late July I've been contributing my special skills to a local repair shop. When I started out there, the guy needed me to do a batch of scooters. I originally quoted a fairly low hourly rate I'd bill for. As I was completing the last of the initial repairs, an additional job or 2 per week would come in, and eventually the "employer" began assigning me more varied projects, and out of frustration at the lack of organization I began the process of sorting fasteners and other items in random spare moments.

From this gradual shift in "job description" I told him to the effect that with all of the different things I was now doing I needed to be paid accordingly. He promised to discuss it. In the meantime it's developed into a routine for me that keeps me from staying home and being continually triggered, and another perk is that I get to play with the machine tools so I take in my own personal projects from time to time.

From what I've observed, I am the only person there that gets there at 10 AM and stays until 5 PM. Everyone else comes and goes at will, usually 1 guy will saunter in about 1 PM, drunk and belligerent. He'll spend maybe 30 minutes on his project and take off again, leaving it unfinished, and yet has complained several times that he can barely afford fuel to get there. A couple of other guys usually won't show up until 4 PM. It's a smaller repair shop that keeps daylight hours.

With that being the main pattern of behavior and the fact the owner doesn't keep enough cash would be enough to make me run but for the overall enjoyment I get from being there. In this regard I most likely am being taken advantage of. But what do I do? Stay home, have meltdowns, get paid nothing, or go there and get $10 some days?

So the other day the owner was in a grouch about all of my projects being backed up (due to nobody following through with supplies I need to finish them) and when I was there earlier today it was barely noon and there was already the party atmosphere going. A couple of tweekers showed up and announced they were each respectively going to start working on these particular motorcycles there. Between them and all of the other noise, and having a project at home calling me I up and left without saying a word to anybody. As I was about halfway home I had a paranoid thought that these 2 tweeker buddies were somehow supposed to be my replacement, but know what? If they think they can do better than me, let them. I wonder how long everyone carried on before they realized I wasn't there to put up with it.

Anyway, from the owner's different attitude I've been sensing, and these 2 bozos showing up out of the blue, it takes me to a feedback loop that historically has shown I'm about to crash and burn. Anybody have experience with this? I'm probably being paranoid about being "fired", but I'm thinking to "punish" him by not coming in for a week, do I just need a break? Ayudenme por pavor!

I'm confused by the way you worded things. I'm guessing this is an under-the-table gig, but are you really only getting paid $10 a day? If so that is not fair at all given your special set of skills.

Agreed, most people nowadays can't change a lightbulb- we're coming full circle back to industrial revolution as more jobs get outsourced and more labour gets insourced.

Don't sell yourself short! That's not a fair trade for your time..

Are you seriously being paid 10 dollars a day to do most of the repairs and basically run a shop?

That's absolute and total BS.

Don't know about Cali but in Indiana that work would be more like $10/hr. As far as the rest of it, hold him to his promise to discuss it. If you suspect you'll have trouble telling him, then write it down and hand it to him. As to "punishing" him, not showing up for a week is more likely to make you persona non gratis than it is to convince him to reason. If I were to not come in for a week as a protest, I'd come back to someone else having my job and me being on the street.