I haven't REALLY crunched the numbers but it seems to me that if people are doing the entire mining and alchemizing process and producing molybdenum to sell... Well, there are probably much more energy efficient (literally ;)) ways to earn currants. With higher Kinship, Gardening, and Cooking levels, which are actually pretty fast skills compared with mining, it seems cooking and selling the excess would actually make a lot more.
It seems worth it to try and get all your gems for the day, but mining as the main form of making money doesn't actually seem like the best way to earn ;)
Thoughts?