Making your living on the Internet is certainly one option, but it pays to remember that, Internet or no, working from home (legitimately ) involves running your own business. Some folks just aren't really set up to run the whole show themselves.

To run your own business (on the Internet or elsewhere) requires a certain level of self-discipline and organizational skills. Then, there is the matter of handling the "paperwork" side of things - taxes, social charges and (where necessary) properly registering your business.

For expats, especially, there is the need to get integrated into the local tax and social insurances systems and that isn't always easy with a home or Internet business. Just as a side note, I hear that the French authorities started doing sweeps of eBay France to try and find people who were subject to VAT assessment and registration. Haven't been over there in a while, but when I last visited, I noted that eBay France has far fewer full-time online vendors than eBay UK, and I suspect it relates to the ease of registering that sort of business.
Cheers,
Bev