It requires time, effort, stake but also building relationships, helping others, promoting the chain and enjoying your time...
This unfortunately guarantees nothing and I don't preach it anymore. You need to do all these things to benefit from the chain but it is not a guarantee; it is not that straightforward and that is where most of the resentment comes from. It is all about managing your expectations and avoiding burn outs from trying to prove yourself or value (esp if you don't particularly enjoy content creation and networking).
I agree that there is no guarantee at all but as you wrote the "most secure" way to earn on hive is through the stake but again there is no guarantee there either :-)