Mining to me nowadays is if you want to hold onto a coin in hopes that it will one day go up in value and you can make some cash on it. If you think your going to mine and cash out daily then good luck you will take a long time to pay off your investment.
Nope.
There are 3 basic cases.
1) You have already equipment and you are still mining for some small profit. Good for you.
2) You have already equipment and you are still mining for losses (it is outdated or energy costs are too high in your neck of the woods - you name other reasons there could be a bunch of them). Time to think about swithing it off until better days.
You can buy crypto direct on exchange for fiat if you wanted after all.
3) You have no equipment and thinking about purchasing it now. It is obviously weird situation.