5 ms·

Just keep in mind that European companies don't pay US rates! London is bit of an exception, but lifestyle there is crazy expensive obviously If you want a US

by vemv 10y ago

Just keep in mind that European companies don't pay US rates! London is bit of an exception, but lifestyle there is crazy expensive obviously If you want a US rate you have to compete globally, which is quite discouraging to me. So as a freelancer I'm happy to have a theoretically 'low' rate but which in practice lets me live more than well in Spain.

passiveincomelg 10y ago
The rates in London I've seen were pretty much the same as what I make in Berlin (400-500 GBP/day). These are from job postings by contracting agencies like Computer Futures. The only exception seems to be finance. Which, I think, requires domain knowledge.
- vemv 10y ago
  First time I heard of such rates in Berlin! I guess they pay that in order to compete with London? Else they don't seem to correspond with Germany's market and cost-of-living...
  - passiveincomelg 10y ago
    Where have you been looking? Examples of companies hiring freelancers at those rates are T-Labs, ImmobilienScout, eBay and HERE. Berlin is actually lower than other regions that have higher cost of living (Frankfurt, Stuttgart, München) so it's not about competing with London. Check out http://gulp.de/ http://gulp.de/. They have a regular survey among their users with a good breakdown by location, experience and the type of work the freelancers do. You can also browse profiles there or project listings on http://etengo.de http://etengo.de.
    - vemv 10y ago
      Great to hear! Answering your question, I've not been looking anywhere - just what I read or could infer. 500 euros/day/head sounds beyond wasteful to me, at least when not in SF/London. I can only imagine there's got to be an awful ASAP culture in those environments...
      - passiveincomelg 10y ago
        Not really. These are big companies, not hysteric startups where everyone works 12 hours a day, deluding themselves that they get more done that way (dunno how common that is with Berlin startups TBH). Personally I am much less stressed out doing corporate contracting than I was with the shitty freelance work I did before, subcontracting with web agencies that haggle about every hour. This is how my rate developed over the years: * 50 DM/h working for a great agency as a student (that was in 2000) * 15 €/h working for an agency as a student (Yep, I was dense enough to take a paycut. Didn't even occur to me to ask for at least 25. So much facepalming...) * 30 €/h working for the same agency when I decided to do freelancing full-time * 30 €/h, then 40 €/h working for a small software company (First time I got to 40 hours a week of billable time. I was swimming in money! ;) * 45 €/h working for another agency (iOS development) * 50 €/h first contracting gig at $BIGCORP (160 hours a month - 8000€) * 65 €/h second contracting gig at $BIGCORP2 (which is where I still am, 160+ hours a month - > 10k) * 65 €/h working for a friend with a product idea (only a few hours, far from full-time) * a few fixed-price projects in between, most of them were a desaster, one was decent Regarding "wasteful"; It's supply and demand. For some reason the capitalism game works much better in contracting than with permanent jobs in Germany. I think part of it is that employees are so hard to get rid of and the overhead is high (~40%?).
        passiveincomelg 10y ago
        Since I can't edit it, let me try again to make a bullet list (srsly?): * 50 DM/h working for a great agency as a student (that was in 2000) * 15 €/h working for an agency as a student (Yep, I was dense enough to take a paycut. Didn't even occur to me to ask for at least 25. So much facepalming...) * 30 €/h working for the same agency when I decided to do freelancing full-time * 30 €/h, then 40 €/h working for a small software company (First time I got to 40 hours a week of billable time. I was swimming in money! ;) * 45 €/h working for another agency (iOS development) * 50 €/h first contracting gig at $BIGCORP (160 hours a month - 8000€) * 65 €/h second contracting gig at $BIGCORP2 (which is where I still am, 160+ hours a month - > 10k) * 65 €/h working for a friend with a product idea (only a few hours, far from full-time) * a few fixed-price projects in between, most of them were a desaster, one was decent

by vemv 10y ago

passiveincomelg 10y ago

The rates in London I've seen were pretty much the same as what I make in Berlin (400-500 GBP/day). These are from job postings by contracting agencies like Computer Futures. The only exception seems to be finance. Which, I think, requires domain knowledge.

vemv 10y ago
First time I heard of such rates in Berlin! I guess they pay that in order to compete with London? Else they don't seem to correspond with Germany's market and cost-of-living...
- passiveincomelg 10y ago
  Where have you been looking? Examples of companies hiring freelancers at those rates are T-Labs, ImmobilienScout, eBay and HERE. Berlin is actually lower than other regions that have higher cost of living (Frankfurt, Stuttgart, München) so it's not about competing with London. Check out http://gulp.de/ http://gulp.de/. They have a regular survey among their users with a good breakdown by location, experience and the type of work the freelancers do. You can also browse profiles there or project listings on http://etengo.de http://etengo.de.
  - vemv 10y ago
    Great to hear! Answering your question, I've not been looking anywhere - just what I read or could infer. 500 euros/day/head sounds beyond wasteful to me, at least when not in SF/London. I can only imagine there's got to be an awful ASAP culture in those environments...
    - passiveincomelg 10y ago
      Not really. These are big companies, not hysteric startups where everyone works 12 hours a day, deluding themselves that they get more done that way (dunno how common that is with Berlin startups TBH). Personally I am much less stressed out doing corporate contracting than I was with the shitty freelance work I did before, subcontracting with web agencies that haggle about every hour. This is how my rate developed over the years: * 50 DM/h working for a great agency as a student (that was in 2000) * 15 €/h working for an agency as a student (Yep, I was dense enough to take a paycut. Didn't even occur to me to ask for at least 25. So much facepalming...) * 30 €/h working for the same agency when I decided to do freelancing full-time * 30 €/h, then 40 €/h working for a small software company (First time I got to 40 hours a week of billable time. I was swimming in money! ;) * 45 €/h working for another agency (iOS development) * 50 €/h first contracting gig at $BIGCORP (160 hours a month - 8000€) * 65 €/h second contracting gig at $BIGCORP2 (which is where I still am, 160+ hours a month - > 10k) * 65 €/h working for a friend with a product idea (only a few hours, far from full-time) * a few fixed-price projects in between, most of them were a desaster, one was decent Regarding "wasteful"; It's supply and demand. For some reason the capitalism game works much better in contracting than with permanent jobs in Germany. I think part of it is that employees are so hard to get rid of and the overhead is high (~40%?).
      - passiveincomelg 10y ago
        Since I can't edit it, let me try again to make a bullet list (srsly?): * 50 DM/h working for a great agency as a student (that was in 2000) * 15 €/h working for an agency as a student (Yep, I was dense enough to take a paycut. Didn't even occur to me to ask for at least 25. So much facepalming...) * 30 €/h working for the same agency when I decided to do freelancing full-time * 30 €/h, then 40 €/h working for a small software company (First time I got to 40 hours a week of billable time. I was swimming in money! ;) * 45 €/h working for another agency (iOS development) * 50 €/h first contracting gig at $BIGCORP (160 hours a month - 8000€) * 65 €/h second contracting gig at $BIGCORP2 (which is where I still am, 160+ hours a month - > 10k) * 65 €/h working for a friend with a product idea (only a few hours, far from full-time) * a few fixed-price projects in between, most of them were a desaster, one was decent