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Billable hours != full time hours. Clocking 8 billable hours a day is actually pretty difficult. Think about how many hours of actual solid work you get done a

Billable hours != full time hours. Clocking 8 billable hours a day is actually pretty difficult. Think about how many hours of actual solid work you get done a day - for most devs I know, it's 4, maybe 6 or even (rarely) 8 on a day when they're really pushing for something. Those are your billable hours. Futzing around on twitter or HN, eating lunch, making yourself a snack: not billable hours. Contractors also rarely have a level of stability where they can work every week. Things crop up - your periodic contract renewal takes a week or two to get approved by legal, stuff like that. These factors are broadly why hourly contracting rates can get pretty high.

mattmanser 6y ago
You think that lawyer who billed you 8 hours actually sat at his desk for 8 hours? You might not be billing the time you went to the loo, or made yourself a coffee. Every other professional in the world is. Are you seriously only billing 4 hours for a full day's work? Think of it the opposite way round, of when you're in the shower and have the 'ah-ha' moment of how to structure the code. Or the evening stroll after dinner when you suddenly find that nice elegant solution to the gnarly code. Do you run home and put those 5 minutes in toggl? Because it took your brain far more than those 5 minutes to get there. We have an intellectual job, the down-time is as necessary and critical to the solutions as the time tapping keys. My brain is churning away in the background, laying things out, figuring out solutions. And that's all extremely valuable subconscious processing time that's not going on my own or other client's projects.