The contractors tax situation is irrelevant to you. The only thing that matters is income vs expenditure. Or in this situation, "how many hours do I have to wor

The contractors tax situation is irrelevant to you. The only thing that matters is income vs expenditure. Or in this situation, "how many hours do I have to work to pay the contractor's hourly fee?" and "how much faster is the contractor?". The tax stuff are just details around this. In my example, a contractor who's twice as fast needs to cost $76 or less per hour . Thrice as fast is $114 or less. You're right in principle though, just not on that calculation. In Sweden we have tax deductions for private citizens exactly to combat this issue: up to a certain amount per year can be deducted from your income, just like a company can, for certain services (such as cleaning or house repairs).