>Um, wouldn't 50-100 USD per hour correspond more or less to an average annual salary divided by 1000 ? Why would I take on all this extra responsibility and r

>Um, wouldn't 50-100 USD per hour correspond more or less to an average annual salary divided by 1000 ? Why would I take on all this extra responsibility and risk to make exactly what I did before (or worse, just the median) when I didn't have to? There are two reasons why I went independent: The first is because I would be able to take off huge chunks of time for side projects. The second is I would make at least twice as much as I used to (after taxes, insurance, etc.) despite taking off huge chunks of time for side projects. Also, you cannot expect 50 weeks a year of utilization. If you're smart, you assume 35 weeks a year, and price yourself with that in mind. If you have higher utilization, you have a good year. If you don't, you have no worries. Moreover, I'm at a client now where I gave them a "fill my rolodex rate", which I was very hesitant of doing. We're tying up after the initial term, because the reason why they couldn't afford me is they have mostly systemic organizational and fundamental business issues than they do technology issues.