Posted on 01/30/2013 1:04:51 PM PST by Kaslin
I’m currently ‘working’ my way BACK to being my own boss. I cannot WAIT until I can make more income off of my farm again. For now, I need health insurance, and if I didn’t LOVE my current job so much and the company I work for, I’d have already done it.
I think ANYONE that has ANY marketable skills (growing food, landscaping, small-scale farming or small livestock, sewing, woodworking, windows, siding, roofing, cheese or soap making, plumbing, electrical, etc.) should be thinking SERIOUSLY about doing something on the side. I am a firm believer in multiple streams of income!
I currently have three - my day job, selling books online and the stipend I receive from my Dad’s estate for taking care of him, paying his bills, keeping him properly medicated (no easy task; stubborn old Kraut), grocery shopping, etc.
I LONG for the days when we’re all back to being a Butcher, a Baker or a Candlestick maker. Use your skills to barter with others. (I bake pies for a guy who does electrical work for me. I’ve swapped live laying hens for home-raised pork chops & roasts.) It’s a great way to keep Big Brother OUT of your pocket! :)
Left out some bigg ones:
Selling expense. About 1/3 of your time will be spent finding new work/ customers.
Collections expense. The bigger the customer, the harder it is to get paid.
You may spend more time working on the AP department than the actual work you provided. Rule of thumb, the bigger the company and the fewer letters in stock symbol the longer it will take to get paid.
Perhaps, but all your former costs, which you had to bear the complete brunt as a worker, becomes a tax writeoff when you own your own business. Many of those expenses, like telephone or heat would be constant costs anyway, employee or employer.
In that respect, you’re actually potentially saving a fair bundle over the year.
See my tag line. The ‘apocalypse’ is closer than you think! :)
Working too hard. I don’t know any self employed people that spend less than 80 hours a week working. Great if you truly love what you do, but you better have a spouse that understands, and not much interest in entertainment.
You have got to be kidding. A live laying hen is worth a whole lot more than a pork roast, surely?
The nice thing about running your own business is deciding which 80 hours a week you have to work.
The nice part about being an employee that plays his cards right to get into the right company is you can not work a minute of over time in 6 years. Really I rarely even truly hit 40 hours, working for a company where everybody has something they’d rather be doing is very liberating.
12 laying hens (raised from chicks by me) equaled 1/4 pig butchered. I was just giving an example. :)
People ask if I would go work for a large company again. In all seriousness, as a guy, I reply “The only good thing in working for a large company is that I could rest my head against the wall when I was taking a leak.”
If you are self-employed working at home, you can write off a portion of the mortgage/rent and utilities at tax time. But you still have to pay them when due, whether your clients/customers are paying you or not. In setting up one’s own business it’s best to have on hand at least a year’s living and business costs.
Ping for later
You don’t win friends with salad!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=aM6xVQwIOYQ
If it does’t work out for some reason most employers will consider self employment time as unemployment time. After 6 years of very successful self employment and 1 year of economy crash ending my self employment I found that out.
Many potential employers won't consider those who've been self-employed. Too independent for their taste.
Here's a newsflash: you're paying this already, even as an employee. It comes out of the pool of money allotted for your position.
Do you have any daughters who were taught the same? ;)
Yeah, I ran into that with one employer. So I revised my resume after I left my position with him. He confronted me, and I told him that this was the reason why.
“You aren’t willing to consider my *actual* experience as valid and pertinent to my skills and work experience. So I see no reason why I cannot change the dates of my work history, to better reflect my actual skills and experience.”
Here’s a newsflash: you’re paying this already,
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That is correct...back in the early 80’s when the Private Sector got around to providing Health Ins, they didn’t ‘like’ it as my wife was carrying the family plan (worked for US GOVT) and I opted for the cash.
So, my ‘bennies’ were a company vehicle (I didn’t ‘own’ a car or pay insurance for about 25 years- back then they didn’t ‘charge’ you because you were in the house. It was my car but my wife drove it and we only insured her.) cash for Ins and my ‘bonus’ reflected that I didn’t take vacations.
In the Asphalt end of it so summer vacations were out.
OF COURSE when Self-Employed YOU don’t get a check if the money isn’t there...same as if you are working for someone BUT at least you can ‘yell’ at the boss/owner if your check isn’t there...on your own, you are on your own.
AND no Workmens Comp, Unemployment - even though YOU pay into it if you have employees.
ALSO you can claim to be ‘your own boss’ BUT IN REALITY, the client is your boss and you are subject to the ‘whims’ of your employees....
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