[alanstorm]

I don't know if it will help you understand, but most of the time it comes down to trust. It's the rare client that will come out and say "I can't pay you because my cashflow is off this month, and I don't know if it's ever coming back".

Instead there's weeks, and then months of putting off, half-truths, lies, and the like. Most people new to freelancing trust that it's just some bureaucratic hold up, and the worst offenders develop entire personalities that are based on exploiting people's natural tendencies to trust other human beings. It usually takes getting burned a few times to learn that "the check is in the mail" translates to "I'm never going to pay you because the amount is small enough that involving a lawyer doesn't make financial sense".

[olefoo]

The real antidote to that is to network constantly. If you know the local market, you probably know someone who has worked with the person you are considering working for. It's good to know if one of your buddies was owed $12,000 and had to go to court to get paid anything.