[Ididntdothis]

Who pays >150? I always hear about this but neither as freelancer or as employee who hires freelancers I have ever seen somebody making that much as freelancer. Sometimes consulting companies charge that much but the freelancers probably get paid only a fraction of that.

[sourc3]

Industries where money comes in by the bucket have no problem spending it with a shovel for specialized knowledge they don't have.

If you're a contractor, your best bet is to focus on an industry to understand the needs of that industry better. Rather being a Python developer, you can be a contractor who builds usable solutions that happen to use Python.

Industry knowledge, referrals, good prior work and marketing are important. These $150/hr jobs won't fall into your lap unless you put an effort to position your lap that way :)

[fmxexpress]

Real estate, finance, oil & gas, software development clients. I charge $160/h. 20+ years of experience.

[antjanus]

I have a buddy who charges $200/h for JavaScript work in Oil & Gas. He works on-site, wears a suit, and makes bank in a cheap city. Never has issues getting work.

[ryandvm]

Normal start-ups (i.e. not Valley Bubble) and small shops are almost never able to pay that much, but medium and large clients will easily pay that rate for established senior engineers WITH REPUTATIONS.

As much as we like to think technology is a meritocracy, at the end of the day, it always comes down to who you know. The charitable interpretation of that fact is that there aren't a lot of ways to gauge reputation, so it's mostly about who can vouch for you.

Source: I co-founded a software and design consultancy co-op (https://www.fountstudio.com/about).

[secondaryditto]

when I get my own clients directly, and I'm closer to that. When I'm subcontracted through someone else, it's typically < $100 ($70-$90). I consciously make that trade off sometimes because I'm effectively outsourcing some of the risk - negotiations, collections, etc. And it's sometimes got me in to projects on teams whereas I'd normally be an independent, and the dynamics and range of engagements I've had has been a bit wider because of it. The $120/hr+ engagements I've had tended to be shorter engagements - (< 6 months). The subcontract ones tend to be longer. While I know if I'm getting $80, the people selling me are getting $110 or more, again, I understand they're providing some service that I didn't particularly want to do (or... negotiated for a 9 month engagement, for example).

[Ididntdothis]

These numbers are more in line with what I have been and am still seeing.

[aaronm67]

Where are you?

In NYC and SF, you'd never fill your contract if you were trying to pay < 150.

[Ididntdothis]

I was freelancer in Maryland and then worked at a company in LA.

[smoe]

When I was freelancing (mostly Swiss companies) in the end 180$/hour was my starting point for negotations.

For bigger multi month projects i would come down quite a bit, but for small ones i wouldn't budge.

Its not something you can pull off when new to freelancing and more importantly don't have connections / referrals.

Its a comparable price to what small agencies charge (or charged, haven't been working/living in Switzerland in years).

[pc86]

If you have a name you can charge exorbitant rates for anything, and large companies will pay it. IAmTimCorey is somewhat of a YouTube celebrity with millions of views on pretty basic (but extremely well-made, all-around excellent) videos. His advertised consulting rate is $300/hr. To your second point, Oracle bills its consultants at $400/hr or more, and they're probably making $200-250k.

[pxue]

Most likely desperate very short term one off contracts.

Almost meaningless to talk about hourly rate without also providing the length of the contract.

[cs02rm0]

Someone paying not just for a dev but a dev with significant domain knowledge in a niche area.