[Kon-Peki]

Do your moonlighting under a single-member LLC with an EIN.

You can generally do this for less than $100 per year in your home state. It can be a challenge to get the IRS to issue an EIN to such an entity, but if you read the rules you can find the exact flowchart of yes/no questions to force them to do it (pro-tip: do that first, so you actually create the business properly). As a bonus, you'll probably end up with a 20% discount on your income come tax time ([1][2]).

[1] https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/2018ntf-twenty-percent-small...

[2] https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/td-reg-107892-18.pdf

[sithadmin]

Not going to work for the sort of use case this discussion thread seems to be aimed at - people that are working 2x (or more?) run-of-the-mill 'day jobs'.

[Kon-Peki]

You mean to say 2x W-2 jobs? Yes, you are likely correct, though it may actually work out if you can convince one of them to switch you to a 1099 status.

Part of your benefits as a W-2 employee don't really do you any good to have 2x of them. 401k plans - your max contribution is the total, not per employer. Health insurance? Well, maybe some people would be better to have two policies (but then you'll get demands for the rest of your life to document whether or not you have two policies for the purposes of coordination of benefits).

Honestly, having one W-2 and one or more 1099 job is better than one or more W-2 job - if you can get it that way.

[bojangleslover]

20% deduction not discount so more like 6-10%. Then it gets cancelled out by SE tax.

[Kon-Peki]

Yes, you are correct (deduction vs discount). But SE taxes - you pay those too if you are working with a W-2. I thought it was understood that working on a 1099 basis rather than a W-2 basis involves a different rate to make up for the "employer-paid taxes" that a W-2 person does not see.