[SarfasCodes]

Take your expected salary per annum, pre deductions. Divide that by 200. This is your BASE line break even contracting rate per day. Any thing less, and you're going to have issues financially.

@ $50,000 per annum

50,000 / 200 => 250 per day.

On average, you'd realistically want to be charging closer to Base + 40%. Im my example, this would be $350

just to give yourself time off, $$ for equipment, marketing, growth, insurance, accounting, other general business costs.

Contractors are expensive because we're the business. We take on the risk. We do the HR, taxes, insurance, office rentals, equipment costs/hire. Everything.

[superb-owl]

Agreed. I usually tell people to charge close to 2x their salaried rate. You can negotiate if you're hungry for business, but I've found the price tag is usually not the biggest blocker to getting clients.

[makestuff]

So Senior engineers on contract at a big tech company could command ~3,000 USD per day? Or does this math break down when you get into salaries in the 400+k range?

[jahewson]

I know solutions architects who are billed out to companies at that rate. They only take home half of it though.