$100 an hour as an independent contractor developing farming robots at a place that feels very very good for me.
EDIT: I definitely got very lucky finding this position. I’m not suggesting everyone can just do this. But if people don’t refuse to work 40-50 hour work weeks, then that’s what employers will expect.
Even though people claim to work 40-50 hours many times they are spending half that time watching videos or messing around, this is a generalization of course.
It’s true. It’s frustrating because when I was hourly at Google I was extremely mindful to always be working when I was billing. Don’t bill for lunch. Don’t bill for long coffee breaks, etc. But when I billed 30-35 hour weeks it felt like my manager thought I wasn’t working hard enough. It’s like... I was probably working just as much as many full time employees who don’t count their hours. My managers manager told me they expect people to sometimes work 50-60 hours on big projects and I was like “nooope”. 20 hours a week suits me nicely.
I don't really know how it works in countries with better healthcare, but in the US you usually have to work fulltime to get any sort of benefits from your employer.
And benefits through the marketplace (not through an employer) are generally expensive for what they offer.
Someone in the US would need to make quite a bit to be able to do part time.
I’m in the US and I pay about $550 a month for health insurance. I’m a 34 year old white male. I factored the cost of insurance in to my bill rate when negotiating this position.
EDIT: I definitely got very lucky finding this position. I’m not suggesting everyone can just do this. But if people don’t refuse to work 40-50 hour work weeks, then that’s what employers will expect.