Contracting vs Full-Time Jobs

Try contracting / consulting. I feel like contracting has a different set of expectations, there's more of an expectation that contractors kind of do their own thing. There's also an expectation that contractors are a bit flaky, so a reliable contractor at 80% time is still a solid asset, whereas an employee at 80% time is communicating "I'm not 100% invested". I guess the difference is that with contractors the relationship is clearly understood by both sides to be

Contractors who do well without being tied to agencies, are not that easy to hire full time. They have the network and the skills to find/retain work, get paid decently for it and still have some freedom. It's not about you retaining the option to hire them full time, it's about them retaining the option to potentially work for you full time.

In my country a lot of people in IT are contractors (not employees) and sometimes these contracts are wild (like not working on anything else during that time and stuff like that).

You probably wont be able to find a permanent job that pays as well as contract job, at the same skill levels.

Every contractor I’ve known has done so with the downside being what you said, and choosing the upside of more flexible work or higher pay. People don’t seem to be forced into contracting?

Sure, but nothing stops you from having long-term "contractor"-s.

Maybe getting contracting gigs might be easier than finding perm roles?

I'm a contractor working 6 months at a time on zero notice and even I wouldn't bother!

I've had both good and bad experiences contracting.Good Experiences:* Variety of work. I've done contracting work from writing sophisticated parsers to financial computations to high-precision arithmetic libraries.* The pay can often be better. Dollar for dollar, I've made as much as 75% more by contracts.* If you're an excellent worker, you can develop many good connections.* Contract work can sometimes lead to very good full-time positions. Sometimes known as

In my experience I have found it more difficult to work less days and take holidays as a contractor. The company that is paying for your services expects complete short term dedication on delivering the project, and that is what you should provide. You can take longer breaks between contracts but again I have found that not to be the case as you always want to have more work lined up for a steady income stream.