OT: hourly contracting rate for a software engineer in GTA

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Sun, Aug 14, 2011 at 01:17:23PM -0400, David van Geest wrote:
> A little off-topic, but thought this group could provide some good insight.
> 
> My wife and I are planning to move to Toronto in the next couple months
> (back to the motherland!).  I'm a software engineer, and the plan is for me
> to keep working on a contract basis for my current employer, who is based in
> Michigan.
> 
> I can figure out an hourly wage based on current salary and some expense
> estimates, but I'm curious as to what the going rate is for contract
> software work in the GTA.  Obviously the type of work and the contractor's
> level of experience play a large role, so if you have a number, it would be
> good to see some context.  As for me, I do a wide variety of stuff, anything
> from C on embedded QNX platforms to Rails in the cloud.  I'm 3 years out of
> my Bachelor of Science in Engineering.
> 
> Any insight into this would be appreciated.  Thanks!

Remember to put aside money for taxes.

Remember the lack of benefits and to take that cost into account.

Remember there are rules about how much contract work you can do for
one customer before you are essentially considered an employee of that
company by revenue canada.

As for money, I have seen claims as high as "Charger per hour what you
would expect to be paid per day if you were working full time".  After all
contractors have to spend time looking for work, don't necesarily get
to charge for all the hours, have to deal with insurance premiums,
lack of benefits, accounting, taxes, and lots of other things.

-- 
Len Sorensen
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