Independent

I know I’ve been quite lately, and that is due in large part to a potential major shift on the horizon.

Here’s some history. A month or two ago, Randy and I were mixing the new indoor percussion show recordings I had just created, when out of the blue he mentions that it has been recommended to him by his accountant that anyone who doesn’t work in the office proper on a day to day basis should be moved from employee to independent contractor.

It’ll save on taxes, he tells me. Plus, getting health insurance is so easy these days, it really would be just as easy for me, he continues. And of course, MSC would pay more to cover the extra cost.

After some initial panic, I really started to think about it. I would essentially terminate my employment with MSC and become solely employed by Metta Audio. I would own and run my own company, full time. I would be in charge of my schedule, completely, and be totally responsible for my income from Jan to Dec. And if I wanted to make more money, I’d just have to find more work. Although that may be easier said than done, I do find I have half a dozen projects I’d love to get in to that I’m struggling to get done right now simply because the only time I have to work on them are evenings and weekends.

The more I thought about it, the more I got excited about it. So over the next couple weeks, I began to dig very heavily into the numbers side of it to see if it was possible to actually make this thing fly. With MSC as my biggest client, a vast majority of my yearly work would already be there. How many small business start out with such a major client right from the word go?

After a couple weeks of soul searching, number crunching and phone calling, I was pretty much ready to take the plunge. Besides, with a one year waiting period on pregnancy for any major health insurance policy, I really don’t want to wait around too much on this.

Then Randy got cold feet. I think he realized he isn’t paying me enough and he wouldn’t be saving as much money as he had hoped, particularly with me setting a more fair rate for my work. When he told me he wants to put it off for 3 to 5 years, I wasn’t relieved like he had hoped. In fact, my stomach dropped out as he was telling me this. “no no no! I’m ready…. I want this!” was all I could hear in my head. He tried to persuade me with warnings of higher insurance costs and extra taxes, but it wasn’t any information I had already gone over time and time again. I certainly could take the easy way out and just stay with MSC, but every time I consider that, my heart sinks.

So that’s where we are. The million dollar question is: Do I become an independent contractor, or do I stay full time employed by MSC?

Much Metta,

John