To wonder how many of you employ yourself and if not why not?

[girlfriend44]

Instead of trying to get someone else to employ you, and have the worry of applying for work, interviews, and all the other things that go with working is there a reason why you don't work for yourself?

There are lots of positives to it and you don't need to rely on anyone else?
If you don't self employ why not?

Well there still needs to be a customer, which is the client. Probably not dissimilar to interviews, all that pitching for new business.

Umm…security of income, the need to get clients in…you know…

Because I don't want to. It wouldn't suit me at all.

You make it sound so easy! 😂

I employ myself 🤔 its great in some ways more freedom to set hours etc but I sometimes really miss not having to worry about getting clients advertising on sm doing taxes. I really miss having colleagues it can get quite lonely.

Why do I get the feeling this is going in an MLM huns direction?!

Because I hate the sales and marketing side of things

I’m a teacher and love my job so as much as I could go self employed at some point (I have a fairly specific specialism), I don’t really want to; I’d rather climb the career ladder employed.

Dh is self employed. It works really well and he earns more money and has more flexibility as a result.

However...there's no employer pension contributions. No paid holiday or sick leave. It's less secure.

I'm PAYE employed and it's because dh is self employed that I'll stay that way. Both of us being SE would make me nervous.

I am good at crafts. It is what keeps me busy. But no one makes a living off of them. The people that do, it is just pocket money as they are married.
I would also not understand or manage the admin side of it.
Plus people are fucking skint now. No one wants to buy handmade stuff when Temu are churning out crap and in some cases copying crafters.
So I make stuff for charity instead.

Heh I thought the same

Literally can’t think of anything worse than being self employed. I have secure employment with clear career pathway, and no matter how successful my sales patter in any given month I get paid the same. Also I get paid holidays and sick pay, and good maternity provision.

I need accountability to thrive, and self employment wouldn’t give me that.

You realise that a guaranteed income is important for most people, right?

People with children to feed, people with bills to pay, people with mortgages or rent due every month...

Not at all just a discussion.

I am self-employed and have been for over 20 years. There are benefits to it, the flexibility is great and no two days are the same, but dealing with arsey clients and chasing up payments is often someone else's job if you are employed.

I do, I can't work for anyone else now. I have gone feral I think.
Its not for everyone though, it can be really hard and no matter how skilled etc you are if you can't find clients you are screwed

Not sure what I could do self employed wise, but I would love to.

I also think it's pretty short-sighted and insulting if you really think that all women who are self-employed are flogging shit in a pyramid scheme.

There are thousands of us plugging away doing everything from cleaning to consulting on IT to tutoring, taxi driving ....

Of course, you can still do it though.

I wouldn’t be good at it. I’m an accountant. I have my job, I’m good at it, but winning new clients is not part of my role and I don’t want it to be.

I do. Do you?

Because I was but I got fucked over financially during Covid, because I got cancer and took a couple of weeks off for a hysterectomy and worked all through chemotherapy because of no sick pay, because most of my work went online and I just sat at home by myself in the dining room all day, because I was sick of chasing late payments, because I was sick of pretending I was “passionate” about my work to promote my work, because the sector that I work in is in chaos and work kept moving and clashing, because I didn’t have regular hours to organise my life, no pension contribution etc. etc. - many reasons!

I’m a TA and love my job.
I also like being able to say “This happened - can you sort it for
me?” I don’t like paperwork or sitting at a desk for any length of time, I get a massive buzz out of explaining something to children and seeing them ‘get it.’
SE just wouldn’t suit me at all.

Because what i am skilled at, employers are willing to pay me a very high salary for, but its a role that only exists working for a very large company. There are self employment options in related areas but I'd earn a lot less than I earn as an employee.

Even if willing to change career, any form of self employment requires that you sell/hustle to get customers. I detest doing this, I am a terrible salesperson.

because not every job can be done on a self-employed basis