Contemplating Paychecks
Note: The following is an example of a Content Free® post offered under the guise of a legitimate and potentially erudite essay. Do not be fooled. And don't try this at home; this post was conceived and executed [you wish] by trained professionals on a closed course.
I've been a "freelance consultant" (another term for "self-unemployed") for about five years, and I'm still trying to adjust to the relative uncertainties of getting paid: not only "how much," but especially "if." As a corporate drone, there was no small degree of comfort in knowing that a regular paycheck would be arriving on a predictable and regular schedule, a fact that I suspect many take for granted.
Since MLB continues to toil in the corporate dronage system, and since her earnings via that toil put mine to shame, I still find myself confronting the vagaries of the pay calendar.
Take this month, for example. October, 2006, is the cruelest month for those on the traditional bi-monthly payment plan, where checks arrive on the 15th and the end of the month. Since the 15th lands on Sunday, many companies will issue paychecks on Friday, the 13th. The upside is that only two weeks have passed since the previous check. The downside, of course, is that it's 18 days until the next paycheck, and that 18 day period includes THREE weekends. (I don't know about you, but for us the weekends seem to be more costly than weekdays.)
Our previous employer had the most pleasing approach to pay periods I've ever encountered. We were on an "every two week" payday plan...meaning that we got paid every other Thursday. This equated to 26 paychecks per year, meaning that twice a year, we got three checks during the month. Of course, the total pay was the same, so that each check was slightly smaller, but this approach eliminated the aforementioned calendric vagaries. And for some reason, those 3-paycheck months always seemed a bit like another occurrence of Christmas.
It was a headache for the payroll department as it almost always meant that at the end of each year, we got paid for days we hadn't yet worked. But, that's why accountants made the big bucks. And every two weeks, at that.
Tim used to be on the once a month system as well (we used to go round and round as to whether or not he was paid at the end of the month or the beginning, it never seemed clear.) We got used to it. Then when they switched to bi-weekly it took getting used to on that score. I have perpetually been on a bi-monthly schedule myself...which seems to work out ok.
Still, it's amusing how little things like this have such a huge impact on the family budget.
Posted by: beth at October 9, 2006 12:14 PMBeen there, done that, got the 1099.
The struggle I had for the five years I was on my own was dealing with the whole "You mean, you aren't going to pay me NOT to work?" thing.
I was fortunate enough to have a client with more work than time/resources to cover it, meaning that even when I finished project X, there was always project Y waiting in the wings. A nice problem to have, but it meant that taking time off was, in effect, turning down money. (As opposed to merely shifting the timeframe that money would arrive.)
Calculating the opportunity cost of a week in the 100 degree heat of Oklahoma for your son's summer camp is not a healthy process on pretty much any dimension.
Posted by: Bret at October 9, 2006 02:10 PMI've been self-employed for 20 years now. My biggest struggle is balancing the marketing with the working. If you spend too much time on one project, you'll find that once it's done, there's nothing lined up to work on. On the other hand, if all you ever do is try and get new business, you'll never get the existing jobs done. I guess I've yet to evolved past the hunter-gatherer stage.
Posted by: John Peter Smith at October 9, 2006 09:34 PMAbout the publisher
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My second father worked for an oil company that for decades paid once a month, on the first. When the company switched over to twice monthy, my mother took over the family banking. Pop didn't like those twice a month decisions!
Posted by: Deborah at October 9, 2006 12:06 PM