There’s a lot of this blog dedicated to advice for creators. It seems to fill some kind of pathological need on my part to keep everyone out there from making the same career mistakes I did. If I could take each one of you by the hand and lead you around the minefield of this business, I would. Many of the worst mistakes are easy to avoid, and no amount of warning seems to keep some people from going right on ahead and making them anyway.
The uncertainty of the freelance life means roller coaster income, if you manage to make any income at all.
I know I come across as cynical in these posts sometimes. I don’t want to discourage anyone from pursuing their goals. By all means, be an artist. By all means, follow your muse. But there is no reason you can’t do it forearmed with a little knowledge that may not make you rich, but it may keep you from being poor.
It’s been years since I had to struggle for jobs. I complain about money like everyone else does, not because I make low income anymore (I don’t) but because I am acutely aware of the fact that for at least 1/3 of my career, I made very low income. If you are making low income for a protracted period, you have to make up for years of not being able to save and invest, and that isn’t easy.
If you have $10,000 of debt, it costs you about $16,000 to get out of that debt. Not only are you paying the interest on the debt, but you also have to pay taxes on the income you have to earn to pay off the debt. So if you have $20,000 of debt, you actually have to earn $32,000. And if you have $30,000 of debt, you have to earn $48,000. At that rate, even someone making $50,000 a year is, effectively, bankrupt. Only serious financial self discipline can eliminate that kind of debt and most people just don’t seem to have that ability. Or maybe they just don’t want to take the trouble.
I know so many creators who have gone into self publishing, or decided to take a few months off work to create their dream project. They fool themselves into believing that their project has paid for itself because they went to a convention and paid for their table space with their sales.
But you are ALWAYS losing money if your project has not earned enough to not just pay the print bill and the convention table space, but for the time you put into it as well. Every minute you are living in your home, your project is costing you in rent, food, electricity and other overhead expenses. If you are not willing to look at your project as a hobby that you are willing to pay for because it amuses you, then you must look at is a business expense that has overhead costs every moment you take to produce that work. If you can’t face that set of facts, you are not a professional.
There is nothing wrong with doing art just because you enjoy it. But it is delusional to ignore the cost of the work. Either you’re a hobbyist or you’re not.
Since there is no steady income to be had in this profession, your income is going to go up and down like a roller coaster. My income can vary by as much as $50,000 in a single year.
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