How freely do you discuss your pay rate with fellow freelancers?

September 27, 2014 9:08 AM

How freely do you discuss your pay rate with fellow freelancers?

I am a freelancer in a skilled labor occupation. I am hired by various companies at an hourly or daily pay rate to do a specific job. I am in (friendly?) competition with lots of other people for these same jobs. One of the things that I have struggled with is how to ascertain if I am being undercut by a client, or if they can afford to pay me more. There seems to be a pretty wide variance of rate depending on who the client is, and the specifics of the particular job.

In my opinion, it would be easier for all of us freelancers to know how much we should be expecting for rates if we all speak freely with each other about how much certain clients are offering. As such, I have been pretty willing to tell my compatriots what I'm making outright. I have found that some people are less comfortable with this than I am. Am I doing it right? How freely do you speak with your friends and competitors about what you're making, and how much you are being offered?

posted by soy_renfield to Work & Money (10 answers total)

Former freelancer, now full-time staff working with freelance writers and editors daily.

I never told my closest freelance friends my specific hourly rate, but we did discuss general ranges, the work, the client, the demand, and retainer options to help each other try to get the best rate possible. I found my friends were often undercutting themselves to land gigs, but over time, these discussions helped us define how we could add value to a project, market ourselves as such, and justify a higher rate.

Keep in mind we all work differently & should approach the rate issue accordingly. I have a couple of workaholic freelance friends who looooove working and take a lower rate because they have the mental agility to juggle more projects. I have another freelance friend who works in an uber-niche executive field and only wants to work periodically, so her rate is higher because she only works a few hours a week.

So no, I would be uncomfortable describing specific rates, but loved being in a small freelance community of friends who encourage each other to find ways to get the best rate possible.
posted by mochapickle at 9:24 AM on September 27, 2014 [2 favorites]

I just read a book about the business of freelancing that warned against talking specifics with your competitors - that it is considered price fixing and is against U.S. law.
posted by Uncle Glendinning at 9:36 AM on September 27, 2014 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I work with musicians. Some of them share rates and work together setting rates so that they get paid fairly. Others, upon finding out what another musician is charging, will go to a venue and offer to play for less. The ethic sharers will also let each other know of gigs that they can't do, so that their buddies can fill that spot. No one helps out the unethical sharer. Only share with people that you trust and who are successful in their own right. Being a team player benefits you in the long run but, you may get horribly burned along the way.
posted by myselfasme at 9:36 AM on September 27, 2014 [2 favorites]

I work as a private tutor, and I'm totally open with anybody who asks. I have my rates on my website, so they can also just find out by looking me up.
posted by ktkt at 10:45 AM on September 27, 2014

I'm comfortable talking about my specific rates, but I'm usually comfortable talking about anything regardless of "etiquette." Also, my friends & competitors are also potential collaborators, so it's necessary to discuss rates sometimes. I would only worry about running afoul of "price-fixing" rules if you're advocating publicly for freelancers to insist on certain minimum rates.
posted by univac at 11:03 AM on September 27, 2014

It's fine to talk rates, and not everyone will want to.
posted by michaelh at 11:20 AM on September 27, 2014 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I work freelance television production. I am very open with my rate, both with the people who do my same job and with people who are below me on the work totem pole. I was very shy about discussing my rate when I first started out, and this resulted in me working for WAY below the going rate for a couple of years. This is extremely widespread in non-union TV production, and it is bullshit, so this is my way of trying to make it stop. Some of my peers think it's weird, many of them are equally open to discuss. I've been told more than once by a superior not to do it, but as of now I'm still getting regular work.
posted by justjess at 11:44 AM on September 27, 2014 [2 favorites]

I do some freelance work, but under different circumstances than it sounds like you are dealing with. I don't discuss my rates at all with other freelancers, but that might be lack of opportunity rather than any particular thought process. However, I have long wanted to be self-employed and I have read a lot of business books and the like over the years. So here are few thoughts:

One of the things that I have struggled with is how to ascertain if I am being undercut by a client, or if they can afford to pay me more.

I think this is the wrong approach to or mental model for the problem. You need to be thinking about whether or not your work is worth more pay, not whether or not the client can afford to pay you more.

There seems to be a pretty wide variance of rate depending on who the client is, and the specifics of the particular job.

In some sense, this is as it should be. The specifics of the particular job is where the value is. But, of course, if an individual is in an information vacuum they can be getting paid below market rate for the work without realizing it. As noted above, that does happen.

There are some pros and cons to doing this kind of casual information gathering amongst your colleagues. Even if you can get this kind of feedback from others, you should probably also be doing some other kinds of research on the topic so you have something resembling objective data. On the one hand, information direct from the source can be high quality. On the other hand, just chit-chatting kind of casually can be rife with inaccuracies of various sorts, from misremembered details to misspoken details to (possibly inadvertent) lies of omission to outright lies and misdirection for personal gain. What people remember off the top of their head or are willing to say off the cuff varies tremendously in value and reliability. Without something more solid to put with it and give it some context and/or some means to vet it, I would be somewhat skeptical about the quality of the information.

You might want to read some negotiating books in order to get a clearer idea of the problem space (in terms of trying to frame it as asking for a price based on the value of the work and how to determine what the value to the client might be). "Getting to Yes" is research based and short. It was one of two required texts for a college class I had on negotiation and conflict management. It's a good place to start.
posted by Michele in California at 12:07 PM on September 27, 2014

I am a freelancer and I discuss rates with fellow freelancers. This is not price-fixing - it is a broad overview of "fair compensation" and making sure I work within normal market rates.

Incidentally, I work in an industry which a lot of people want to work in. Many of these newcomers undersell themselves grossly (and I mean grossly) just to get a foot in the door. By underselling themselves they are actually harming their own careers as they are seen as unprofessional. Knowing average rates is very helpful to these people.
posted by kariebookish at 2:21 PM on September 27, 2014 [1 favorite]

I completely agree with your perspective. I wish my fellow freelancers in my field would tell me what they get. I'd be happy to tell them what I make. But since THEY won't, I don't want to either, for fear that I'm making way less and will look like an idiot. But i REALLY want to know. Because then we call all price more equitably--if client X will pay 50$ an hour, it sucks that I'm only charging them 30$ because "that's what the market rate is" according to rumor.
posted by misanthropicsarah at 5:38 PM on September 27, 2014