<prompt> Human: Doing some career soul-searching and thinking and was reading today about someones tax burden now that he is self-employed, and thought I should know what Im getting into if I go that route.So what are the points to watch out for if you become entirely self-employed, either as an independent contractorconsultant, a freelance content producer, or an entrepreneur small business owner? I mean in terms of taxes and other financial considerations. Right now it seems like all financially far worse than being employed have to pay your own self-employment tax, have to pay your own health insurance, no other perksbenefits, but Im sure that cant always be true. There must be some financial bright side to it other than the personal value of more independenceautonomy. Id like to know the financial pros and cons and if you have other pros and cons and want to sneak them in, thatd be interesting, too, though not as on topic for this subreddit. Thanks.  <response>: The personal autonomy is the most valuable non-monetary aspect of being in business for yourself. Its also the scariest. Unless youre at the top of your field, clients wont come to you. You need to seek them out - and that can cause stress, and breaks, in your income stream.You also need to make sure youre charging enough. If youre making 50k as an employee now, you should charge 50hr or as close to it as you can for it to be equitable. 