Many full-time web developers make the mistake of dividing their annual salary by 2,080 hours (40 hours × 52 weeks) to establish their freelance rate. For example, dividing $120,000 by 2,080 yields $57.69/hour. However, billing at $58/hour as a freelancer results in a severe income drop. Freelance developers only spend 55% to 65% of their working hours on billable code delivery; the remaining 35% to 45% is consumed by client discovery calls, architecture proposals, administrative accounting, and continuous technical education. Furthermore, independent contractors in the US must pay both halves of FICA (15.3% self-employment tax), purchase private healthcare insurance ($400–$700/mo), and cover professional dev tools (GitHub Enterprise, JetBrains, Vercel, AWS sandboxes). To net $120,000 after business expenses and taxes at 25 billable hours/week (1,200 hours/year), a software engineer must bill at least $115.00 to $130.00 per hour.