Hello
I am a nuclear engineer with 8-10 years of experience with background in electrical/mechanical/licensing areas (different projects-different responsebilities over time). I am contemplating in becoming a consultant/contractor but do not know what an appropriate billing rate is for someone like me. All questions below assume there are no benefits.
Is $80 an hour + per diem for a 1-year contract reasonable?
What about jobs where you can work from home (e.g, an MCNP calc)- no per diem, but should the billing rate change to reflect the benefit of working from home?
Should one charge more for projects that are only a month or two in duration? - I am thinking that longer term projects are more desirable (hence cpmpensation is lower) but maybe I got this one wrong...
thanks for any feedback
Looks like $80/hr is at the high end, check this site http://www.gcservices.com/ it's one of the few sites that I have seen that actually shows compensation rates.
Pair of pay ranges I've seen for contractors, that might be considered long term (18-24 months):
procedure writer for uprate AOPs/EOPs = $80/hr no per diem
Ops training instructor = $105/hr plus $100/d per diem
Just as a disclaimer, these two guys had about 70 years of nuke experience between them, probably makes a difference.
Thanks guys - for someone like me the number i used does seem to be in the uper range..(even though I would most definitely deserve that pay hehe)...this contracting stuff is interesting though - I could take half a year off and make the same amount of money as working an equivalent full time job...time to make my prons/cons list in excel...
Don't forget to include the benefits (vacation, holidays, sick time, 401k matching, health insurance rates, etc) you currently get in the spreadsheet. They usually add up to a number that is larger than most people think.