Contract is $95/hour, roughly 25 hours a week, no benefits, and the current statement of work ends in five months with a vague promise of renewal. Salaried role is $138k with health insurance that covers my partner, and it's stable but the work is dull and I've learned nothing in a year. I have about four months of expenses saved. I can hold both until October at the outside and then something has to give.
The other question I'd ask: which one makes you more employable in two years? A year of dull salaried work plus a year of contract work on interesting problems reads better on paper than two years of the dull thing. If the contract is genuinely teaching you something, that has a cash value even if it's hard to put on a spreadsheet.
True, but four months of runway is thin for betting on that. I'd want eight before I'd let go of the coverage.
Half a suggestion: is going part time at the salaried role on the table? Four days for 80% keeps the insurance in a lot of setups and buys you a whole day for the contract. Worth asking before you frame it as a binary.
Hadn't considered it. HR says benefits hold down to 30 hours here, so that's actually viable.
Ask the contract client directly about renewal, in writing, before October. Not hinting, asking: is there budget approved beyond the current SOW, and when will you know. You'd be amazed how often the answer is a straight no that nobody was going to volunteer, and how often it's a yes with a start date you can plan around.
Whatever you choose, don't resign the salaried one on a Friday feeling. I did that and the contract went quiet six weeks later. Wait until the renewal is signed, not promised.
@invoice_ivan · 10mo ago · 3 replies
Price the insurance before you do any other maths. Get an actual quote for equivalent coverage for two people on the open market where you live, monthly, including the deductible you'd realistically hit. In a lot of cases that number is between $900 and $1,800 a month, and it turns the salaried role from $138k into something closer to $155k in real terms.
Then compare against the contract honestly: 25 hours at $95 is roughly $123k annualised if you never take a week off and it never gaps. Contracts gap. A five month SOW with a vague renewal is not five months of certainty, it's five months of income and then a job search.
On those numbers I'd keep the salaried job and be very deliberate about fixing the boredom inside it.
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@invoice_ivan · 10mo ago
That's $16k a year of compensation you were about to hand back without noticing. Boredom is a real cost too, but it's a cheaper one to fix than health cover.
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@arraysformula · 10mo ago
The insurance quote came back at $1,340 a month for the two of us with a worse deductible than I have now. That reframes it a lot.
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