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Comment by ccozan | Hacker News Reader

No is not ridiculous at all: having your name on a door means that you are "forced" to work there, thus rendering you in a employee since you cannot determine for yourself the place and location of work, the cornerstones of beeing a freelancer.

I do consulting for a big technology company in Munich and they have special freelancer areas where you can have any place you want, since there is no concept of "office" for a freelancers like. Some colleagues always have to chase me, since I can choose to take another place than they are used to :).

Also, you have to bring your own coffee machine, water, you are not allowed to use the ones from the kitchen, since they are only for employees. But I just don't care :), and use them anyway.

PS. i had some other crazy contract where I had to show them proof I am working also for another client, otherwise not able to take the gig. Germany is quite special :)

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I heard this has to do with the fact that once social services prove that you are not actually self employed the employer would have to pay back a significant amount to social services AND a fine on top of that.

I understand that these laws should prevent abuse of employees by big corporations, but it's hilarious that they go after self employed consultants that make several 100k Euros per year and already pay the maximum amount of social security that is possible.

And it's not like these companies have 2 or 3 consultants, they will likely have 10, 100 or even more. We are talking about fines that could be as high as many millions for these companies.

In Germany you need to make about 60000€ a year to get private health insurance (better service, lower price) OR you have to be self-employed, where it doesn't matter how much you make. (500€ private, 750€ public)

Yes, this doesn't matter for an engineer who makes about 100000€ a year. :)

But!

If you're an employee, you have to pay into a government-controlled retirement fund, if you're self-employed you don't.

If you make about 100k, you (and your employer) would have to pay more than 10k a year.

So, no, if you're self-employed and make good money, you don't necessarily have to pay "the maximum amount of social security" :)

A software engineer can make 100k€ in Germany? Where's that!?

Never said "software" engineer :P

;)

I knew it! :/

For the retirement fund only the first 74,400€ (west) or 64,800€ (east) of your income is used (2016 numbers, different rules if you work in mining). For anything over you don't pay into the retirement fund.

There are some self-employed that need to pay into the retirement fund, including teachers (which is applied broadly, e.g. training supervisors and moderators), journalists, and artists.

Also don't forget about the unemployment fund into which employees must pay.

> lower price, 500€ private

Heavily depends on your health and age. Additionally family members are insured for free in public but not private insurance which might tip the scale. Also important to note is that it's close to impossible for most to switch back to public insurance once they decided to go private (e.g. if the premiums rise in the future).

Only after 50 it is impossible to switch back.

Before that you just have to report, that you're unemployed and the state forces you to go back into public healthcare

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