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In most cases its "by having previous connections" or "pure luck".

If it would be easy - everyone would be doing consunlting coz it pays way better and work-life balance is also better.

Is work life balance really better when you have to worry bout finding your next gig and also that everything’s on you (don’t have a team/others to fall back on)?

When 3 months of one gig pay for your whole year of expenses - yes its better.

You must live outside the US. In the US If you’re only looking at expenses many full time jobs can get there in 3-6mos too. And not even big tech

Sure it’s nice to have the choice to not work between engagements but again you’ll be back to finding the next one

If you bounce from full time to full time with 75% unemployment you are a no-hire many places and almost universally in a downturn. Consulting and contracting is often used to be vague and even pretend you are unsuccessfully looking for contracts a lot of the time precisely because that is the reality for many and more acceptable for many types of employment.

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