How much do you charge?

[RevoltStudios]

$1250 a song and they pay to book blackbird studios. It's my job and undercutting yourself is not advised. Occasionally I'll go to 800 or so if I can use a much cheaper studio and save them and me money.

 

[crillemannen]

I charge 350$ + vat /day at the moment. I think it is alright, but we pay crazy amount of taxes in Sweden so i would probably have to charge 500$/day to make good money.

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

How much do you pay in taxes in Sweden?

 

[::XeS::]

50% like Italy....% + % -... the difference is that in Sweden they have lot of services, no highway tickets, lot of welfare services.....here we have to pay 2 times, 1 with taxes (that disappear) and 1 by ourselves

 

[crillemannen]

How much do you pay in taxes in Sweden?

Without VAT it is around 45-50%. With VAT it is around 70%.

But yes, we got pretty good health-care system etc. But it would be great to have a higher non-taxable income limit. Now it is 2500$.
So it is hard to start a small business here in Sweden

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

I'm not sure I understand. The % you guys are talking about are from your income or your benefits? I'm guessing the latter (it's the same here).

 

[::XeS::]

Here (and also in Germany) before you are able to start a business, burocracy and stupid rules about commercial activities have already make you wanna kill yourself.
For example in USA (FWIK) you can do your business in a basement, in your room, paying your taxes, etc... It's cool because you can work with what you have and do it legit. Here you can't because a basement or a garage are not "designed" to be used for that...if you have a commercial activity your place has to be at least 3.50m height (so if it's a studio with insulation, it means it should be at least 3.70m...fucking huge) and you can't do it at home because an house is not "designed" for a commercial activity as well ... And if you wanna work with clients in your studio you need insurance, estinguishers, dedicated wc for the clients and lot of things. And lot of money for all the papers! You understand that it's very difficult to start a business in a legit way here...expecially if you don't have lot of money to invest. You know...when someone says that italians are "cunning" (in the bad way) it's because we have to deal with all these useless stuff...

PS
Here the % is based on the invoices you do (and taking away the expense you can)..and you have to pay the taxes also if the clients don't pay. I mean a client have to pay 3000€, but at the end of the year he still doesn't pay...you have to pay taxes for it, because you have already do an invoice. And more...you have to pay taxes based on the last year: if you do 20 last year, this year you have to work AT LEAST 20 and pay taxes for it (and if this year you work way less, you have to pay like the year before).....it's fuckin' insane

 

[crillemannen]

I'm not sure I understand. The % you guys are talking about are from your income or your benefits? I'm guessing the latter (it's the same here).

I don't understand that question but here is an example:

10days work á 350/day ex. VAT.

350x10 = 3500
Add 25% VAT
3500x1x25 = 4375

Income tax etc 70% of that total sum = 3062.5

4375-3062.5 = 1312.5$

That leaves you with a total of 1312.5$ in your pocket for 2weeks work.

 

[AudioGeekZine]

$1250 a song and they pay to book blackbird studios. It's my job and undercutting yourself is not advised. Occasionally I'll go to 800 or so if I can use a much cheaper studio and save them and me money.

So do you put in 80 hours of work into each song?

 

[Brett - K A L I S I A]

Ok this sounds crazy, I think you got something wrong in your formula because it just can't be...
Here the tax is about 40% of your benefits (can be 50% depending on your status).
So let's say you made 100,000 € last year.
You declare your expenses (accountant / book-keeper / invoices needed here...) that would be let's say 60,000 €.
So your benefit is 40,000 € so you'd have to pay about 20,000 € in taxes.

And ::Xes:: yes when you receive money from a customer, you must put a part of it aside to pay for next year's taxes... Why would your clients not pay you when they get their invoice anyway? (just kiddin')

 

[jangoux]

I think I should move overseas because your rates are just...awesome I work at a nice studio, one of the biggest on the place I live and my boss charges around $30/hourly. The most expensive studio here is around $55/hourly. Well, off those 30 bucks, i get around $15/hourly - BUT, my boss stopped charging per hour, and now it doing per song and charge about $280 including mixing and mastering, and I get around $100 from this. A full album, including mixing and mastering is around $2000, and I get $800 from that. On my home studio, I charge a little more than that...around $150 per song and $1200 for a full album, depending on the project.

I usually get $1200 monthly, summing both studios, but lately my own place has paying me an average of 4x more. It really is a struggle to pay my bills and stuff, but if I want to get more money, I either should move to another State, or better yet, another country

 

[crillemannen]

Ok this sounds crazy, I think you got something wrong in your formula because it just can't be...
Here the tax is about 40% of your benefits (can be 50% depending on your status).
So let's say you made 100,000 € last year.
You declare your expenses (accountant / book-keeper / invoices needed here...) that would be let's say 60,000 €.
So your benefit is 40,000 € so you'd have to pay about 20,000 € in taxes.

And ::Xes:: yes when you receive money from a customer, you must put a part of it aside to pay for next year's taxes... Why would your clients not pay you when they get their invoice anyway? (just kiddin')

If you are an employee you pay 30% of your income in taxes. But when you have your own company the tax from earnings to your salary is around 70% as i described. It is around 50% if you exclude the VAT, that you charge your customers.

 

[RevoltStudios]

So do you put in 80 hours of work into each song?

Oh gosh no haha. I'd die.

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

So do you put in 80 hours of work into each song?

...so you think a proper salary for an AE is $10-15.625 per hour? :zombie:

Or did I completely misunderstand something here?

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

If you are an employee you pay 30% of your income in taxes. But when you have your own company the tax from earnings to your salary is around 70% as i described. It is around 50% if you exclude the VAT, that you charge your customers.

I think what Brett means is deducting your expenses, which brings down the amount of taxes you pay in reality. There's a shit-ton of stuff you can write off as expenses in this business (thank lawd).

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

I can't believe I posted my prices. I'm not that cheap anymore.

 

[midget donkeys]

Those swedish taxes sound insane. If I lived in Sweden there is no way that I would work. I would just mooch off of societies lush benefits and be a total dirt bag.

 

[AudioGeekZine]

...so you think a proper salary for an AE is $10-15.625 per hour? :zombie:

Or did I completely misunderstand something here?

you missed it

 

[::XeS::]

Those swedish taxes sound insane. If I lived in Sweden there is no way that I would work. I would just mooch off of societies lush benefits and be a total dirt bag.

You pay lot of taxes but lot of things are free...highway free, university free at 90%, free healt services, etc...
The problem start when you have to pay a shitload of taxes and you have to pay also everything...university, ticket when you go to the hospital, lot of money on the highway, lot of taxes included on the oil prize (we pay Unleaded 1.60€/l and the 50% are taxes...some of them are taxes to pay wars of the 1920.....)

 

[crillemannen]

^

Yes and that is the benefits that comes with that price. I feel terrible reading like James Murphy needs to raise money in order to get treatment for his cancer :S That fuckin sucks that you can be refused to get treatment because you can't afford it. So HAIL SWEDEN