Working for Free: Part Two - Hidden Costs

For many writers of children’s non-fiction books, there’s usually a contracted fee and no royalties. However, once again, payment is made once the work’s completed, rather than during the writing process. In addition, although there’s a fee for writing the book, it may involve far more research than you anticipated when signing the contract. There may also be a great deal of editing, especially if the client decides to take a new direction with the non-fiction book or article. Consequently your fee per hour ends up being much less than you might have initially calculated.

You may decide to pitch a non-fiction book to a publisher hoping that they’ll publish it. Yet this can involve a colossal amount of work with no guarantee that you’ll eventually be paid for it. This might also apply to writing copy for websites, blog postings, or for magazine articles. However, much of this is the life of the freelancer and is largely unavoidable. For freelancers in most professions, the freedom to live life as one chooses has to be balanced with the inevitable financial insecurity.