A Canadian tells us about her taxes:

1. $2,690: Tax reassessment from 2011, to cover the pension plan payments neither you nor your employer made. (Sent: Jan 21st; Received: Feb 4th or so; Due: Feb 11th) Side note: About half of this amount is due to the fact that, because you are apparently self-employed, you pay both your own pension plan deduction, as well as a matched contribution that would normally be made by your employer (e.g. approx $1,300).

2. $95.83: Oh yeah, plus another $100 in interest accrued for not paying the above on time. So really, a $2,790 payment in total.

3. $184: The cost of getting your taxes done by a professional to make sure this doesn’t happen again. Note that it costs more because your situation qualifies as “complex.”

4. $6,000: The amount deposited into a newly opened retirement savings plan (RRSP) in order to accrue a sufficient tax rebate (Due: March 1st). This amount is calculated to offset $1200: The amount estimated by the tax professionals that you owe the government for 2012.

5. $200 (approx): The final amount owed for 2012. (A $7,000 RRSP deposit could have probably brought this down to 0.)

6. $1,605.05: Last but not least, the first quarterly tax instalment for 2013. (Due: March 17th).

Total: $10,774.88 Granted, $8,690 of that will be yours again in retirement, so it’s probably shitty to complain.

Recalculated total: $2,084.88. And yet, that just doesn’t seem to accurately reflect.

This Canadian makes $36,000 a year and has been paying $1,605.05 quarterly in taxes from the beginning (of the job, not the beginning of time).

I’ve been fortunate enough to spend the majority of my twenties traveling across five continents and temporarily living in some of the most exciting cities on earth: London, Los Angeles, and New York City—with long stints in Paraguay and Belize. I’ve been able to afford this, not because of a trust fund, but because I rarely have to pay rent. Before you get super excited about reading this article and fantasize about all the places you’ll jet off to, let me explain that I have made almost the equivalent of no money. I’ve learned to be savvy. The trade-off for my wanderer’s lifestyle has been that I’ve never owned a car, maintained a rental lease after college, bought furniture (maybe a table, once) or seriously thought about having children. My bills consist of student loans, a smartphone, health insurance, and a subscription to a streaming yoga website. I don’t own much besides my laptop, camera, and clothes that would not be considered business casual. Still, for anyone with insatiable wanderlust, check out the following ways I’ve traveled on the cheap:

Scholarships
Back when I was in community college (I’m serious about having no money), I got a financial need-based scholarship to study James Joyce in Ireland where I encountered a lot of retirees who had a difficult time walking uphill and seemed slightly afraid of the Irish. I vowed to travel while I was young and work while I was old. A reverse retirement, if you will. If you’re in college or graduate school ask the financial aid office about scholarships for study abroad programs.

Moonlight
Coat check attendant. Babysitter. Waitress. Author’s assistant. These are all unglamorous jobs I’ve logged thousands of hours doing. In Los Angeles, I made a few grand working as a temporary nanny (while the stay-at-home mom recovered from surgery) and used the money to check out art museums in Buenos Aires and the beach scene in Uruguay. Craigslist and asking friends for connections seem to be the best way to find short term, cash paying gigs between trips.

Peace Corps
Aside from the free round trip airline ticket, the two-year commitment to helping communities in developing nations, and the character development of living on eight dollars a day, the Peace Corps offers volunteers $6,000 cash at the end of service. Of course, this money could be used for a security deposit or a car back in America. I used it to bike in China, swim in Thailand, and get cheap spa treatments in Indonesia. Applying for the Peace Corps can be competitive and take anywhere from three months to a year.

Freelance
I’m a freelance travel writer. I’ve been paid everything for my work from exposure to a few thousand dollars. Better, I was the writer-in-residence for Belize as part of a social marketing campaign with the Belize Tourism Board. That means I was paid (not a whole lot, $30 a day) to travel around Belize for three months, while scuba diving and blogging. I’ve also gone to Micronesia, San Francisco, Miami, and Mexico on press trips. MediaBistro offers online writing courses, including several focused on travel writing. Or, WordPress has free blogging software.

Glammy
I don’t like to refer to myself as a babysitter, because that’s a job for teenagers. Bethenny Frankel calls her fill-in nanny a glammy, or glamorous nanny. So I’m comfortable referring to myself as that, too. I’ve gone to France, Newport, and Virginia with a lovely family whose full-time nanny isn’t always willing or able to travel. Being a glammy also means I’ve been stuck with a screaming baby in the back of coach for several hours and cleaned up his vomit at a gas station. Still, I never could have afforded a trip to the South of France during high season otherwise. Nanny agencies in urban centers are usually looking for babysitters (glammys) as support for clients who already have full-time nannies.

Frequent Flyer Miles
I was way too late to the frequent flyer miles game. It’s heartbreaking to think about all those flights I took across the ocean without accumulating anything. I’ve since educated myself and got a Delta credit card. Last week, I flew to Denver for five dollars and 25,000 miles. Sign up for the free miles program with every major airline carrier. Remember that the individual whose butt is in the seat always gets the miles, regardless of who paid for the flight.

Vouchers
Even more precious than frequent flyer miles are airline vouchers. Travel enough and the airline will eventually screw up. You’ll get bumped off an oversold flight or it will get cancelled and the airline will give you a voucher (usually worth $250) towards a future flight as an apology. Apologies are how I’m going to Costa Rica over Thanksgiving and to Wisconsin for Christmas for next to nothing. If a flight attendant asks for volunteers to be bumped onto the next flight in exchange for a voucher, for God’s sake, volunteer.

Friends
How was I able to live in Los Angeles for five months? My best friend had a guest bedroom. When my boyfriend swapped his apartment in Brooklyn for one in the Bay Area, I went with him. I just got back from a road trip through New Mexico because a friend works for the Marriott and got us incredibly cheap hotel rooms. I’m happy to return the favor (that is, once I settle down). For now, I’m looking into spending the summer volunteering for the National Park Service, housing and stipend included.

Megan L. Wood wrote this shortly after returning from the airport, and filed it before she left again. Photo: MikeBaird

If you’ve ever worked as a freelancer or started your own business, you know that your income can fluctuate wildly depending on how much you’re in demand, and how much work you’re doing. Dorothy, the artist behind Cat and Girl, has been tracking how much she’s been earning and tallying her dollars on beautiful charts. She also does this really cool thing called “Donation Derby” where anyone can donate $5 or more to her, and she does a drawing to show readers how she spent the money. (Thanks to Jon C. for the tip!)

There was very little about going freelance that threatened to put me off, back when I did it a year or so ago. Sure, I would probably never be able to get a mortgage, and my lack of preparation meant that my savings would take a pounding as I worked to get the show on the road. These were the things that bothered my friends when I told them about my plans to quit to go it alone, my voice full of manic relief at finally reaching a point where I no longer gave a monkey’s you-know-what about money—I just wanted my freedom.

The only thing that niggled at me about my plan, or should I say lack thereof, was the fact that I probably wouldn’t be able to travel. I love going places, mostly long weekends in neighboring European countries (I live in the U.K.), but I suspected my hair-brained idea would cost me my precious San Francisco trip. I’d lived in the Bay Area for three months when I was a very impressionable 19-year-old, and I’d fallen hook, line and sinker for the foggy city and was gagging to go back. But transatlantic vacations are for people who sweat it out in offices, collecting regular salaries … right?

Actually, no. A year and a bit after I jumped into the freelance pool, I found myself on an airplane headed for San Francisco, where I stayed for 29 amazing days without putting any of it on credit. This is how I did it: 

1. I’m a freelancer; I’m a minimalist. The day my paychecks stopped coming in at regular intervals was the day I stopped shopping. Goodbye to new clothes, trinkets and gadgets; hello make do and mend, libraries and hand-me-downs. This may sound restricting, but I found it strangely liberating, knowing I could live on very little money. It made me feel in control. And unless you are Kate Middleton, no one needs more than five dresses, I swear. Of course, I still get coffee, and the occasional Thai meal with friends, but now that my income is so closely tied to my efforts, the value of money has gone up. 

2. Experiences are the new Things. As a kid, I remember thinking it doesn’t count as a gift unless it’s wrapped. Don’t get me wrong: I get as excited as the next geek over my Apple products, but generally speaking, shifting my focus from things to experiences has gone a long way to make me happier spending less money. For me, freelancing meant trading money for time, but this is the thing: They were right when they said the best things in life are free. Happiness isn’t a widescreen TV—it’s an afternoon walk by the canal with an ice cream. Or at the very least, I’m convinced you can have just as good a time, if not better, at the hole-in-the-wall Vietnamese restaurant where you can bring your own beer, as you can at some fancy place with linen napkins.

3. Let your freak flag fly. Of course, this sudden tightwad attitude may well cause people to think you are weird. I remember the look on my then-boyfriend’s face when I suggested that instead of spending three figures on his birthday present, I’d get us some fish and chips and a bottle of rum, and throw the money saved in a pot marked ‘Rome’. Apparently, that’s not as romantic as I thought. So beware: Once you start comparing every price tag to air miles, there may be casualties.

4. We do what we want. When I announced having finally bought my San Francisco ticket, people would lament over not having the money to do something similar. Then they’d show me what they’d just bought from American Apparel. I’ve realized most people resent being reminded of the connection between the two, because underneath it all, we do what we want—even if we don’t realize it. I kept thinking I wanted to buy my own place, but it finally dawned on me that I’ve moved ten times in the past ten years so I’m probably the rootless kind. I’ve now stopped reading the real estate pages. To sum it up: If you want to travel, stop buying takeaway pizza.

5. Keep your eye on the prize. I can spend a hundred on a big night out, or I can use that money to pay for a whole week in a hostel in Istanbul. Of course, there has to be a balance, but chances are you can have just as good a time on half that money if you’re careful. And while being a new-ish freelancer puts me at a disadvantage when it comes to cash, the time saved on commuting alone means I now have time to cook from scratch. But all this presumes one thing: That there is something you want, and badly. For me, it was a Mission burrito and a view of the Golden Gate Bridge. Now I’m thinking it’s high time I go to a little place called New York. I hear it’s incredible.

Jessica Furseth is a freelance journalist living in London, U.K. Read more of her writing here: www.jessicafurseth.com Photo: Shutterstock/sdecoret

We all do money differently. How do you do money, Richard Rushfield?

Logan Sachon: Richard Rushfield, what is your job?
Richard Rushfield: I am currently a combination of things. My main occupation right now is that I’m in the process of getting a website of my own off the ground. It’s been a long extensive process, and I’ve been living on a combination of money from the last book I wrote, savings from my time at the LA Times and old media, and I do a fair amount of freelance.

LS: Have you always been a saver?
RR: It’s only been in sporadic parts of my life that I’ve been able to get ahead. I’ve been a freelancer for most of my career with a few little exceptions. I came to the LA Times with the habit of living on on a shoestring and spending very little, and that enabled me to put away a little money while I was there. Also, when I was there, I was working every hour, every day, so it gave me little time to spend money.

LS: Why did you decide to break away from freelancing?
RR: I was at a point in my career as a freelance writer that I really wanted to become an editor as much as a writer; I wanted to be able to shape things bigger than my own writing, and to do that, you have to be a part of something.

And I was excited about the particular challenge. I joined the web team and the website at that time was known as the worst website in journalism. It was like the fourteenth most popular news website in LA—more people in LA looked at the Boston Globe site than the LA Times site. So I was excited about this bigger challenge. Also, the freelance life can get tiring. I’d been doing it for 15 years by that point, and the hustle never stops. To not have to hustle like that for your basic paycheck was a relief after all that time.

LS: Did you make more money with a “real” job?
RR: I don’t know that it was hugely more—when you include health insurance, it might have been slightly more. It was probably comparable, but it was consistent. As a freelancer, you have lean months and months with windfalls, and then you have places that go out of business before they pay you. Consistency is worth 20% of the dollar value, at least.

LS: Were you able to save money?
RR: When I started working at the LA Times was when I started getting ahead of the game and started racking up significant savings. Then I worked for Gawker and had the book deal, which was a very generous book deal. I was lucky they fell for it. The good thing about my book deal was that it was a very quick timeline. I had to turn in the book in five months, so it was like I was paid for a certain amount of time’s work, and I knew how long I had to last on that money. If I hadn’t had that calendar, I probably would have spent years on it.

LS: Do you have health insurance?
RR: I do. That’s where my money goes now: Gasoline, baby products, and health insurance, none of which are cheap.

Before the LA Times, I bought my own health insurance, and I do that again now. I went through an extremely talented insurance broker. I was put in touch with this broker, and the broker gets a commission from an insurance company for bringing you through them. Unless you’re some sort of savant and these things don’t make your head spin, this is the way to go. The brokers are people that know the whole system and can guide you to the best deal. And they have incentive to do that, because their money comes from keeping you insured.

LS: You seem to have it pretty together. Would you say you’re good with money?
RR: No. I’ll put it this way. I’m not good with numbers. It’s hard for me to keep track of numbers and things and to think about investing. My wife and I keep our overall longterm savings together, but we have separate account for our discretionary income.

LS: Do you have a budget you go off of?
RR: Ha, no. I have a budget in my head. I basically know where I am; I know what my monthly burn rate is. But I don’t have it written down in an organized way.

LS: How did you learn how to deal with your money?
RR: Back when I wore a younger man’s clothes and I was just getting started as a freelancer, I wasn’t making a lot of money. I was going out every night and I had access to credit cards, and I got myself fairly well in debt. I had no thought of, “I’m making this much, so I should spend a number that is smaller than that.” I just didn’t do that kind of math.

That experience of having very little income and being in debt was probably one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. I never got a good night’s sleep when I had that debt looming over me. Since that time I’ve had times when I’ve had very little money, but having no money and no debt is so much better than having money and having debt.

LS: How high did it get?
RR: It probably wasn’t very high. I was young, and it seemed high to me. It was probably $6,000 of credit card debt. Compared to giant student loans and things it’s not a ton, but owing $6,000 at a time when I was making $900 a month, the thought of how I was going to pay it back was horrifying.

LS: How did you do it?
RR: I started making more and spending less, a little at a time. No magic formula.

LS: Had your parents talked to you about money?
RR: They tried. My father is a banker, a man of finance, and he made every attempt to teach me all these things, to little avail. Nothing teaches you like getting in trouble. When I stopped using credit cards, I started doing better. I just focused on one number, and that’s the number in my bank account.

I went for five years and didn’t use them at all—I lived entirely all cash, but there are times when when you have to use them. I use them very rarely, and never just for day-to-day things. One example would be if you’re buying a plane ticket for a story, or something like that, and you don’t have the money yet, but you know is coming.

As a freelancer, while your basic guiding principle has to be spend less than you make, basically, you have to spend money to make money. Pursuing stories often takes money—for travel, for research, for instance. And if you’re going to be a freelancer, you have to make it your priority to turn over every rock in search of the stories that will make your name—knowing even, that most of the stones you turn over lead to nothing. You can’t miss out on a story because you wanted to save $75 on a ticket to something. You have to keep doing that. Be smart about it, but don’t be cheap about it. Thats the price of doing business.

photo: flickr/maveric2003

Freelancer’s Union is pushing the Freelancers Payment Protection Act, which if passed, would give freelancers in New York State some recourse when clients don’t pay. To advertise how widespread the problem is, they’re compiling the World’s Longest Invoice by inviting freelancers to add their own lines of non-payment. Their total amount of unpaid fees is already $5 million, but that figure includes a $499,999 unpaid fee for a “pretending to be a horse” and a $311 entry for “this is so lame-go get a lawyer you whiny little pussies,” so it’s somewhat suspect.

Much of the list, however, is within the realm of plausibility, and it’s fun to see what people (don’t) get paid for various gigs. Check this sampling of the variety of fees for logo design:

Andrew M., Logo Design, $300
Josh B., Logo Design, $500
Kristin B., Logo Design, $200
Jeremy, Logo Design, $500
Tom K., Logo design, $250
Rachel L., Logo design, $150
William, Logo Design, $250
Dario C., Logo Design, $650
Grace N., Logo design, $100.00

Grace N. and Rachel L., ask for more money. Dario C., good work. Way to negotiate.