According to Dr Phil, “there’s a lot of dogs after them bones.” Independent contractors, such as self-employed tradies and freelance consultants, instinctively know this and often take on whatever work becomes available regardless of their capacity to undertake it, because they know lean times could be coming up. Also many contractors believe that the key to ongoing success is to always deliver greater service than for what you are paid. The end result is that many independent contractors end up working very long hours. The ABS’s Forms of Employment report, released on Friday, provides some useful national data:

There were 1.1 million persons who were independent contractors in their main job in November 2010, the majority (74%) of these were males. Almost half (47%) of all independent contractors actually worked 40 hours or more in their main job (56% of males and 22% of females).

Around 28% of independent contractors work 6 or 7 days per week compared with less than 11% of employees (see chart below).