Who is a freelance artist?

What does a freelance artist need to pay their taxes?

• Do I need a business permit/ license? Or do I need something else? I would mostly be doing freelance jobs. Requests if you will, of custom work. I live in California if that helps. ...show more

• Answer:

  You do not need a "permit" to go into business. This is called "Sole Proprietorship". You may need a permit, locally, if you use a "dba" or "doing business as". This is where a business uses a "trade name". So Joe Blow the plumber uses "Acme Plumbing"; that's a "dba". The reason for the permitting is so the customer of "Acme Plumbing" can find out who to complain about or sue if he has a problem. You will need to pay your taxes, Income and Self Employment, at least quarterly. Technically "quarterly" means every 3 months, but the schedule of payments is April 15, June 15, Sep 15 and Jan 15. Not really quarterly. Self Employment tax is FICA, commonly referred to as "Social Security". As an employee you pay your share and the employer matches it. As a Self Employed person, you are both Employee AND employer, so you get to pay both halves. This is 15.3% of your Net Income. You will report your Gross Receipts (all money paid to you) on the Schedule C when you file your 1040 next year. You also report allowable Expenses and determine the Net Income (Gross - Expenses). Then you carry that to the Schedule SE to calculate your SE Tax. Regardless of whether you wind up with no "Taxable Income" for Income Tax purposes, you will still owe the SE Tax since it is a different tax.