Does Cloudflare interfere with AdSense?

The short answer is no. Cloudflare does not interfere with AdSense in any way that would harm your ad performance or revenue. In fact, Cloudflare can actually improve your AdSense performance by speeding up your website loading time, reducing bounce rate, and enhancing user experience.

Cloudflare works by caching your website’s static content (such as images, CSS, and JavaScript) on its global network of servers, and serving it to your visitors from the nearest location. This reduces the load on your original server and makes your website faster and more reliable.

AdSense, on the other hand, is a dynamic service that serves personalized ads to your visitors based on their location, device, browsing history, and other factors. AdSense ads are not cached by Cloudflare, because they are always fetched from Google’s servers when a visitor requests your webpage. These external requests would have to be cached by Google or AdSense rather than your local pages.

Therefore, using Cloudflare does not affect the delivery or display of AdSense ads on your website. You will still get the same ads as you would without Cloudflare, and your visitors will still see the same ads as they would without Cloudflare.

Does Cloudflare steal ad clicks from AdSense?

Another common concern that website owners have is whether Cloudflare steals ad clicks from AdSense. This is based on a misunderstanding of how Cloudflare works.

Cloudflare does not modify or alter the content of your website in any way. It only caches and serves the content that you provide to it. It does not inject any ads of its own or replace any of your ads with its own.

When a visitor clicks on an AdSense ad on your website, they are redirected to the advertiser’s website through Google’s servers. Cloudflare has no involvement in this process and does not intercept or redirect any ad clicks.

Therefore, using Cloudflare does not affect the tracking or reporting of AdSense clicks or revenue. You will still get credited for every valid click that you generate, and you will still see the same data in your AdSense dashboard as you would without Cloudflare. And it won’t mess up your SEO either.

Why is using Cloudflare with AdSense a good idea?

Using Cloudflare with AdSense does not have any negative impact on your ad performance or revenue. On the contrary, it can have several positive benefits for your website and your visitors.

Some of the advantages of using Cloudflare with AdSense are:

• Faster website loading time: By caching and serving your static content from its global network of servers, Cloudflare can reduce the latency and bandwidth consumption of your website. This can improve your website speed, which is an important factor for user experience and SEO.
• Lower bounce rate: A faster website can also reduce the bounce rate of your visitors, which is the percentage of people who leave your website after viewing only one page. A lower bounce rate means more engaged visitors who are more likely to view multiple pages and click on more ads.
• Better security: Cloudflare also provides various security features for your website, such as SSL encryption, DDoS protection, firewall rules, bot management, and more. These features can protect your website from malicious attacks, spam, and abuse, which can harm your reputation and revenue.
• Higher availability: Cloudflare also ensures that your website is always online and accessible to your visitors. If your origin server goes down or becomes unreachable for any reason, Cloudflare can serve a cached version of your website until it comes back online. This can prevent downtime and lost revenue.

What are the alternatives to Cloudflare?

If you are looking for a CDN and security service other than Cloudflare, there are several alternatives that you can consider. Some of the popular ones are:

• Sucuri: Sucuri is a comprehensive website security platform that offers CDN, firewall, malware removal, monitoring, backup, and more. Sucuri is compatible with Adsense and other ad networks.
• StackPath: StackPath is a high-performance CDN that offers edge computing, security, DNS, monitoring, and more. StackPath is compatible with AdSense and other ad networks.
• Fastly: Fastly is an advanced CDN that offers edge cloud computing, security, streaming media delivery, image optimization, serverless functions, and more. Fastly is compatible with AdSense and other ad networks.

How does Cloudflare affect other ads like Ezoic and Mediavine?

Ezoic and Mediavine are two popular platforms that help website owners optimize their ad revenue by testing different layouts, placements, sizes, formats, and networks of ads on their websites. They also provide CDN, security, analytics, and other features for their users. These ad networks are alternatives to AdSense.

If you are using Ezoic or Mediavine on your website, you can still use Cloudflare as well. However, you need to make sure that you configure them correctly to avoid any conflicts or issues.

The main thing to remember is that Ezoic and Mediavine need to have access to your website’s HTML code in order to insert and test different ads on your pages. Therefore, you need to configure Cloudflare’s HTML caching feature, to allow Ezoic and Mediavine to modify your HTML code.

To disable Cloudflare’s HTML caching feature, you need to create a page rule in your Cloudflare dashboard that matches your website’s URL and set the Cache Level to Bypass. This will tell Cloudflare not to cache any HTML content on your website and allow Ezoic and Mediavine to work properly.

Can I Use Cloudflare and AdSense at the Same Time? originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

The biggest question for people looking into freelance writer tax deductions is, “What writing business expenses can I deduct?”

The answer is ALL OF THEM. The IRS is going to tax you on every penny you earn, so you need to deduct every penny you spend on your business. It’s a battle for your income. These tax tips for freelance writers are your shields.

Of course, what you really meant to ask was, “Which of my expenses count as business expenses?” Hey, if we can’t parse language on a writing blog, where can we do it? Let’s jump in.

Writing Business Deductions

Writing Business vs Hobby

First, and foremost, let’s get something out of the way right up front. In order for any of your writing expenses to be deductible, your writing must be a business, not a hobby.

The definition, as you can imagine, is rather gray, but the short version is that if you have a profit motive, then it is a business. If you don’t care if you make money, then it is not a business, it is a hobby.

That doesn’t mean you have to be successful at making money by writing, it just means that you have to be doing your writing for that purpose.

However, nothing proves your business is really a business like making a profit. In fact, if your business is profitable in three out of the previous five years, then the IRS affirmatively assumes that your business is legitimate.

You have nothing to prove.

If your business can’t meet that profitability standard, then the way you prove your writing is a business and not a hobby is by running it like a business. That means keeping records, registering your business with the Secretary of State (your state, not the federal one), submitting your work for pay, and so on.

Assuming that you do have a writing business, what kinds of expenses can you deduct? Below, I’ve listed some examples of writing business deductions and their categories. Use these for brainstorming, and remembering the things you spent money on for your business this year. These are NOT exhaustive lists. Your writing small business is unique, and your writer tax deductions will be as well.

If you use a credit card for your spending, and they send out, or let you download, an annual report of all your spending, get one. Then, go through it line by line. It’s tough to tell if a trip to Target was a business expense, but that monthly recurring charge for Adobe software that you use to generate website images and graphics most certainly is. Don’t give up on that Target trip business deduction, however. If you have a Target RedCard and an online account, you can get the full, itemized receipt. Then, print a copy, highlight which items were for business, and write on the back so you don’t forget. You don’t submit documentation like this to the IRS when you file your freelance writer taxes, but it is critical to have if and when an IRS audit notification shows up in your mail.

Once you have a list, make sure you have the receipts and records to back up your deductions.

Easy Writing Deductions

The easiest writer tax deductions are those for supplies and materials for your business that you have receipts for.

Yes, you need the receipts.

No, you don’t have to turn in the receipts with your tax forms. You do have to keep the receipts in case you get audited or contacted by the IRS for more information.

Keep in mind, in order to be deductible, you must use these things primarily for your small business. If you use them for making snowflake decorations for your cookie club, then you can’t deduct those. (Unless you also have some sort of cookie business…) Start with these tax write offs for freelance writers.

Deduct Supplies for Your Business

• Paper, notebooks, notepads, journals
• Pens, pencils, highlighters, sharpies, markers
• Planners, calendars, organizers
• Calculators, label makers, scissors, paper cutters
• Toner, ink cartridges, printer supplies
• Books, magazines
• Memory sticks, memory flash cards, USB drives

Notice that supplies are, by definition, consumable. That means that they have to be the kinds of things that get used up. You don’t have to have already used them up, but they need to be that type of thing. For example, a pen eventually runs out of ink and you grab a new one.

A printer runs out of ink, or toner, and you refill it and keep using it for years. The printer is not a consumable, or a supply, but the toner is. For tax purposes, the toner is a supply, but a printer is a capital expenditure, which we get to next.

Deduct Office Equipment for Freelance Writers

Most technology and other tangible things that last more than a year are considered capital expenditures. They can (and should) still be deducted.

If you are a big enough business, you may have to depreciate these kinds of expenses over a period of several years. However, small businesses get a break and can deduct up to a certain amount of expenses without depreciating them each year. This is called a Section 179 Deduction, and TurboTax Home and Business, or your accountant can make sure the forms get filled out correctly. For a freelance writing business most of the equipment writers can deduct is typically office furniture, and technology.

• Computers, laptops, tablets, printers, scanners, fax machines
• Desks, chairs, lights, filing cabinets, bookshelves, storage
• Software purchases (not rented, or monthly services – those go elsewhere)
• Space heaters, space coolers, window coverings.

Some things end up in kind of a gray area. For example, I use headphones in my freelance writing business. They are certainly deductible, but under what category? They aren’t really “equipment” and they aren’t really all that consumable either. I’ll probably keep a pair for a year or two. So, how should I deduct headphones?

Believe it or not, not everything is precisely defined for taxes. In the case of the headphones, you can probably consider them either supplies or equipment without getting into any trouble. As a rule of thumb, most things under $100 can be considered supplies, even if you can use them for over a year.

Remember, the IRS isn’t interested in splitting hairs about which section you used to deduct a $60 purchase, just that the purchase was legitimately deductible, so don’t get caught up in exactly where to place any specific deduction.

If you get audited and have headphones deducted under supplies, that won’t cost you anything, even if they determine that they are equipment, because the deduction is the same. Never let the fear of putting something in the wrong category stop you from taking a legitimate business tax deduction for your small business.

Deduct Services Used for Your Writing Business

In addition to THINGS you buy for your own business, you can also deduct services you pay for in order for your freelance writing business to operate. Save the invoices and cancelled checks or credit card statements.

Remember you can deduct everything YOU PAY FOR during the tax year, so if you pay your web hosting costs for the year, you can deduct the whole amount, even if the last two months of the contract are in the next year.

Common service deductions for writers and small businesses:

• Web hosting, web design, domain name registration
• Subscriptions software (like a subscription to Adobe CC, or Office 365)
• Rented equipment
• Internet access, cell phone, business phone line

Stuff like electricity and utilities are only deductible if billed separately or as part of a home office. We’ll talk about home office tax deductions in the advanced tax deductions section coming up later.

Deducting Travel for Your Writing Business

You certainly can deduct business travel, but don’t forget to also deduct local travel expenses. Your mileage is tax deductible when driving for business purposes. Also, business expenses like parking, tolls, and other travel items are deductible.

• Airfare, hotel, car rental, gas (you usually do not deduct gas when driving your own car. You’ll use the standard IRS mileage rate deduction instead, but you do deduct gas spent to fill a rental car when traveling on business.)
• Mileage, parking, tolls, express lane fees
• Booking fees

You do not get to deduct the value of any rewards or mileage that you use to pay for business travel, so consider whether that is important to you before booking your trip using your frequent flyer rewards or redeeming something from your credit card rewards catalog.

Advanced Small Business Tax Deductions

Deducting a Home Office for Writers

Once upon a time, a deducting a home office was considered an “audit flag,” something that was more likely to trigger an audit. This was because certain professionals, mainly doctors, were fighting with the IRS about how and when a home office could be deducted. For example, a doctor might do all of his job at a hospital, then deduct a home office on the grounds that he didn’t actually have an office at the hospital.

These days, the rules have been tightened up, and a home office is no more of an audit flag than anything else is. The key for someone like a writer to deduct a home office is that it is a separate, defined space used for conducting business. Assuming you don’t have another office that you do most of your work from, chances are very good that your home office is legit.

The most common gotcha is for writers working on a long-term contract for a company. If they give you an office, and you go there most days, then that is your office, and you can’t deduct a home office. As a purely freelance writer, I seldom set foot in most of my clients’ offices, so my home office is my only office.

Make sure you take advantage of your home office tax deduction as a writer, because it can be a big one for offsetting otherwise brutal taxes.

Freelance Writer Tax Deductions originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

Check out my Rakuten / Ebates review.

TurboTax for Freelance Writers

You have probably heard a lot of negative things about TurboTax recently. Frankly, they deserve it. They have been deceptive about offering “free” tax returns, and steering people who would have qualified for a free return into paid products instead. As a freelance writer looking to calculate self-employment taxes, and deduct a home office, this doesn’t apply to you. You and your business count as a “non-simple” return so you aren’t getting a freebie. With that being said, TurboTax offers a solid paid product to do taxes for home businesses.

In my second year as a freelance writer, I had an accountant do my taxes. He was highly recommended by another family with their own business. I had this vision of him talking me through my businesses, sifting through records, and then finding me oodles of lucrative tax deductions.

Instead, he gave me a workbook and asked me to fill it out. Along the way, I recognized the blanks in the workbook as the same as the blanks on the IRS Schedule C Form. What value is there in me going through my receipts, adding them up, and then putting an amount on the “supplies” line for him to just type that same number, without any real review, into the accountant version of Turbo Tax?

The next year, I used TurboTax Home & Business. Ironically, many of the questions were word for word from the workbook I’d filled out for the accountant the year before. This year will be the 13th year I’ve used TurboTax Home & Business to do my freelance writer taxes, and it always seems to work out.

The key is to get the right version of TurboTax. As a freelance writer, you’ll need to figure out your self-employment taxes, as well as your home office deduction. These are either not supported or are self-calculated in lower tier versions. If you are not looking at a home office deduction, you can probably get away with using a lower tier version. I have found the dividing point to be whether or not you do take the home office deduction. If so, you really do need the Turbo Tax Home & Business version. Note that you can also generate 1099 or W2 forms if you hired anyone for your business as well, although I’ve never done that. If for some reason you have your business structured as a partnership or S-corp or something, you will need to go up to the Business version.

How To Use TurboTax for Writer Taxes

Once you download and install the software, you just go through and answer the questions as they come up. They may not use the order you would think, so you can click around the outline. Feel free to skip things and come back to them if you don’t have a particular piece of information handy. You can go back and forth and edit numbers over and over again, and it will just keep recalculating, so don’t be a slave to the interface.

The big things you will need are your 1099-MISC Forms showing your income, and then all of your receipts and records showing your expenses. Deduct everything you can. Self-employment taxes are murder, and you’ll find yourself owing a huge percentage of your income otherwise.

Don’t feel like you are cheating. This is the trade-off of filing as a small business. You get to deduct more business expenses, but your actual taxes are based on a higher percentage (income taxes plus self-employment taxes). Claim every legal deduction you can. If you don’t know, do some research, check the forums, ask around.

There is one thing you are going to have a question about, and there is no 100% answer. That is where to deduct websites, webhosting, and other internet services. The answer is that there is no definite rule. I deduct my domain names and websites under Advertising on my taxes, but if you feel more comfortable putting them elsewhere that’s fine. It doesn’t matter because the end result is the same whether you deduct $500 as Advertising or as Software. Those numbers all get added up as a single number to deduct for expenses.

In other words, even if you did get audited, and even if they did have you move those expenses to a different category, your taxes owed would not change. If there is no change, then there is no problem, no fees, no penalties, and no interest.

Check out my Credit Karma review.

Other than that, most things are pretty straightforward. When you are finished, do the e-File, but print a hard copy to save for your records. I also recommend printing a copy as a PDF file. Print the extra schedules as well so that you have all the worksheets if you ever need to have them, even though they don’t have to be submitted to the IRS.

If you do get audited, it is likely to be a year or two down the road, and by then you might not remember the answers to all these questions.

TurboTax Security

We live more and more of our lives online, and maybe I’m just too old fashioned, but I still recommend that you download the software, or get the installation disc, and install TurboTax on your own computer rather than doing the taxes online. This not only keeps your tax info out of the TurboTax databases, which may one day be hacked, or subpoenaed, but it also means that you have your data on your own computer where it can’t be lost by another company. (Of course, you should be backing up your computer regularly).

I’ll be starting my own freelance writing business taxes in the next day or two. I’ll make sure to add any updates, and include some detailed screenshots, so be sure to stop back by.

Taxes for Freelance Writers with TurboTax originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

How To Spell Valentines Day Correctly

Some AP Style rules exist because they made printing easier back in the day. Other AP Stylebook reviews are nothing more than good grammar. For the most part as we dig into AP Style Valentine’s Day action it’s the latter.

Valentine’s Day Proper Noun

Valentine’s Day is a proper noun in more way that one. First, Valentine’s is a possessive of a name. Just who Saint Valentine was is in some dispute, but the version that fits the holiday’s traditions and customs best is the story of a saint who sent a letter to his jailer’s daughter whom he had “befriended” and healed her blindness. He signed a letter he sent to her, “From your Valentine.” — Oh yeah. We’re going with that version. — Regardless, whomever Valentine’s Day is named after, it was a person who had a name, and that name was Saint Valentine who was martyred (killed but the people who are still alive think is particularly inspiring) after sending the letter.

Anyway…

Saint Valentine has a day name for him. It is his day, so to speak, so both AP Style and proper grammar dictate that it be Valentine’s Day.

Now, if you are good at grammar, you might be wondering shouldn’t it be Valentine’s day?

That’s a good question but remember that this is a proper noun twice. It is the proper name of Valentine, and it is also the proper name of a holiday, like Thanksgiving, Arbor Day, and President’s Day. So, capitalize both words for the win.

Valentines the Cards

Now, we come to valentines, the little cards you and your kids exchanged in grade school, as well as the overpriced Hallmark cards that you must buy until you and your partner are both cynical enough, and have been together long enough, that you make the wise decision to do something else with the $15 instead of buying cards. (Don’t get me started on flowers.)

Valentines, while ostensibly named after the holiday or the man, are his, like the day do not belong to St. Valentine the way the day does. — The one he sent from jail centuries ago notwithstanding.

So, the cards, whether sweet and innocent, or robbery and blackmail, are lower case, as in valentines. Now, if you add the word card, the lower case still applies. The spouse gave the spouse a valentine card for Valentine’s Day, and their kids too candy filled valentines to school. Note the only way to get an ‘s’ on the end of valentine is to have multiple of them. This is all standard grammar as much as it is AP Stylebook rules.

What about asking, “Will you be my valentine?” — Still lower case. No possessive. Technically what you are asking here, is will you be my version of the third century saint who was martyred? But, not literally, because you mean a person who is coupled with you on a specific day, or for some number of days on out, depending upon your relationship, so lower case there as well.

One more hiccup. If the person you have designated as your valentine has ownership of something, then (and only then) do you add the apostrophe. My valentine’s cat got cat hair all over me.

Happy Valentine’s Day to you and all your valentines.

Choose your own Valentine’s Day story at Britannica (they did encyclopedias before there was Wikipedia)

*I did it wrong on purpose for the SEO.

Fin

Valentines Day AP Style Grammar Punctuation originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

Crypto Currency or Cryptocurrency AP Style

Should I write crypto currency or cryptocurrency according to AP Style, and while we’re at it, what about writing CryptoCurrency?

When writing AP style use cryptocurrency, not crypto currency, or CryptoCurrency. Use all the normal capitalization, plural, and possessive rules of the standard word “currency,” so: Cryptocurrency at the beginning of a sentence, cryptocurrencies as plural, and cryptocurrency’s as possessive as in cryptocurrency’s flaws.

Generally speaking, according to AP Style crypto should be avoided in formal writing and articles, however it is acceptable in headlines so long as the writer is not using crypto interchangeably with a specific crypto, such as Bitcoin.

How To Write Bitcoin AP Styles (and while we’re here, how to write Ethereum AP Style, and other specific cryptos.)

Okay ready? Dig in for this one.

In previous rules according to AP Style Bitcoin should be capitalized when referring to Bitcoin as a system, however bitcoin should not be capitalized when referring to use as payment, or currency derived from the Bitcoin network. This is essentially the rules given to traditional currency which are that only proper nouns are capitalized and that the specific type of currency is not a proper noun, so:

• U.S. dollars
• Canadian dollars
• British pound
• The euro

This Associate Press Stylebook rule is less followed than others, but if the Washington Post calls and they want an article, that’s the AP Style rule. Part of the reason this Bitcoin rule exists is because Bitcoin itself (or at least its official glossary) says the same thing. So, the government is cracking down on Bitcoin, but then, “Years ago someone used bitcoin to buy a pizza.”

Other cryptocurrencies are considered proper nouns, which name their respective currencies. The basic AP rule now is that while crypto, cryptocurrency, and blockchain are all non-proper nouns and no capitalization, Ethereum, Tether, Dogecoin, and Whatevercoin are all proper nouns and should be capitalized even when used as currency. Ethereum Classic is also a proper name, so the C gets capitalized even if it doesn’t follow the rules above.

What About Altcoins AP Style?

Altcoin, or altcoins refer to all blockchain based cryptocurrency that are not Bitcoin. Yes, even Ethereum, which is the biggest altcoin.

Writing About the Blockchain AP Style

So, if you want to know, “What is the AP Style rule for blockchain?” then you should know that blockchain is a generic concept, like network, or raiding party. As such you do not capitalize blockchain unless it is at the beginning of the sentence. At the beginning of a sentence blockchain is capitalized, but the B only.

Then, just to wrap up, it is blockchain, not block chain. Then all the usual rules apply, blockchains, blockchain’s, blockchains’ and so on.

Author

Brian Nelson is a professional freelance writer specializing in technology writing and financial writing. He writes for numerous publications and websites including his up-and-coming professional personal finance website Finance Gourmet.

Cryptocurrency AP Style originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

Giant Sucking Sound

Rather than look forward and try to guess what the future might bring, he looked back. He mentioned Ross Perot and his Giant Sucking Sound which was caused by all the U.S. jobs flooding across the border into Mexico would become the master of America.

That didn’t happen. If you aren’t old enough to remember the Giant Sucking Sound, it was coined by an American Presidential candidate running as an independent. The worry was that with globalization and trade agreements like NAFTA there would be no reason for any company to operate in America, and he was right. Kinda.

Check out my review of Digit before you send your money.

Manufacturing jobs were indeed shipped overseas. Ironically, not too many went to Mexico. Instead across the Pacific there were nations willing to do anything at any price. Your dirt-cheap microwave comes courtesy of them.

Even more interesting than Ross Perot and his Giant Sucking Sound was that it wasn’t the first time America worried about such a thing. Before Perot, there was fear that all the jobs (and money) would end up in Germany. Then, after Perot and the GSS there was Japan. It seemed that America would falter and bow to Japan. Unfortunately for them, their economy smashed the great Japanese company to pieces.

If some of this sounds familiar, that is because it is.

You see sometime after the Giant Sucking sound something happened. That something was the creation of and use of mobile networks, fast local networks, all connected to an internet. Every bit of that became American jobs. Laying cables, wiring up data centers, building new headquarters and then secure facilities. Ever faster phones that demanded data faster than it could be delivered. (How many of you are old enough to remember you could only get an iPhone with AT&T, and as part of that agreement with Steve Jobs, AT&T agreed that it would not limit users’ data causing AT&T to fail frequently until its infrastructure caught up. Then there was the internet bubble followed by a recession followed by an expansion followed by…

The interesting part is that about every fourth market catastrophe was self-inflicted by the financial industry. (See also the Savings & Loans scandal, and the guy who offered a good rating on customer’s company if the customer’s CEO could get the ratings guy’s kid into preschool. – I’m not making this up. I haven’t looked into it, but its very likely that nothing happened to him, and he probably still works on Wall Street to this day.)

Right now, everyone believes that this time it’s different despite all the evidence to the contrary. China’s current dominance is hindered by its government and its need for total control, including their currency.

Was There Really a Giant Sucking Sound

It is difficult to say whether Ross Perot was completely right or wrong in his concerns about the effects of globalization, as the issue is complex and multifaceted. However, it is true that globalization has had many positive effects on the economy. It increased trade and economic growth. It also had negative consequences, such as job displacement and wage stagnation for certain groups of workers.

One of the main ways in which globalization has affected the job market is through the movement of manufacturing jobs to countries with lower labor costs. This process, known as “outsourcing,” has led to the loss of jobs in the manufacturing sector in industrialized countries like the United States. However, it has also led to the creation of new jobs in service and technology sectors, as well as increased efficiency and competitiveness for businesses.

Globalization has also had an impact on wages, with some workers seeing stagnant or declining wages due to increased competition from overseas workers. However, other workers have benefited from globalization through access to new markets and opportunities for growth and advancement.

Overall, the effects of globalization on the job market and wages have been mixed, and the extent to which Ross Perot’s concerns have been realized will depend on individual perspectives and circumstances.

That part in the middle was written by AI. It is relatively obvious to me, but something else happened. I never meant to travel down the Ross Perot rabbit hole. So, I pawned that part off to AI so that you could get some facts here, and more facts at an article of mine over at Medium.

Will AI Replace Writers originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

How To Get Health Insurance as a Freelance Writer

I’m going to start by saying if you have a spouse, and they have a health insurance plan through work, it is almost certainly better than individual health insurance you can find and afford. The best way to compare health insurance plans is to get the information from your spouse’s health insurance plan, go through the terms, and understand it. Use that as your baseline. If any self-employed insurance is better than your spouse plan, then go ahead and look deeper. Otherwise, get on your spouse’s health insurance.

Also, if you happen to be a young freelance writer looking for health insurance, remember that thanks to what is left of Obamacare, you can be on your parent’s health insurance until you are 26 years old. Do that. Do that especially if you have parents who have climbed the corporate ladder into a nice office job.

Now, what if you don’t have a spouse with sweet health insurance and you are over 26 and you are a freelancer?

Freelancer Union Health Insurance Plans

I was already a freelance writer when someone started the Freelancers Union and proclaimed that they would figure out how to get health care for freelancers.

Is Freelancers Union Legit?

I didn’t pay much attention because I didn’t believe they could do it. I mention this because these people have been kicking around for YEARS so if Freelancers Union is a scam, it is a very long con and nobody has heard about it.

Is Freelancers Union Health Insurance Legit?

Yes, because they aren’t really Freelancers Union health insurance plans. They are health insurance company’s plans that have agreed to tie into Freelancers Union in some way. They tend to be state specific, which means a lot of these plans are regular individual health insurance plans from a health insurance marketplace. In fact, if you pay attention, you’ll see that the Freelancers Union Insurance Agency only does dental plans and only in some states.

Freelancers Union negotiates discounts for its members, kind of like how AARP negotiates discounts for everything like hotels and car rentals. That means that these Freelancers Union health plans have all the same rules as Affordable Care Act health plans including an open enrollment period. This year, it is November 2022 to January 15, 2023.

For example, the health care plan that pops up when I put in Colorado as where I live is Oscar Health Plans. I don’t know a damn thing about Oscar Health Care, but I know both HCPF and the Colorado Insurance Commissioner has to OK them to run in Colorado.

Once you click Shop Oscar Plans, you go to the Oscar Health Insurance website, after you enter in some information so that the Freelancers Union can get a commission or finder’s fee, or something. My understanding is that you also get a discount, but I didn’t verify that because I’m not going to enter my info.

Individual Freelance Writer Health Insurance

Of course, the whole point of the Affordable Health Care Act was to let individuals get health care without having to settle for whatever health care plan their boss wanted them to have. This should be a no brainer to support, but politics in America is about nothing more than fighting the other political party. So, while the Affordable Health Care Act was really close to the plan created by the very conservative Heritage Foundation, Republicans hated it because it was a Democrat who was President. If you wonder why the Republicans had to stop saying, “repeal and replace,” it is because there is really no other way to reform American health care without going full liberal and just having the government give Medicare to everyone.

What is left of the Affordable Care Act still offers some health insurance on individual markets run by the individual states. You can go to HealthCare.gov to find the marketplace for your state. If your site didn’t make its own marketplace you can use the one from the Feds. I was going to look into it more for you, fellow freelancers, but they want all my info, and a lock of my hair before I can see the plans, so you’ll just have to do it yourself.

Freelance Writer Health Insurance Tax Credits and Deductions

I know what you are thinking. “Hey, I’m a freelance writer, but I’m also a small business so can I get sweet health insurance?”

Alas, the answer is no. While health insurance is often linked to your employer, it isn’t business health insurance so much as group health insurance, and your group of one isn’t going to cut it.

Nothing beats having quality, low-cost health insurance, but if you can’t get that, health insurance tax credits are better than a sharp stick in the eye.

If you run your freelance writing business as self-employed and file a Schedule C for taxes, you can likely deduct your health insurance premiums. You might also be able to get a tax deduction for your medical expenses if they are high enough.

Freelance Writer Health Insurance originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

Do I Already Own a Domain For This is a book of wisdom, joy, and woe.

A book for the inspired and the over-inspired.

Coming when all the really cool electric cars they keep advertising are actually something you can buy and not a “concept” or whatever they say. (I’m bitter because I just had to spend $3,000 on my 2007 Honda CRV to keep it running, because I can’t do anything but put my name on a waiting list for the next generation of cars. – When you own a 15-year-old car, you need to be sure the next one can at least do five without you jonesing for a new one.)

Too Many Domains originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

Typically, Slack only allows for collaboration with others in your same organization. Slack Connect solves this problem. Slack Connect is an extension of Slack functionality that allows users to communicate with others outside of their own company all without leaving their standard Slack workspace. By utilizing this feature, users may work faster without the need for back-and-forth emails or switching workspaces. In addition, all communications remain secure and retained according to company retention policies.

Users can utilize Slack Connect in two different ways. With Slack direct message users can connect directly with a single other person outside of their own company and participate in a one-on-one chat. While Slack Connect channels allow multiple users from multiple companies to participate in a single channel within the standard workspace.

To use Slack Connect direct messages, users access Slack Connect in the sidebar. It is represented as a stacked diamond icon. When clicked the Slack Connect interface offers two options, either Start a direct message, or Create a channel. If you choose to use direct message, Slack will ask for the email address of the person you wish to link to. That person will receive an email invitation so they can join the direct message channel. Once they click the link to accept your direct message channel, they will return to their Slack environment to set up the connection. Both users may now communicate across the persistent link with all the advantages of the Slack system.

Slack Connect also offers users the ability to create Slack channels containing members of different organizations. Slack channels can connect multiple people at up to 250 different companies. These Slack Connect channels appear in the standard workspace, and work just like the regular channels do. To create a Slack channel the user will send invitations to other users both in the same company and those outside of the company. They will receive an email with a link that allows them to connect to the channel in their own Slack environment. If the user does not have Slack installed on their computer, they will be offered a free trial during which period they enjoy all the advantages of using Slack and Slack Connect.

Once connected, users may freely exchange messages and files. However, to ensure that such connections are appropriate and safe, connections may require administrator approval prior to use. This additional step provides added security. In these cases, while the channel appears on the sidebar, it cannot be used until approval is granted.

Slack Connect direct messages may be established with any Slack offering, including the free plan. However, in order to establish Slack Channels, users must be participating in one of the paid Slack plans.

500 Words About Slack Connect originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com

The Fed AP Style

First of all, you need to get the AP Style rules for the Federal Reserve right. The Federal Reserve Board is capitalized because it is the proper name of a specific entity. Technically, according to the AP Stylebook, you will need to spell out the Federal Reserve Board the first time. You can use The Fed, The Federal Reserve, or even just, the board, on second reference, if you are getting tired of typing federal all of the time.

If you want to be technically accurate, it is the Federal Open Market Committee that actually sets the interest rates.

AP Style for Federal Reserve Interest Rate

So, now that we know the AP Style rules for the Fed, it’s time to move on to the subject of interest rates because that is probably why you are writing about the Fed in AP Style.

1. Time to get into some financial world technicalities. The Fed does not actually set an interest rate. It sets a target interest rate that it then makes happen by buying or selling bonds and treasuries to either add money into the system (lowering interest rates) or taking money out of the system (raising interest rates.) Unless you are writing about the Fed itself, no one cares about this nuance.
2. The Fed does a few different things, but when everyone is writing about the Fed and interest rates, they are talking about the Federal Funds Rate.
3. No person actually has anything to do with the Federal Funds Rate. The impact is felt because many lenders and financial institutions base their varies interest rates on the Fed Funds Rate.
4. When the Fed cut interest rates to 0% the first time, it felt like it sounded bad. So, they changed it to being a “range,” and then set that range at 0% to 0.25%. That means whenever the Fed acts you might see something about how the Fed set a range of 3.0% to 3.25%. This is not helpful to you as a writer. If it is not necessary to use the range, then just use the higher number. That is what they do with the Prime Rate.
5. And, finally, what are the AP Stylebook rules for writing percentages? This one is actually pretty simple. If you use a numeral, then you use a % sign. If you spell out the numbers, then you spell out percentage. So, 8% or eight percent. Choose your poison.

Federal Reserve AP Style Writer

As a fellow financial writer, I end up writing about the Fed and interest rates a lot. I understand your compulsion to dive into how the Federal Reserve Open Market Commitee works, and how banks use the Federal Reserve rate to lend money to each other overnight, and so on. Unless you are writing about the Fed itself, don’t waste your time. Readers don’t want to hear it. They want to know what the interest rate is. Editors know this too. I’m telling you this from experience so that you don’t end up wasting an hour writing a detailed investigation into how the Fed works when the article is about credit card interest rates only to have it slashed in the editing room.

Brian Nelson

How To Write Federal Reserve AP Style originally published at Freelance Writing Blog of ArcticLlama.com