TL;DR — Key Takeaways
- →UK: employees pay Class 1 NI; self-employed pay Class 2/4 — contractor NI can be lower but IR35 and agency rules dominate.
- →Spain: autónomo social security is expensive — employee + Beckham can beat standard contractor all-in for some inbound profiles.
- →Germany: employee vs freelancer Sozialversicherung differs — at mid incomes the gap is often smaller than people think.
- →Netherlands: zzp vs payroll + 30% ruling interaction is specialist territory — model both in professional advice, not memes.
- →Italy: regime forfettario can crush standard employee net for eligible freelancers — not available to every visa holder.
KeepMore.money models employee-style payroll and statutory contributions by default. Remote workers often hear that freelancing is always cheaper — that is not universally true. Here is where structure really moves the needle in 2026.
United Kingdom
Employees pay Class 1 National Insurance with predictable bands. Self-employed individuals pay Class 2 (flat) plus Class 4 (profit-based). At some income levels Class 4 is cheaper than Class 1 — but IR35 and agency PAYE rules can force employment treatment anyway. The infamous 60% marginal band from personal allowance taper still hits high-earning employees; contractors are not magically exempt from scrutiny.
Spain
Spanish autónomo social security (cuota) is a major line item and can exceed what employees pay in total social charges for certain bases. The Beckham Law (Ley de Startups) can give inbound employees a flat 24% rate on Spanish-source employment income for up to six years — for some packages that beats a vanilla autónomo quote. Always model both in the calculator and with a Spanish gestor.
Germany
Germany is famous for high employee social insurance. Freelancers pay different health insurance paths (public GKV via Künstlersozialkasse or private) and do not pay unemployment insurance the same way. At mid incomes the employee vs freelancer gap is often smaller than Twitter suggests — the OECD Taxing Wages series repeatedly shows Germany as "narrow gap" for certain bands.
Netherlands
Payroll vs zzp (self-employed) interacts with the 30% ruling, income spread between partners, and pension deductions. Do not optimise from blog posts — use payroll and tax advisors who handle cross-border remote setups daily.
Italy
Regime forfettario for freelancers can produce stunning headline rates (substitute tax on a taxable base of 78% of gross with a 15% rate for many activities). Employees face IRPEF from 23% with no zero-rate band plus INPS. The visa you hold and whether you can invoice as a person vs work as an employee controls which world you live in.
Honest limitation
We do not yet expose a global "toggle employee vs contractor" in the public API. Use the calculator for employment-style results, then treat contractor numbers as a parallel exercise with a professional until we ship dedicated structure modes.
When you are ready, run /calc with your countries and compare results side-by-side on /results — that is still the fastest honest comparison we can give you today.