An Unfortunate Early Halt for My Medium Endeavour
Hey folks,
Inspired by Christina and Diane, I recently created a Medium account and started writing articles.
My initial plan was of course to promote my blog, but making some money through the Partner Program seemed to be an appealing prospect.
I joined a couple of publications, starting gaining a few followers, and for a start, it's reasonable to say everything was going pretty smoothly.
However, I was unfortunately hit with a roadblock. And then a more massive one.
The First Roadblock
Medium manages payments through Stripe.
It turns out that if you don't reside in a country that has a tax treaty with the US, your earnings are subject to a 30% withholding tax rate.
In other words, you'll only have access to $7 out of every $10 you make through the Partner Program.
It's not great news, but I thought I'll manage. Making money on Medium was a side quest anyway.
The Second Roadblock
More woes to the fellow who doesn't live in North America or Europe.
Stripe requires that all residents of the UAE submit either a trade license or a freelancer permit to be able to earn money with Medium.
This was a big inconvenience.
I'm not a business. I'm not trading. I'm just writing articles, can you leave me alone?
Then I thought: fine, let me see how tedious the application process is.
Step #1: How much does it cost?
It turns out that a trade license/freelancer permit in the UAE costs at the very least:
.
.
.
$2000.
No thank you.
I guess I'll have to scrap out the side quest and just view Medium for what it initially looked like for me: A place to raise awareness of my website.
Thanks for reading.
Yusuf
Recent Comments
8
If you think this is bad, read the following. In one of the EU countries where I live, to earn anything extra (if you are employed somewhere) you have to register a business. Fine, but there are social taxes you have to pay, and the absolute minimum right now is around 900 E quarterly. Even if you may be earning 100 E quarterly, you will have to pay those taxes.
If you are lucky to earn much more, then around 60% of total business income will go on social taxes and income taxes.
All in all, I would happily exchange the country with you.
Oof, that's a lot.
And that's to earn absolutely anything on top of your employment? Let's say you're a tutor on an online education platform like Chegg or Studypool, you would still have to register a business to receive payments through PayPal?
Actually, I gave an incorrect number above, the minimum of around 900 E per quarter is if you are self-employed through your business. Then you will pay that amount even if you do not earn anything (like when sites collapse due to Google thing).
If this is an extra business parallel to your employment, similar to what you describe, the social taxes are lower. Cannot give the exact number, but here too there is a minimum to be paid, I know this for sure. This means you lose money if you do not earn enough, you will pay the prescribed taxes no matter how little your extra business brings.
Wow! Sorry to hear about these roadblocks, Yusuf. Good luck with raising awareness for your Chess site.
Have a fantastic weekend!
-Matt
Thank you for sharing this information, and sorry you were hit with all these road blocks in your endeavor.
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There always seems to be a catch somewhere. Sorry to hear that Yusuf but thanks for sharing your findings.
Susan