An displayed TJM says nothing about what lands in a bank account on the 30th of the month. Between a freelance micro-entrepreneur and a ported employee, the initial turnover may be identical, but the deductions, acquired rights, and hidden costs create two distinct financial realities. Comparing these incomes requires going beyond the simple contribution rate to include what each status finances, or does not finance.
Restitution rate in ported employment: what commercial brochures do not detail
Ported employment operates on a seemingly simple principle: the porting company invoices the client, deducts management fees, and then pays a net salary after deducting employee and employer contributions. The restitution rate, which is the ratio between the invoiced turnover and the net salary received, varies according to the porting companies.
Management fees generally range from a few percentage points of turnover. But this figure alone is misleading. It must be added to the employer and employee contributions, which represent a much heavier share. In the end, the ported employee receives about half of their turnover as net.
This ratio covers social security, supplementary retirement, insurance, mutual insurance, and unemployment insurance. In other words, every euro deducted opens a right. The question is not just how much one loses, but how much one capitalizes. To understand how this mechanism affects the tjm calculation in portage compared to traditional freelancing, one must lay the two charge grids side by side.
Freelance micro-enterprise charges: higher net, lower rights
In a micro-enterprise (BNC regime), the Urssaf social contribution rate is around a quarter of the turnover. Compared to portage, the freelancer retains a significantly larger share of what they invoice. On the same turnover, the monthly net difference between micro-enterprise and portage often exceeds several hundred euros.
This apparent surplus has a structural cost. The reduced contributions of the micro-entrepreneur finance a lower basic retirement, no unemployment insurance (except under strict conditions with the ATI scheme), and no mandatory insurance. The mutual insurance remains entirely the responsibility of the freelancer.
The invisible items that reduce the real gap
To make the comparison fair, it is necessary to reintegrate into the freelancer’s expenses what portage automatically finances:
- The health mutual, fully borne by the freelancer in a micro-enterprise, while portage covers part of it through the employer
- The insurance (sick leave, disability): the freelancer who subscribes to nothing takes a direct financial risk in case of work incapacity
- The voluntary supplementary retirement savings, necessary to compensate for the minimum validated quarters by the micro regime
Once these items are subtracted from the apparent net of the freelancer, the real difference in purchasing power significantly reduces. It does not disappear, but it becomes a trade-off between immediate cash flow and medium-term protection.
Unemployment insurance and the 2025 reform: a portage advantage that is compressing
One of the strong arguments for ported employment remains access to unemployment insurance. The ported employee contributes to the general scheme and can, at the end of the assignment, benefit from the ARE like any other employee. The freelance micro-entrepreneur is not entitled to it, except through the ATI (allocation for independent workers), limited to about 800 euros per month for six months under strict conditions.
The unemployment insurance reform that came into effect in March 2025 modifies this advantage. The duration of compensation is now adjusted based on the national unemployment rate. In practice, this may reduce the covered period for ported employees between assignments. The safety net still exists, but it is less generous than before.
For the freelancer, nothing changes: the ATI remains capped and conditioned to previous income criteria. However, the ported employee who relied on several months of ARE to smooth out their inter-contract periods must recalculate their margin of maneuver.
Pluriactivity and portage: the most common income scenario in 2026
Binary comparisons (pure freelancer versus full-time ported employee) overlook a statistical reality. According to Insee, cited by ITG in 2026, about 20% of independents combine independent activity and salaried activity. And for four out of five pluriactives, the majority of income comes from salaried work.
Ported employment often fits into this hybrid scheme: a part-time or full-time CDI on one side, billed assignments through a porting company on the other. The disposable income at the end of the month then depends on the mix between the two sources, not just the restitution rate of the portage.
This scenario completely changes the analysis. The ported employee in pluriactivity already benefits from social coverage through their main employer. The contributions paid by the porting company enhance their retirement and unemployment rights, without needing to finance them twice. The “remaining at the end of the month” is optimized because social protection is already ensured elsewhere.
Reading grid to compare real net: freelancer versus ported employee
Rather than a single table (which assumes an identical TJM and number of billed days for all), here are the variables to consider before any comparison:
- The number of days actually billed per month: a freelancer who bills for 15 days and a ported employee who bills for 18 do not have the same starting turnover, regardless of the TJM
- The cost of reconstructed social protection: for the freelancer, add mutual insurance, insurance, voluntary retirement savings. For the ported employee, these items are already included in the contributions
- The anticipated inter-contract duration: the ported employee can mobilize the ARE (even reduced since 2025), while the freelancer must self-finance their low periods
- The marginal tax rate: in micro-enterprise, the flat-rate deduction can become less advantageous beyond a certain turnover, while the ported employee deducts their actual expenses via the payslip
The most profitable status depends on the risk profile and the volume of activity, not on a generic calculation. A regularly busy freelancer with low health costs earns more in a micro-enterprise. An independent worker with frequent low periods or high social coverage needs recovers part of the gap through portage.
The available data do not allow for setting a universal TJM threshold beyond which one status systematically prevails. The only reliable calculation remains one that integrates the individual situation, item by item, month by month.
