Self-employed means working for yourself rather than for an employer. Your own invoices, your own tax return, and nobody paying you when you are ill.
It is a legal status rather than a description, and it determines how you are taxed, what rights you have and who is responsible for your safety. Britain has a long-running argument about whether some workers are genuinely self-employed or employees in all but name. There is no sick pay and no paid holiday, which is the trade-off for the freedom.
1adjectiveself-employedWorking for yourself rather than as somebody's employee.
“He has been self-employed since leaving the firm.”
Middle English
self
English
self
English, today
self-employed
From self- + employed. self comes from Middle English self. From Middle English salve, self, silf, from Old English self, seolf, sylf, from Proto-Germanic selbaz, from Proto-Indo-European selbʰ- (“one's own”). 2
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA