Comment by pc86

There's "doing accounting work for clients as part of a contract" which is not that dissimilar to being an independent contractor on the software side except for 1/3 the pay or less. The work is "easier" but less intellectually stimulating as you're doing the same thing over and over again with different numbers.

Then there's "doing accounting work for a company as part of an accounting department" which is much more likely to be 40h weeks, punch-the-clock type of work. However there can still be crunch time there as the deadlines are real deadlines not VP-pulled-out-of-a-hat deadlines (e.g. tax filing deadlines, SEC reporting deadlines).