I was speaking from a global perspective ... not a protected market.
The global market is protected by the Van Allen Belts, an ozone shell and re-runs of Bugs Bunny in drag :-). But, the art of selling projects and time billing has probably been around since the inception of the oldest profession <s>.

We get a lot more from projects than income. We make new friends, learn new business/industrial models and learn alot about systems development. Find the center of the project. The place where the transaction hits the journal. Time line the modules you feel the project needs. Deliver the supporting modules (customer maintenance, inventory control, etc;, as early as you can. The user can then test, critque and help you debug those guys while you develop the core. Complete the core requirement and drop it in. The supporting data will already be there! Write user documentation. Snag screen shoots, and explain the process and consequence of each control. But most of all - have fun!!

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>>>That was in the "old days" ... it's a new economy.
>>Economics is economics. Provide an estimate of your hours, but do not limit your billing to those hours. The prospect could have a ghost in the wiring, and you could loose a lot investigating problems not related to your development effort. You could lower your hourly in exchange for things like copyrights and rat-boarding the system.