Just because the press did not pick up on when Kate may have started at Jigsaw, or when she may have started working with her parents does not actually mean the dates you are suggesting are in any way accurate, nor are the periods of "time for herself" or "shopping, partying and vacationing"!
The duration of her stay at Jigsaw is not a matter of speculation.
We know exactly when she started working and when she left. It was corroborated by reputable news-sources, by her colleagues at Jigsaw, and by pictures.
I.e., soon after it was announced she was taking the position we started having daily pictures of her going to work (except during the hiatus when she took a compassionate leave -to go clubbing it seemed). Before that we had daily pictures of her wandering around London, shopping, having lunch, in short, not holding a 9 to 5 job.
When she quit some colleagues talked about the farewell party and then we stopped having pics of her going to work. Pretty straightforwards.
You are right that it is unclear when she started to work for her parents or what she is still doing for them (if anything at all). I never implied I knew the exact timeline. However, the mention of her working for them appeared on their website a couple months ago.
Before that, no indication whatsoever of her having a notable role within the company. Since they saw fit to add her on their website alongside the rest of their employees only a couple of months ago, I think it isn't totally unreasonable to assume she wasn't on the website before that because she had no steady role within the company.
Needless to say, your willingness to place reliance on what the tabloids publish about what Kate might do with her time is very telling.
I find a bit ironic that you chide me for supposedly making assumptions about Kate when you are making assumptions about me yourself.
I rely on tabloids? A quick browse through my posts would tell you just how reliable I think tabloids are.
The info I have mentioned have been reported in various news sources, such as
AP,
BBC, broadsheet newspapers,
VF, etc and yes, tabloids too. And, as already mentioned, I also trust pictures, which of course do not tell the whole story but help back up a piece of information and build a chronology.
A propo of tabloids, while they do write a lot of nonsense, they do get
some things right.
For example: The
Daily Mail and
News of the World, as trashy as they are, often know in advance when and where the young royals go on holidays. The DM was right about Harry and Chelsy going to Mauritius, to give you a recent example. The 2007 break-up was revealed by
the Sun, etc.
Some of the people who have come in contact with Kate or William or Harry also openly speak to tabloids and/or sell them stories (hence various royal scandals). Not all their sources are imaginary.
If tabloids where just systematically wrong, it would make everything easier.
The reason why they are so potentially harmful is because they mix hard facts and fiction.
Believing that everything that is printed or said is a lie is just as naive as believing everything is true.
Given the amount of time that she's invested in her relationship with William, I doubt that she sees herself this way. She's reported to have said "He's lucky to be going out with me." I can't imagine a woman with such a healthy sense of self ever consenting to be a passive hanger-on in a relationship.
But what I find even more amusing seems to be your belief that if the tabloids have not published something, it was either "undercover" or did not happen! 
