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The Developing Gig Economy:Freelancers Predicted to Become the US Workforce Majority Within a Decade
IWB ^ | Robert Carbery

Posted on 11/08/2017 12:42:47 PM PST by davikkm

In mid-October, Upwork, a global freelancing platform where businesses and individual freelance workers connect and collaborate online, released the results of a new study on the gig economy, in conjunction with Freelancers Union, titled “Freelancing in America: 2017” — the most comprehensive measure of the U.S. independent workforce.

This is the fourth annual study of the 57.3 million American freelance workers, which amounts to 36 percent of the U.S. workforce. This chunk of the world’s top economy contributes around $1.4 trillion per year, an almost 30 percent increase year-over-year, per Upwork’s report.

The amazing takeaway from the world’s largest freelancing website is that the majority of the U.S. workforce will be freelancers by 2027 if current trends hold. We could get to over half of the working public deciding to be freelancers within the next decade. The current growth rate of the freelance economy is likely to continue since people seem to be choosing freelancing by choice. The study showed that 63 percent of freelancers said they chose their line and mode of work by choice, up 10 points since 2014.

(Excerpt) Read more at investmentwatchblog.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy
KEYWORDS: businesses; economy; freelancers; gigeconomy; workforce
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1 posted on 11/08/2017 12:42:47 PM PST by davikkm
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To: davikkm

BFL


2 posted on 11/08/2017 12:46:50 PM PST by Lurkina.n.Learnin (Wisdom and education are different things. Don't confuse them.)
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To: davikkm

Freelancing is hard work, but there are many rewards.


3 posted on 11/08/2017 12:48:43 PM PST by Army Air Corps (Four Fried Chickens and a Coke)
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To: Army Air Corps

I have been doing freelance work for over 35 years. The gig economy sucks.


4 posted on 11/08/2017 12:51:37 PM PST by SoCal Pubbie
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To: SoCal Pubbie

I do not mean to pry, but may I ask what sort of freelance work you do? The reward seems to vary according to the particular field of freelance endeavor.


5 posted on 11/08/2017 12:53:18 PM PST by Army Air Corps (Four Fried Chickens and a Coke)
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To: SoCal Pubbie

Much of the gig economy is very low pay.


6 posted on 11/08/2017 12:59:26 PM PST by crusher2013
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To: davikkm

FreeLancers will never restore the economic power that US had during the Bush administration. The economy and industrial base of the US will not recover. China, Japan, Korea, Russia and Europe will never let the American economy become the powerhouse it was.


7 posted on 11/08/2017 1:04:25 PM PST by Rapscallion (Politics just makes us hate each other. It's un-christian and un-American)
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To: crusher2013
Much of the gig economy is very low pay.

That would be my first impression.

What they're really saying is it will be a part-time worker economy for average people and a gig economy for highly skilled and talented people.

Average people (i.e., most of us) will be screwed.

8 posted on 11/08/2017 1:05:15 PM PST by Prolixus (Drain the swamp!!!)
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To: crusher2013

.
A very significant share is quite highly paid.

Most licensed professionals more or less pick their own level of income (Doctors, Lawyers, Engineers, contractors, etc.)


9 posted on 11/08/2017 1:07:14 PM PST by editor-surveyor (Freepers: Not as smart as I'd hoped they'd be)
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To: davikkm

We are entering the kind of economic conditions of mass poverty that will result in a socialist revolution. The gig economy is modern day pauperism. You can’t make a middle class living this way in most cases.

The only thing saving many older people in the gig economy is that they used to have real job that allowed them to buy homes and build up assets. These bad gigs allow them to scrape out survival. For younger people who never got that chance to have a real job, the gig economy condemns them to life long poverty. They can’t buy a home or save anything.


10 posted on 11/08/2017 1:07:18 PM PST by WatchungEagle
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To: davikkm

gig economy goes well with gig marriages.


11 posted on 11/08/2017 1:09:17 PM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: crusher2013

It’s all being done in India and such for the Civil Engineering gigs.

The people hiring are saving tons of money. Design work for 3-4 bucks an hour.


12 posted on 11/08/2017 1:09:45 PM PST by 1_Inch_Group (Country Before Party)
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To: Prolixus

.
>> “Average people (i.e., most of us) will be screwed.” <<

If you get screwed, it will be because you screwed yourself by not establishing yourself in any niche of life.
.


13 posted on 11/08/2017 1:10:17 PM PST by editor-surveyor (Freepers: Not as smart as I'd hoped they'd be)
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To: editor-surveyor

People have to develop a “skills portfolio” that is as diversified as any good stock portfolio, just doing one thing won’t cut it, anymore.


14 posted on 11/08/2017 1:12:03 PM PST by dfwgator
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To: editor-surveyor

Once Trump is gone, that will not help you when the elites flood the US market with as many Central and South Americans and those from the Caribbean, under the hemisphere free trade act.

We are heading into 100 years of absolute poverty and enslavement.


15 posted on 11/08/2017 1:18:04 PM PST by Jonty30 (What Islam and secularism have in common is that they are both death cults)
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To: Army Air Corps
Before I answer, let me state that I am NOT one of those who think companies exist to provide jobs. I don’t even mind freelancing. But my observation is that “the gig economy” is a bad deal for workers. It totally shifts all the power back to the employer, after decades of movement in the other direction as a result of unionization and government regulation, both of which I find very anti-competitive in the world marketplace.

I am a designer, specifically I design exhibits and displays. In truth my specialty is not yet fully immersed in this new freelance world, but graphic design is. It’s impossible to plan your life in this system. I find the job alerts are always for gigs that start tomorrow, and you’re competing against multiple other candidates, many who have more specific experience than you do. The job may last two weeks as stated, but it might end in a few days in which case you’re scrambling to find another gig. There is zero investment in you as a worker, unlike in the older system where employers might pay for additional training and education. On top of all that pay rates on many offers are ridiculously low, as another poster wrote.

Freelance work as a category is fine. I see that as different then the “gig economy,” which seems like a license for amoral millennial aged middle managers to go all Simon Lagree on your ass.

16 posted on 11/08/2017 1:22:37 PM PST by SoCal Pubbie
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To: editor-surveyor

Of course the average person is going to try to make his way in life.

It’s insulting to say otherwise.

There are no jobs that “Americans won’t do.”

There is a trend for lower skilled work to be off-shored and for job “openings” to be for one-per-centers in skills and talent.


17 posted on 11/08/2017 1:22:52 PM PST by Prolixus (Drain the swamp!!!)
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To: SoCal Pubbie
Freelance work as a category is fine. I see that as different then the “gig economy,”

Ah, that is an important distinction.
18 posted on 11/08/2017 1:26:15 PM PST by Army Air Corps (Four Fried Chickens and a Coke)
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To: 1_Inch_Group

You generally get what you paay for.


19 posted on 11/08/2017 1:30:57 PM PST by crusher2013
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To: Army Air Corps

Yes I think it is.

When you base your company on employees, the number of which may grow or shrink based on necessity, that are augmented by freelancers then that freelance work is great. Long term contract Work is fine too. But if the majority of workers are freelancers it will lead to social instability IMHO. I’m not sure I’m ready to go all doom and gloom like other posters, but how are you going to be able to buy house if you’re constantly changing work location month-to-month?

There is ZERO loyalty between company and worker, which I think was the basis of employment in the past. The company made a commitment to you, and return you made a commitment to them and gave sufficient notice if you’re going to leave for a better opportunity arose. I don’t see that kind of civility continuing if everyone’s a freelancer.


20 posted on 11/08/2017 1:43:34 PM PST by SoCal Pubbie
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