The number of Americans who freelanced this year surged to a record 60 million, signaling a change in how people assess their values and priorities around work.
About 39% of the entire U.S. workforce freelanced this year, compared with 36% in 2021, a study by freelance platform Upwork Inc. showed.
People are redefining what work means beyond traditional career pathways, a trend that’s accelerated since the pandemic, when millions lost their jobs or were forced to work from home. With the economy having rebounded since and some U.S. employers now struggling to fill jobs in the tightest labor market in decades, more people are emboldened to go solo, giving themselves more flexibility and autonomy.
The study found that 81% of freelancers chose the option to have more control over their careers and 73% of them said that perceptions of freelancing as a career are becoming more positive, up from 68% in 2021.
“The 9-to-5, in-office, single-employer model is not what all people want anymore,” said Margaret Lilani, vice president of talent solutions at Upwork.
People born in the late 1990s—known as Generation Z—and so-called millennials born from 1981 to 1996 are the most likely to explore freelancing, with 43% of all Gen Z professionals and 46% of millennials performing such work in 2022, the report showed.
About 17% of U.S. workers seek multiple sources of income from a mix of traditional employment and freelance work, up three percentage points from 2021, it said.
Freelancing is also becoming more popular among those with postgraduate degrees with 26% of all those opting for gig work holding such qualifications this year, six percentage points more than in 2021.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.