From Forbes, Elaine Pofeldt provides another excellent article on the gig economy. I highly recommend that you should follow her. She discusses a recent survey that attempts to find how how satisfied gig workers are. It turns out that why a person is doing gig work determines how satisfied they are with it. Elaine writes:
Satisfaction with the on-demand platforms varied widely among these groups. It was very high among career freelancers (82%) and business builders (83%). But it dipped significantly among side giggers (65%) and passionistas, (61%)–and fewer than half of the substitutors–47%–said they were satisfied. Why these gaps exist wasn’t clear. If you’re part of the on-demand economy or a close observer, I’d be interested in your thoughts on this.
It’s worth noting that most of these workers participate in the on-demand economy part-time–even though they put in full-time hours when you add up all of their lines of work. The average worker in the on-demand economy logs 40.4 hours per week and relies on three different sources of income, including a traditional full or part-time job (30%), contracting and consulting (19%) and running a business (14%), the survey found.
Most of the respondents–63%–are doing on-demand work for the money, even though it’s not their main job. On average, they earn 22% of their household income from on-demand work, with only 5% earning all of their income through an on-demand platform. That’s not surprising, given another finding: The average gross income from on-demand work in the past 12 months among the workers was $7,900. Their hourly earnings averaged $28.
Read the full story How Happy Is Your Uber Driver? Survey Offers Candid Glimpse Of Gig-Economy Workers