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Elance-oDesk report says 34% of US workers freelance

September 04, 2014

A survey released by online staffing firm Elance-oDesk found 34 percent of U.S. workers — 53 million people — are freelancing. The workforce adds $715 billion annually to the economy through their freelance work.

“The 53 million Americans who are freelancing already contribute more than $700 billion to our national economy and help U.S. businesses compete and find the skills that they need,” Elance-oDesk CEO Fabio Rosati. “This is just the start: The connected era we live in is liberating our workforce. The barriers to being a freelance professional — finding work, collaborating with clients and getting paid on time — are going away.”

Types of U.S. freelance workers in the report:

  • Forty percent, or 21.1 million are independent contractors who don’t have an employer and do freelance, temporary or supplemental work on a project-to-project basis.
  • “Moonlighters” represent 27 percent, or 14.3 million workers. They have a primary, traditional job who also moonlight doing freelance work.
  • “Diversified workers” represent 18 percent of freelancers, or 9.3 million workers. They are people with multiple sources of income from a mix of traditional employers and freelance work. The report cites as an example someone who works the front desk at a dentist’s office 20 hours a week and fills out the rest of his income driving for Uber and doing freelance writing.
  • “Temporary workers" represent 10 percent, or 5.5 million workers. These are individuals with a single employer, client, job or contract project where their status is temporary.
  • “Freelance business owners” represent 5 percent, or 2.8 million workers. These are business owners with between one and five employees who consider themselves both a freelancer and a business owner.

Other findings in the report include:

  • Thirty-two percent of freelancers reported an increase in demand over the past year compared to 15 percent who saw a decrease.
  • Technology had made it easier to do freelance work, 69 percent said. And 42 percent said they have done freelance work via the Internet.
  • Thirty-eight percent of millennials are freelancing compared to 32 percent of workers older than 35.

The study “Freelancing in America: A National Survey of the New Workforce” was conducted by research firm Edelman Berland and commissioned by Freelancers Union in partnership with Elance-oDesk.