As the gig economy has grown in size and influence, so too have attempts to understand the marketplace have increased. We’ve seen studies looking at who engages in the gig economy, what they’re looking for, and what societal changes need to occur to ensure people are operating in a safe manner.
The latest of these comes from JPMorgan Chase, who have published a paper that attempts to explore the gig economy as it stands today. The study was based upon the JPMorgan Chase Institute Online Platform Economy dataset to track both participation in the gig economy and earnings. They have identified around 38 million payments made across 128 distinct platforms to 2.3 million unique individuals over a six year period to March 2018.
They primarily analyze four key sectors of the gig economy:
- The transportation sector, in which drivers transport people or goods
- The non-transport sector, in which workers offer everything from dog walking to telemedicine
- The selling sector, in which people sell goods through online marketplaces
- The leasing sector, in which people lease out homes, parking spaces and other assets
A growing economy
A number of key findings emerged from the data. Firstly, the gig economy is one that is growing at a rapid pace. Indeed, whereas just 0.3% of the population earned any income from the gig economy in 2013, this had risen to 1.6% by 2018, with 4.5% of families having participated at some point in the last year.
Many of these participants were on transportation platforms, with as many participants in this sector as in the other three sectors combined.
“Although the non-transport work sector includes 55 percent of the platforms we tracked, it never generated more than 4.5 percent of total transaction volume,” the authors say. “In fact, its share of total transaction volume we observed declined since 2013.”
Sporadic income
Whilst growth has been strong however, the majority of participants only dip in and out of the gig economy, with many only active for a few months out of the year.
Indeed, 58% of all people who earned any money from transportation platforms only did so for less than three months of the year. This was common across all sectors, with less than 20% of all gig workers making money for at least half of the year.
This highlights the itinerant nature of gig work, and underlines demographic data generated by previous research suggesting that most gig workers are either young people who value the flexibility or older people earning a bit on the side. It’s relatively rare to find full-time gig workers in the family-raising age range.
Important income
Interestingly however, whilst income from the gig economy might be sporadic, the data suggests that for the few months of the year when gig workers are most engaged, the income they generate is a vital part of their overall income.
Indeed, during the months when gig drivers are active, it equates to over half of their total take-home income. Whilst it is lower in the other four sectors, it still represents between 42 and 54% across all sectors.
This should be a concern as median income in all but the leasing sector is below $1,000 per month, which when costs of trading are taken into account leaves only a small number in any kind of profit.
Declining income
Worryingly however, as the numbers of people participating in the gig economy has risen, there is evidence that incomes are declining. The data suggests that average transportation earnings have fallen by 53% between 2013 and 2017.
There was however, growth over the same period of 69% in the earning of those operating in the leasing sector, whereas income across the other two sectors showed no clear trends.
“Even as the non-transport work sector has broadened to cover new types of services, average earnings have been essentially constant at $725-$750 per month over the entire period. In the leasing sector average earnings in 2017 were roughly $1,700, 69 percent higher than they were in 2013 with most of the growth realized by 2014,” the authors say. “In the selling sector, revenue peaks regularly in the holiday season, but has otherwise remained consistently between $600 and $650 per month since 2014.”
Who participates
Previous research has found that gig workers tend to be predominantly older and younger workers, and this was replicated in the data found by JPMorgan Chase.
Whilst most of those in the transport sector are not employed elsewhere, this isn’t generally the case in other forms of gig work. This is perhaps because the barriers to entry are low in this sector, making it a relatively easy opportunity for the unemployed to earn money as they look for steady work.
With earnings falling however, this is far from a satisfactory source of income and does not bode particularly well for the prospects of such work providing a buffer against unemployment.
The report draws five key lessons from their finding:
- The gig economy is comparable to a major employment sector in the overall economy, and therefore deserves to be treated as such.
- Freelance driving remains the engine of growth for the gig economy, but it is seldom a full-time job for most participants.
- In both the selling and leasing sectors, high earnings are only really achieved by a small minority of participants.
- Platform participants are not generally quitting their jobs to go freelance, but rather using gig work to supplement regular income.
- There are key differences between the four sectors of the gig economy, and they require an individual policy response.
“The Online Platform Economy is growing,” the authors conclude. “As it grows, its sectors are diverging in important ways, raising the question as to whether they require tailored policy approaches.”
