✈️ Voluntarily Overemployed | Flexible Working Rights | Digital Nomadism 2024

➕ Overemployed vs. Underemployed ➖ 

Last year was full of layoffs and life lessons. A major outcome of The Great Betrayal is that 62% of knowledge workers say they don’t feel secure committing to one employer anymore. Employees now throw 🚩when they see company culture touted as being a “family” - the social contracts between employers and employees have been broken.

How have knowledge workers responded? We have seen one of the largest surges in freelancers in recent years with 38% of the U.S. workforce performing freelance work ($1.27 trillion in 2023). In the same vein, the category of “voluntarily overemployed” has been growing rapidly.

Highly skilled and effective knowledge workers hold down multiple full-time jobs and consistently earn $300,000+ annual income. Can’t be that many, you say? The r/overemployed subreddit is now home to 272k members sharing tips, tricks, and case studies to hold down multiple remote jobs without being caught.

Knowledge workers aren’t the only ones under close watch. HMRC, the UK’s tax authority, is rolling out a “side hustle tax” for online sellers on eBay, Vinted, and more. That’s right, folks, you now get the privilege of earning income, paying income tax, buying goods, and paying VAT, then paying an additional round of income tax on that old t-shirt you sold for £4 on Vinted. This is a continued trend in governments demanding tax and revenue data from online marketplaces.

For all my talent platform pals, this is bittersweet news. Yes, you will see an increase in senior and skilled workers opening up their moonlighting schedule to work with your clients. What this ALSO means is that they are multitenanting. In a private survey completed earlier this year with a competitive programming community, the average tech freelancer was on a total of 4 freelance marketplaces. The only way to maintain the defensibility of a network is to provide value.

How will you retain the wallet share of time and attention of your most valuable workers?

In underemployment news, skilled knowledge workers seem to be safe but women, youth, and manual workers are being hit the hardest. Gaining experience to advance careers has been a challenge, historically, with many unable to take unpaid internships to grow their skills.

Silver lining? The EU is making major moves to end the exploitation of unpaid internships. Bo Burnham, we’re waiting patiently for a new tune. 🎵 

📜 Flexible Working a right, not a privilege 📜 

As we saw in last week’s issue, flexible working will be a core theme throughout 2024 with more and more employees identifying with the term “flexeteriat” - workers who prioritize flexible working over all else. In the UK, this is about to become a protected right.

New regulations, set to come into force this spring, will protect workers’ rights to request flexible work. Those who have been employed for at least 26 weeks can now push for flexible hours (part-time, flexi-time, term-time, compressed hours, and start and finish times) as well as location (working remotely or from home)

Paul David, Co-founder and CEO at Literal Humans, is an ex-digital nomad and long time supporter of flexible work. His company was a part of the official 4-day workweek experiment and, while there was overwhelming evidence that they should keep the compressed workweek policy, it has not been without its challenges - they’ve entirely changed how they work.

I suspect we’ll see more and more resources emerging for companies to effectively manage flexible teams. Example: Working remotely in different timezones: 6 tips for remote work success

🛫 Digital Nomad Corner 🛬 

Home is where the WiFi connects automatically and work is a state of mind.

Nomad List’s 2024 State of Digital Nomadism report is out and the findings are both insightful and hilarious.

We get a pretty good picture of the current nomadic persona. While it is obvious that nomadism is reserved for those with passport privilege, we now see the consistent incomes and attributes that exist within the population.

• Age: Most likely in their mid-30s

• Gender: 62% male (the digital bromad era continues)

• Ethnicity: 59% white

• Education: 91% have completed higher education

• Employment: 42% are employed full-time, 17% freelance

• Income: Average $122k/year, Median $85k/year

  _{Note: The report pulls live numbers as survey results continue to trickle in. See the linked report for the most up-to-date figures.}

Understand nomadic professions more clearly. Top professions include web and software development, marketing, creative, and startup founders.

See the most and least popular destinations. I was pretty shocked to see countries that ranked lower on the list than North Korea, including Barbados and Malta - both leaders in creating Digital Nomad Visas.

More and more workers, including managers, will be driving the remote work revolution. Get with it or get out of the way.