Back in 2019, if someone said that he’s a freelancer, the questions that instantly popped into anybody’s mind were ‘do you get enough work?’ or ‘is the source of income even stable in this profession?’. But thanks to the global pandemic, it has drastically accelerated the growth of the freelance industry especially in the field of digital marketing, content writing, graphic designing, video editing, and developers.
As per the reports by Payoneer, here’s a list of the top 10 freelancer growth countries:
1. Philippines – 208%
2. India – 160%
3. Japan – 87%
4. Australia – 86%
5. Hong Kong – 79%
6. Mexico – 72%
7. Canada – 71%
8. Pakistan – 69%
9. Argentina – 66%
10. Spain – 66%
While many employees who lost their job during the pandemic moved to freelance as an alternate, similarly many companies who had to cut down costs preferred hiring freelancers on a project basis at a lower price. They are finding hiring freelancers a better alternative in terms of quality and costs. Looking at the above growth rate in freelancing, we can clearly call freelancing a respectable legitimate career option now.
With most of the industries adapting to remote working after the lockdown, freelancers have undeniably benefitted from this culture as they are well used to working from their homes. Companies can hire the best of talent on a freelance basis, without worrying about providing them office space, training, or fixed employee benefits.
Talking from an employees point of view, they prefer flexibility over rigid guidelines, diversity over fixed work & clients, and of course scope of a better pay scale. Freelancing has proved to be a boon for them.
The rise of the freelance industry was something that people expected will happen in the next 10-15 years, but the global pandemic made it happen in a few months only. Also clearly, this is not going to change. With digitalisation & remote working culture taking a lead, freelancers will be given preference in comparison to full-time employees in a lot of companies.