The U.S. Gig economy: economic imposition or economic choice?

Abstract

Part-time work, with workers finding themselves in non-structured payroll jobs is not new. The purpose of this paper, intended for HR professionals, seeks to examine the growing phenomenon that is the U.S. gigging economy, and the opportunities and challenges facing the U.S workforce, inlight of disruptive technologies, creative destruction, and disruptive innovation, as the resultant technology displacement of workers continues to swell the ranks of the gigging workforce. This paper, synthesizing and representing a distillation of thought on the gig economy, examines among other things, the phenomenon of senior-level executive positions in career streams such as, finance, accounting, and IT not being exempt from inclusion in gigging activity, with resulting business agility and flexibility being inserted at this hierarchical level. The paper closes with research recommendations regarding the gig economy, with an outlook on the near-to medium-term, with reasoned cautious optimism regarding the “animal spirits” unleased by proposed changes for the economy. However, the gig economy with its job-hopping and employment reshaping patterns, the growing attractiveness of attendant career changes to bolster employability, and thereby supplement individual incomes, all taken together, do appear to have created a certain element of rigidity against a near-term significant decline in U.S. gigging behavior.