The Science of Freelance Income Anxiety: Why the Swings Hurt More Than the Total

Key findings

1. 2015

   With Anthony Hannagan, finds that financial-diaries households averaged 2.7 income spikes and 2.7 dips a year, each roughly half a typical month's income — and that job loss and job changes explained almost none of this volatility. ↗

2. 2017

   With Rachel Schneider, documents in The Financial Diaries how families of all income levels cope with volatility through constant, largely invisible juggling of bills, borrowing, and savings — not through simply earning more. ↗

3. 2017

   Shows that for households above 150% of the poverty line, smoothing within-job income variability — the everyday spikes and dips — would cut episodes of poverty roughly in half, independent of any change in yearly average income. ↗

Key findings

1. 2018

   With Foong, Vincent, and Hecht, analyzes 48,019 U.S. freelancer profiles on a major platform and finds the median woman's self-set hourly rate is 74% of the median man's for comparable work. ↗

2. 2021

   With Foong, finds that differences in stated pricing strategy do not explain the bill-rate gap between men and women freelancers — full-time freelancer status and self-esteem measures are stronger predictors than any conscious pricing tactic. ↗

Key findings

1. 2020

   With Joris Rietveld, finds that self-employed workers had greater short-term psychological distress than wage workers during the early pandemic, and that self-reported financial insecurity and perceived job-loss risk — not self-employment status alone — mediated the gap. ↗