More and more professions that require advanced degrees or highly specialized skills are joining the gig and/or on-demand economy.
A good example is law.
Crain's The gig economy comes to law covers the expanding use of contract lawyers. Key quote:
"Three-quarters of law firms with more than 250 lawyers use contract attorneys, says a 2016 report from legal consultancy Altman Weil."
The article chart below also illustrates this growth.
You can even hire lawyers online for fixed fees. The online site legal site Avvo recently announced a new service that covers routine legal scenarios for business, family and immigration, with fixed-price offerings starting at $39 for a 15-minute advice session or $149 for a document review.
It's not just lawyers. Doctors are also joining the on-demand economy.
Doctor on Demand, for example, provides video medical consultation service.
Nomad Health is another example. They connect freelance doctors with temporary clinical positions. In the healthcare world, these are called locum tenens positions.
As Nomad Health points out, there are a number of reasons doctors go freelance:
"Many doctors work locum tenens in addition to their full time position. Younger doctors may want to earn extra income or experience different clinical environments, while older doctors may use it as a means of maintaining a part-time schedule."
Consulting, of course, is another field with growing numbers of independent workers. The Boston Globe's Consultants get in on the gig economy nicely covers Catalant, the online site connecting consultants with clients.
And if you want to hire data scientists on a project basis, Experfy is the place to go. They have thousands of freelance analytics experts.
Or if need gig scientists to help you with genomics or synthetic biology, head over to Scientist.com. They just raised $24 million to help them "Uberize" biomedical research.
The same thing is happening in many other professions. This is why the number of independent workers making more than $100k per year has been growing so rapidly (see chart below).
As with other types of freelance work, not all highly skilled gig workers are happy with this type of work. Key quote from Crain's:
But as the industry has grown more competitive, with staffing agencies jostling for clients, contractors are worried about wage stagnation and amassing enough hours to pay the bills, which often include law school debt. While some contract attorneys are retirees, parents or avid travelers who enjoy the flexibility of temporary work, Volz says, more would appreciate the stability of a full-time job. Jobs expected to last months can end in weeks or days. Lawyers look at the current market, where law school graduates outnumber legal jobs, and see "a bidding war where they don't have too much leverage."
We're working through the 2017 data from the MBO Partners State of Independence study and the number of higher earning independents has again increased.
We'll have more on this in the coming weeks after we release the study report.
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