Bloomberg's Men Make 48% More Than Women in the Gig Economy. Study Finds covers an interesting ZenBusiness study on freelancer earnings by gender.
The study's methodology is quite clever.
ZenBusiness scraped data on freelancers' names, specialties, and hourly rates for almost 6,000 US-based freelancers active on the talent marketplace Upwork.
And after using a gender API to group the freelancers by sex, they calculated the average wage rates for men and women.
They found that the average hourly rate for men is 48% higher - $68.58 versus $46.30 for women.
As the Bloomberg chart below shows (click to enlarge), the study found that the pay gap varies quite a bit by job type.
Our broader studies of the overall independent workforce have found the gender pay gap between male and female independent workers to be in the 20% range.
This is similar to the 16% gender gap Pew Research found for full-time workers.
And although we're impressed by the ZenBusiness study, it's not without issues.
For example, listed hourly rates may not reflect actual pay rates.
We also know from our studies that, on average, part-time independent workers charge less than full-timers, older workers charge more than younger workers, and more experienced workers charge more than less experienced workers.
The ZenBusiness study doesn't have data on any of these attributes. But gender differences in any of these areas could easily skew the results.
So kudos to ZenBusiness for raising this issue and pointing out this data.
But more research is needed before conclusions can be drawn on the freelance gender gap associated with online talent marketplaces.
