Side Hustlers are rushing a little less, but doing more when they do.
About 36% of American adults say they earn extra money from a side job beyond their main source of income, according to a survey by consumer finance platform Bankrate released Wednesday. That’s down from 39% last year, when defendants earned slightly less. The average side gig now earns $891 a month, up 10% since 2023 — well ahead of inflation.
The findings add “a more positive picture” of the struggling economy, said Ted Rossman, senior credit card analyst at Bankrate. But he warned that “things are still not great”.
“About twice as many people are on the side hustle compared to 2017,” Rossman said, “and it’s alarming that even in a good job market so many people need a secondary source of income.” Still, the latest survey data looks like “progress” as inflation cools, he said.
Bankrate’s findings come a day before the closely watched consumer price index gives a fresh look at inflation for June, marking two years since the last period of price increases peaked at 9.1%. Economists expect annual inflation to have eased to 3.1% last month from 3.3% in May, and the rate has barely budged since last summer.
But workers’ pay has changed for the better, compared to prices.
Federal data show average hourly earnings rose 3.9% last month from a year ago. And while the job market is cooling, there are still more openings than job seekers looking to fill them after a scary wave of mass layoffs failed to materialize.
On Tuesday, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told lawmakers that the economy no longer appears overheated and “the labor market appears to be fully back in balance.”
Just over half of the defaults began in 2022, when inflation was much hotter, Bankrate found. Last year, people with side jobs were more likely to rely on them to subsidize day-to-day living costs than to fund discretionary spending such as travel or eating out (33% and 27%, respectively). But today, these shares are roughly equal (36% and 37%).
Dreon Owens, a 32-year-old who lives in Brooklyn, New York, isn’t one to ease up on the side hustle this year.
After dabbling in side projects since being laid off during the pandemic, Owens finally landed a full-time position managing a housing nonprofit group in late 2022. But in May, he landed a human resources consulting contract that he said he brings in as much as $2,500 a month on top of his $100,000 annual salary from his day job.
“We’ve gotten beat over the head and gotten into paying these extra prices when we didn’t have to,” Owens said, echoing concerns about so-called greed, in which some consumer advocates have accused corporations of raising prices more. much as their costs have increased.
“Extra income is always very useful in this good old system of capitalism,” he said.
Consumers increasingly expect inflation to ease further in the next 12 months, according to a New York Fed report on Monday. But consumer sentiment has remained tepid at best this year and many household budgets are still under stress.
After Owens’ father died last fall, he sent money home to help his mother and younger siblings. But his application for a New York City housing program that helps residents find affordable rent recently moved forward. He’s eager to move out of the three-bedroom apartment he shares with two roommates, where his share of the monthly rent comes to $1,800, but he’s also prepared to pay at least $500 more to live alone in a studio or one bedroom.
With his freelance gig, Owens said, “I have the ability to hang out with my friends, travel a little bit, come home to see my family without having to cower in a corner thinking, ‘Should I do this? ? Can I afford this? It brings that sense of relief.”