Independent work: choice, necessity, and the gig economy

45
%
unincorporated 
self-employment in 
the US in 1900, 
compared to 6.5% 
today

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McKinsey Global Institute
1. Sizing the independent workforce 
SOME 20 TO 30 PERCENT OF THE WORKING-AGE POPULATION IN THE 
UNITED STATES AND THE EU-15 ENGAGES IN INDEPENDENT WORK 
This report aims to create a comprehensive and nuanced picture of independent earners—
and the first question to tackle is the size of the independent workforce. Sizing solely based 
on available official data would suggest that approximately 11 percent of the working-age 
population in the United States and about 14 percent in the EU-15 engage in independent 
work.
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 However, government labor statistics do not capture the full range of possible 
work arrangements, given the array of business structures and even terminology that 
independent workers themselves use.
We have brought together data from three distinct sources: officially published government 
data, analysis of several third-party private surveys, and our own survey, which asked 
respondents about all of their sources of income. MGI’s survey reached thousands 
of respondents from a representative population sample in the United States and five 
European countries (France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom). 
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  The working-age population includes ages 15 and up. The EU-15 countries are Austria, Belgium, Denmark, 
Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and 
the United Kingdom.
Exhibit 3