Independent work: choice, necessity, and the gig economy

Individual demand for labor services could grow
Although on-demand digital platforms are still relatively new, there is early evidence that they 
have generated increased spending on services. Uber has done more than simply replacing 
taxi rides; it has encouraged people to take car services for trips on which they would 
once have driven themselves. In New York City, one study found that while only 6 percent 
of traditional taxi pickups were outside of the most affluent borough of Manhattan or city 
airports, 22 percent of Uber pickups occurred in the more underserved outer boroughs.
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To assess whether there is additional growth potential in consumer markets for personal 
services, we began by looking at government household survey data on how time is spent. 
An analysis of the BLS American Time Use Survey and OECD Time Use Survey revealed 
that people spend approximately 3.2 hours per day on unpaid household work for which 
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  Jennifer Erin Brown et al., 
Shortchanged in retirement: Continuing challenges to women’s financial future
, 
National Institute on Retirement Security, March 2016.
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  Jared Meyer, “Uber-positive: The ride-share firm expands transportation options in low-income New York,” 
Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, issue brief number 38, September 2015.

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McKinsey Global Institute
3. How independent work may evolve in the future
a paid corollary existed. This includes activities such as driving to work, food preparation, 
garden and lawn care, and external housecleaning (Exhibit 27). 
We then considered what reasonable portion of this work might be outsourced to an 
independent worker if finding the right service provider were easy, transparent, and 
affordable—exactly what on-demand platforms are designed to do. The MGI survey asked 
respondents about their willingness to pay for such services. Depending on the activity, 
between 5 and 30 percent of respondents stated that they were at least very likely to hire 
someone to perform the unpaid task. Based on their responses, we estimate that 6.2 billion 
annual hours of currently unpaid household chores in the United States and another 
5.6 billion hours per year in Europe could be converted to approximately $100 billion worth 
of paid independent work. This would be equivalent to creating some seven million full-time-
equivalent positions.
This analysis suggests that at least in theory, there could be further growth in demand for 
individual services performed by independent workers—and if this came about, it could 
even represent a positive development for gender parity. MGI research has found that