What does a self-employed worker look like and where will you find most of them?
Our image of a self-employed person — often distorted by movies, television shows or novels — is that of a successful professional, usually male, who is a consultant, works out of an office full of high-tech gadgets and spends the workday visiting clients or writing reports, followed by an evening of wining and dining.
The reality is far different, however. The agriculture, forestry and fishing industry comes first, as 81% of those working in this sector are self-employed.
According to a recent report from Pew Research, three-in-10 U.S. jobs are held by the self-employed and those they hire. The research, based on an analysis of data recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau, found that 14.6 million Americans (10% of the U.S. labor force) were self-employed in 2014, and they in turn provided jobs for 29.4 million others. Those 44 million jobs represent 30% of the U.S. labor force, which is defined by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics as the subset of Americans who have jobs or are seeking a job, are at least 16 years old, are not serving in the military and are not institutionalized.
The Pew report also found that not all self-employed workers are job creators. Only about one in four of them (3.4 million) said they usually have at least one paid employee. Hiring is typically small-scale, the report noted, finding that self-employed workers with employees had a median of three paid employees in 2014 and an average of 8.6 employees.
These statistics provide opportunities for insurance agents to reach out to clients who are self-employed to ensure that the clients have necessary coverage. Some things that many self-employed business owners overlook is intellectual property coverage for all those blog posts and articles they write as well as disability protection. On the property and casualty side, they have technology concerns, including cyber protection, and they usually own at least one vehicle that is dedicated to business use. If the business has employees, especially in construction, Workers' Compensation coverage is a concern.
The following chart from Statista provides a snapshot of the top 10 industries with the most self-employer workers.
(Source: Statista)
© Arc, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to TMSalesOperations@arc-network.com. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.