How Gen Z is tackling their biggest career fear

A single stream of income is simply not cutting it for today’s young professionals. Instead, “income stacking” is the new way young people are weathering an unstable job market and rising cost-of-living. 

The annual Next Gen of Work survey from freelancer services company Fiverr polled over 12,000 respondents from both Gen Z and Gen Alpha across the U.S., the U.K., France, and Germany. It found that for almost half of Gen Z (46%), their biggest career fear is not making enough money to live comfortably. 

Cue income stacking. 

“Gen Z is watching the single-paycheck model wobble, and instead of waiting for it to steady, they’re building safety nets of their own design,” Michelle Baltrusitis, Fiverr’s associate director of community and social impact, told Fast Company. “Income stacking is their response to a volatile economy—a way to diversify risk and create stability on their own terms.” 

While it’s not unusual for young people to work multiple jobs through college and early in their career, Gen Zers are stacking jobs on top of jobs as a way to DIY their own careers. (One Gen Zer, Carissa Ferguson, says she’s earned more than $144,0000 selling voiceovers, content creation, and copywriting on Fiverr’s platform.) Of those surveyed, 67% said that multiple streams of income were essential for a sense of financial security. 

Many are already striking out on their own, with 38% already freelancing or planning to start—the average age to start being just 19.

The rising cost of living is just one part of the picture. Gen Z also isn’t buying into what they see as a broken social contract, where a linear path up the career ladder is seen as the most reliable route to success and financial stability. It’s also a generation in which freelance employment has been modeled in the form of influencers, content creators and podcasters online.

As career paths grow less predictable, 56% of GenZ predict traditional employment will be rendered obsolete in the future. By forging their own paths, younger workers are no longer at the mercy of big companies that can lay them off at the drop of hat. 

In fact, the desire to work for a household name corporation ranked as one of the lowest career ambitions for Gen Z, at just 14%. Early-career workers are not trusting anybody else to take care of their future. 

For the first time, Gen Alpha was also included in Fiverr’s survey, despite the oldest being just 14 years old. 

Rather than lemonade stands, social media has made it easier than ever for the next generation of workers to start their own side hustles. Of the more than 4,500 13- to 15-year-olds polled, 31% said they wanted to freelance, with 30% crediting social media for introducing them to different career paths. 

Their screentime is already paying off. A recent survey by social commerce platform Whop found Gen Alpha are pulling in an average of $13.92 per hour from their online side hustles—nearly double the U.S. federal minimum wage of $7.25. Based on those hourly earnings, that equates to a $28,000 full-time annual salary, all before turning 16. 

How’s that for pocket money? 

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