The increasing number of freelancers in Serbia, the number of gig workers in Užice has doubled

The number of gig workers in Serbia continued to grow on the dominant platform Upwork, according to data from Gigmeter. The latest measurement included a population of 11,596 workers, a growth of 14.5 percent.

Considering that the growth in the previous measurement was similar (15.9 percent), the population of gig workers increased by a third in the previous year.

Among the factors that contributed to the significant growth and attractiveness of gig work in the previous period are, according to analysts from the Center for Public Policy Research, primarily the dynamic development of technologies that increases the availability of this type of work globally, and disruptive changes in the business models of companies that force them to, due to development needs, competitive pressures and technological transformation, continuously search for talents and human resources outside their own organizations.

Demographic changes and preferences of new generations have contributed to the increasing number of domestic freelancers, for whom working on the Internet represents an attractive alternative in professional development. To this should be added the large increase in wages, which occurred due to the 20 percent higher value of the dollar compared to the period of a year ago.

A large number of new freelancers from Šumadija and Western Serbia

The latest measurement shows the trend of "deurbanization", i.e. the growth came predominantly from smaller areas, Gigmeter data show.

The largest population growth was recorded in the region of Šumadija and Western Serbia, where the number of gig workers increased by almost a third. The growth champion is Užice, where the population has more than doubled.

Continuous monitoring of the population of gig workers in the regions indicates that most of them live and work in 28 cities in the Republic of Serbia - 82.4 percent. The most recent increase in internet workers came predominantly from smaller communities, which contributed to the decline in the share of the urban gig population compared to the previous measurement.

The region of Southern and Eastern Serbia recorded a growth of 19.1 percent, making it the region with the largest increase in gig workers in the previous year. The regions of Belgrade, with a growth of 10.3 percent, and Vojvodina (9.8 percent), had a more modest population growth in the latest measurement.

"The champion in the growth of the number of gig workers is the city of Užice, where the gig population has more than doubled - a growth of 102.3 percent. A very large increase in the number of gig workers, over 50 percent, was recorded in three more cities - Prokuplje, Novi Pazar and Vranje", according to the Center's analysts.

Požarevac (43.5 percent), Kraljevo (41.9 percent), Jagodina (38.6 percent), Leskovac (38.1 percent) and Smederevo (35.6 percent) also recorded a large increase in the population of gig workers.

A large number of freelancers from Serbia do the lowest paid jobs

The growth in the number of gig workers by profession stands out in the field of writing and translation (over 24 percent), while the weakest, but significant, growth was recorded in the field of marketing and sales (7.5 percent).

Although the field of multimedia and creative services is still dominant, in the latest measurement, the field of writing and translation attracted the largest number of new gig workers - 24 percent of them.

"There are two particularly significant conclusions that emerge. One concerns the fact that despite never better conditions on the conventional labour market, where the average salary of programmers is 3.2 times higher than the average salary in Serbia, the number of those who try to find career development in the digital labour market is still increasing significantly. This suggests that there are other, more significant factors that determine career development, apart from the level of earnings. On the other hand, although with the increase in the gig population, the number of gig workers also increases in the field of sales and marketing, the increasing trends are on average the lowest in this profession. This can potentially point to broader weaknesses that appear in the domain of curriculum and skills acquired at business schools in Serbia", the researchers emphasize in the latest Gigmeter.

In the latest measurement, the number of men increased compared to the number of women in all professions, and this change is most visible in the field of writing and translation.

The latest measurement shows a decrease in the share of gig workers in Serbia in the gig population - in the latest measurement, they make up 32.8 percent, as opposed to the previous measurement where their share was 36 percent. That's still significantly higher than the global average, which according to Payoneer's Global Freelancer Report is 29 percent.

The most significant change occurred in the domain of the number of male and female freelancers, by individual professions. Namely, while in the previous measurements women were more numerous in three professions (professional services, data entry and administrative services and writing and translation), in the latest measurement they make up a smaller part of the population in each of the areas.

Hourly earnings growth

The median salary of freelancers has increased significantly and it is now 18 dollars per hour. The wage gap is at an all-time low - women earn on average 86.5 percent of men's wages.

When it comes to the official price of work - the one that gig workers state on their profiles, the latest measurement indicates that the trend of salary growth has continued, even that there has been a slightly more pronounced growth (2.8 percent). The average cost of labour for women was 17.5 US dollars, while in the case of men it was at the level of 20.2 US dollars.

Weaknesses of the Serbian gig work market are reflected in the still present large lag behind the global price of labour - Serbian gig workers on average earn 45 percent less than the global average, but also in the fact that only in the most recent measurement the price of labour reached the pre-pandemic level, which the previous two years, at least when it comes to the earnings of Serbian gig workers, were practically lost.

Source: biznis.rs