Found’s 2023 Self-Employment Survey

If you’ve been hearing more about self-employment lately, you’re not imagining it. The population of self-employed workers in this country is soaring—accounting for approximately 16 million Americans. In fact, self-employment will soon surpass traditional employment to become the majority of the American workforce. While growing in influence, these workers represent some of the most underserved segments of the U.S. economy.

We created Found to remedy these gaps and are focused on building a modern financial platform for the self-employed. We’ve spent years talking with self-employed business owners and find their insights invaluable. 

We recently surveyed Found customers to better understand how they think about their work, their motivation, their finances, and even our tax system. We were blown away by the 500+ individuals across virtually every demographic that took time to share their valuable observations and insights. 

Our aim is for others, from companies to regulators, to pay closer attention to this soon-to-be majority. Our goal is to create a collective voice for the self-employed and we believe surveys like this provide a first step. 

Here are the top 10 insights from our survey: 

There’s no turning back.

The vast majority of self-employed workers remain uninterested in traditional employment. A whopping 75% have no intention of considering going back to conventional, W2 work.

The self-employed represent the “breadwinners.” 

70% of self-employed individuals consider themselves to be the primary breadwinner of their household. This number steadily increases with age—only 63% of Gen Z said they play this role, while 86% of those over 65 reported bringing in the majority of financial gains. 

The money tends to be better.

41% of the people we surveyed reported that they’re making more now than they did before becoming self-employed, while 38% are making less. The remainder isn’t sure or are making the same.

That said, for Gen Z (18-24), things may be less promising – 65% report they don’t feel like they have a handle on their finances. However, as we’ve seen with the breadwinners, financial gains tend to increase over time, as experience grows.

The “Venmo tax” isn’t well understood – but it should be.

Half of self-employed people use peer-to-peer payment apps like Venmo or Cash App to run their businesses, but less than 23% understand the changes coming to next year’s digital payments tax reporting.

Interestingly, half of Gen Z (18-24) use Venmo or Cash App for their business, and they’re actually the group that’s most informed on the changes coming to digital payments tax reporting.

Feelings towards our tax system aren’t warm.

Perhaps not surprisingly, an overwhelming 81% don’t think the current tax system is set up to support the self-employed. Along those same lines, only 22% of self-employed people understand how to maximize potential deductions and write-offs. 

Let’s break it down by a few industries: 

• 83% of gig economy workers feel negatively toward the system, and 75% don’t know how to make the most of their deductions. 

• 92% of creators feel negatively toward the system, and 67% don’t know how to make the most of their deductions. 

In 2021, layoffs didn’t lead to self-employment.

From 2019-2023, 2021 stood out as the only year where fewer people turned to self-employed work because of layoffs, with a record low of 19% of respondents reporting layoffs impacted their decision to take the leap. If you exclude 2021, the average of the other years in that range was 24%. 

Sleep improves for some when you’re self-employed.

Overall, 36% of self-employed individuals sleep better now that they run their own businesses—A majority (46%) are doing about the same and haven’t noticed a change, and a small few sleep worse. 

Flexibility is a surprisingly low driver for the self-employed.

Only 7% of gig workers cited flexibility as their main motivation for turning to their current work, with only 16% of the overall self-employed workers citing it as a main driver.

Gen Z carries the most stress around self-employed work.

Gen Z (18-24) is the age group that’s most likely to be stressed out from being self-employed, with 42% claiming they’re more stressed now than before working for themselves. This percentage steadily decreases with age – with 36% being the average across all years.

Financial security in self-employment improves with age.

Nearly a third of people under 44 (Gen Z and Millenials) are considering going back to full-time work because of the financial challenges of running an independent business. Meanwhile, only 15% of those over 44 (Gen X and Boomers) feel that way.

Methodology

The methodology for this survey involved administering an optional online questionnaire to 531 self-employed Found customers in the United States over one week. The survey was sent via email and consisted of multiple-choice questions designed to gauge participants' sentiments on various topics. There were no incentives or rewards offered for participation, ensuring unbiased and voluntary responses. The collected data was then analyzed to identify trends and derive insights that inform the state of self-employed work.