Freelance Journalism Story

After two decades as a reporter with Bloomberg, Rachel Layne felt the need for some ﬂexibility in her life, just as the news outlet was restructuring the department where she worked. Layne decided to make the leap into full-time freelance journalism. Since then, she has reported for CBS News, USA Today and more recently, Harvard Business School Working Knowledge.

An independent journalist and adjunct professor at Boston-based Emerson College, Layne reﬂected on what it was like starting out as a freelancer right after graduating from college, and how different it feels returning to freelancing later in her career.

The gig economy, consisting primarily of independent contractors, freelancers and temporary workers, both part-time and full-time, has been in ﬂux in the U.S. over the years, especially in the wake of the pandemic.

As more people seek to supplement their income through diverse streams, gig work has become not just a backup plan, but a key source of employment for millions.

Between 2015 and 2022, the number of independent workers surged by 64%, growing from 39.3 million to 64.6 million, according to MBO Partners. Already a large segment of the workforce, the sector has only grown more integral to the U.S. economy.

Leading freelancing platform Upwork reported that in 2022, freelancers comprised 39% of the entire U.S. workforce, contributing an estimated $1.35 trillion in annual revenue to the national economy.

While gig work is commonly associated with ride-hailing apps or delivery services, the model has expanded into a variety of other sectors, including journalism. Facing shrinking budgets and ongoing staff cuts, newsrooms are increasingly relying on freelance and contract contributors to maintain more agile, on-demand coverage.

Lian Parsons, a Boston-based journalist, feels this shift firsthand. While pursuing a master’s degree at Harvard Extension School, she works full-time as a digital content producer for the university, and still carves out time to freelance on the side, a path she first embarked on in college. Freelancing offers a degree of creative autonomy, but Parsons is aware of the pressure it entails—the constant need to be highly self-motivated, which can be nerve-wracking. The broader industry trends only add to that tension.

“Journalism is already a very competitive market,” Parsons said, citing recent employee cuts at outlets like BuzzFeed as signs of a growing reliance on gig workers, and expressing concerns about the industry’s volatile economic model.

While recent staff cuts may point to a heightened dependence on freelance labor, the long-term erosion in journalism jobs may also herald a broader shift toward a more gig-oriented employment structure. Newsroom employment fell 21% from 2011 to 2021, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Newspaper publishers were hit hardest as staffing dropped from more than 50,000 to under 30,000.

Workforce Erosion (2011-2021) Each dot represents ~1% of the original workforce.

-45% Newspaper Jobs

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

“A lot of these legacy media places are doing a lot of ﬁring and relying more increasingly on a contractor freelance workforce,” she said. “It’s not quite a gig economy level, but it could be, and I don’t want it to be.”

Who Goes Freelance?

A 2022 Pew Research Center survey looked at how journalists’ employment status, self-employed or salaried, correlates with their reporting specializations. The survey found that freelance journalists are most prevalent in travel and entertainment reporting, while crime and legal beats have the fewest.

Select a Beat

Freelance Percentage

34%

Across the industry, 34% of journalists are self-employed.
Select a beat on the left to see how it compares to the average.

Source: Pew Research Center

Amy Guttman, a seasoned journalist and producer based in London with more than 20 years of experience, started freelancing in 2010 within a range of news sectors. Describing the current news industry as being in a “state of chaos,” Guttman believed relying exclusively on journalistic endeavors to make a livelihood was precarious, a sentiment echoed by many of her peers. In the same Pew survey, nearly three-quarters of journalists used words like “struggling” or “chaos” to describe the field, while 42% reported feeling at least somewhat worried about their job security.

“If you try to make a living strictly off freelance journalism, unless you have very regular clients you're working for on a consistent basis and preferably with some kind of contract,” she said, “it really makes sense to have an anchor client, and it’s okay if that’s not in straight journalism.”

Buoyed by the loose nature of the gig economy, getting paid fairly remains a stubborn challenge for freelance journalists and other independent workers. Writer and lifestyle journalist Michael Berman said that although numerous gig opportunities are available to freelancers, many fail to offer reasonable compensation, especially when demand for such work is sporadic, which further reinforces the “tenuous nature of all freelance gigs.”

“You have to be really discerning about what you’re taking on and who is sort of treating you what you’re worth,” Parsons said. “Because they’ll pay you as little as they possibly can.”

Compensation across the news industry has stagnated for years, with pay varying widely by role. Reporters and photographers at legacy newspapers tend to earn less than their counterparts in digital media, where editors and specialized digital positions often command higher salaries. The proliferation of online media and relatively low barriers to entry have driven the industry’s rapid expansion, giving rise to new roles and platforms that are redefining traditional notions of journalism.

"I Love All Of It"

“Parts of it are well-funded; other parts of it are not,” Guttman spoke to the dysfunctional news industry. “The economy is much more unstable, broadly speaking, than I can remember it being, and I’m talking globally.”

The journalism industry, like many others, is undergoing a signiﬁcant transition in response to the ever-changing world. Despite the challenges and uncertainties, Guttman said she remains grateful to be part of a dynamic field rich with opportunity. “Everything moves so fast now that you have to be highly adaptable, and being freelance forces me to be adaptable,” she said.

“It gives me great longevity and sustainability in my career,” Guttman continued. “One day I could be producing in West Africa, the next working on a deep investigative piece for a private client, then doing live shots outside Westminster, and later planning stories for a trip to Japan, and I love all of it.”

“I would never have that kind of diversity if I had a full-time, singular job, and I love the diversity,” she added. “It’s what keeps me stimulated and keeps me feeling fulﬁlled.”