5 ways freelancers are making the world a better place to live

The meteoric rise of new startups in both the developed and developing countries owe so much to the work of freelancers

As the world is becoming smaller and distances are getting closer with every passing day, nations, businesses and individuals are getting more interdependent. Businesses and recruiters are hiring people from around the world, making international borders meaningless. Freelancers now have access to platforms where they can offer services and get jobs. Freelancers are not only the people who are offering their expert services from the comfort of their homes and earning their livelihoods with a lot of freedom, but they are also making this world a better place for us all to live. This article will give you five reasons how freelancers are making this world a better place just by doing what they are doing.

Freelancers are bringing the servers and clients closer from around the globe

Freelancers in possession of a vast spectrum of skill sets offer their services to clients all over the world, in this way they increase people to people contact from countries situated in distant corners of the world. This is a good thing for the quarrelsome human family. Freelancers are not diplomats but they are inadvertently bringing the world closer. Freelancers working on platforms using internet represent a professional class that is a true representative of that part of humanity who earn a living by working on a day to day of a project to project basis.

Freelancers are improving the accessibility to expert services for everyone

It is true that freelancers are not the people, who work in an environment characterised by a hierarchical structure of an office setup bound by a time frame from 9 to 5, but this is also true that freelancers are that group of professionals who work without restrictions of a time frame and whose services can be acquired at any time. This remarkable flexibility of timings ensures accessibility of services to clients and optimises availability of the same to those who need them. Most freelancers come from countries with low costs of living this means individuals and businesses in the developed world can have access to cheap work force without any additional costs.

Freelancers are improving the quality and affordability of services for clients around the world

Freelancing know very well how hard it is to survive and succeed in a market that offers cutthroat competition. Success and recognition doesn’t come easy in the freelancing world, it takes grueling labour and gigantic amount of stress, fruit of which is ever increasing quality and competitiveness of services. Fierce competition keeps the prices of services within natural limits of affordability even though this reality may not be particularly liked by the freelancers themselves. Businesses and clients around the world can benefit from this availability of low price services without violating any laws in their countries.

Freelancers earn and contribute to the GDP of their countries

According to a recent report by Oxford Internet Institute (OII) 55% of all freelancers live in four densely populated developing countries namely India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Philippines. Forty per cent of them belong to India and Bangladesh alone. Freelancers in these countries are contributing to the GDP of their countries, and their share is increasing day by day. Indian freelancers contribute $400 billion to the GDP of their country. Similarly freelancers earned more than one billion dollars for Pakistan in 2017. Moreover, in other countries, freelancers are earning foreign exchange for their countries by working remotely for clients abroad.

Freelancers are fueling entrepreneurialism and helping businesses grow and above all are empowering millennials around the world

New businesses depend heavily on availability of affordable yet reliable professional services and cheap human resources. Freelancers are the people who make sure this availability of reliable and accessible professional services, for this reason freelancers play vital role in the success of new startups. The meteoric rise of new startups in both the developed and developing countries owe so much to the work of freelancers residing in distant parts of the world working remotely for their clients. According to a research 43% of the freelancers are millennials and this percentage is increasing. Freelancing economy empowers millennials not only financially but also helps them land in leadership roles in different field.

The writer is affiliated with the Education Department of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and is pursuing MPhil in Education

ePaper - Nawaiwaqt