7.

Know the Nature of the New Labor Market

Here are some of the trends that will affect your ability to find work:

• Outsourcing. The outsourcing industry has grown approximately 10 percent every year since 2005 and now has a market value of about $370 billion.
• Offshoring. An estimated 1,000,000 jobs now held by Americans will be offshored this year. That's on top of an estimated 3,000,000 manufacturing jobs that have been lost since 1998 and over 500,000 service and IT jobs that have moved overseas in recent years.
• Temps, contract workers, and consultants. Close to 10,000,000 people are hired in the United States every year, and only about 80 percent of them work full time.

Adding to the issue is that the power of unions has been declining. In 2012, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 11.3 percent of workers were members of a union. In 1983 (the first year for which comparable data are available), the union membership rate was 20.1 percent.

If you're entering or re-entering the workforce—after losing a job, changing careers, or finishing school—these are some of the circumstances you can look forward to. Their inevitable results: downsizing, layoffs, and early retirement. Every time I read about a merger, I know the next bit of news will be that the new company is cutting its workforce. More and more workers are on their own now, and it's important that you understand this—and prepare yourself.

Remember how the very first tip in this book was “Distinguish What Is from the Way You'd Like Things to Be”? The sad truth about “what is” is that companies can show you the door at a moment's notice—often for reasons having nothing to do with your performance. Don't get too upset for too long. This is the new normal.

You are either an asset or a liability. When your employer terminates your employment and tells you “It's nothing personal,” believe them. Labor costs are usually a company's biggest expense, so it's often the first thing they cut when they need to trim their budget. Like anything else—furniture, parking spaces, water coolers, etc.—you're either an asset or a liability, and you can move from one column to the other overnight.

You're like rented furniture. In the world of higher education, I call adjunct professors—who do the majority of the teaching—”migrant workers with degrees.” Don't be insulted and don't fight it. Your talents are used (hopefully not misused) for as long as they're valuable to others—and then returned to where you came from when you're no longer of use.

These are the realities you need to accept to meet the challenges of the new freelance marketplace.