The Human Capital of the Freelancers and Their Satisfaction with the Quality of Life

Abstract

Digital technologies are underpinning a wide range of products, services, processes, and business model innovations that are significantly transforming industries, organizations, and society. They are increasingly permeating every aspect of our daily lives. In this paper, we looked at the challenges of digitalization, leading to a new way of working in the market and new business models, such as the gig economy. Individuals are becoming more mobile and self-directed in their careers, as opposed to traditional careers. We investigated the demographic characteristics of the new, growing group of self-employed, so-called freelancers, at the national level in Slovenia and investigated the relationships between human capital and their subjective (job and career satisfaction, life satisfaction) and objective success (income satisfaction). The survey was conducted among 200 freelancers (respondents). The empirical results show that most Slovenian freelancers working from home work in professional, scientific, and technical occupations; are between 35 and 44 years old; have completed the second level of tertiary education; work more than 40 hours per week; and have 16 years or more of work experience. To explore the quality of life of freelancers, empirical analysis showed that human capital factors are important for the success of a new career as a freelancer. The results show that freelancers’ human capital factors (education and experience, skills, and training) positively influence subjective and objective success. Using structural equation modeling, we also confirmed that human capital has a greater impact on freelancers’ subjective success (life satisfaction, career satisfaction) than on objective success (income satisfaction), suggesting that job and life satisfaction should be considered an important resource that freelancers rely on to determine their quality of life.

The relationship between working in the “gig” economy and perceived subjective well-being in Western Balkan countries

“…Furthermore, their subjective well-being may vary depending on their motives for joining this kind of economy and the source of income that it provides, as previous studies have shown ( Huđek et al, 2021 ). This paper found similar results, showing differences in satisfaction levels based on two main factors.…”

Personal and Professional Balance Among Freelance Workers: A Statusquo Analysis

“…The study, which showed that skills had a positive and meaningful impact on employment and job satisfaction, was consistent with this. This was supported by the study of Hudek et al (2021) where explained by the fact that successful freelancers working for themselves, generally more than 40 hours per week, and in the competitive market lack the time for extra training or even have insufficient knowledge of opportunities for their personal growth in their country.…”

Empirical Analysis of Population Urbanization and Residents’ Life Satisfaction—Based on 2017 CGSS

“…According to the theory of exploitation, the life benefits output by individuals with different human capital is different. The higher human capital is, the lower the sense of relative exploitation is, the more the sense of social fairness they have, and the higher the individual life satisfaction is [10,28,62]. Therefore, this paper puts forward the following assumption: Hypothesis 2 (H2).…”

“…There are few studies on the impact of population urbanization on human capital [74][75][76] and family capital [77,78] accumulation, but from the perspective of urbanization, it is found that the process of urbanization will affect various aspects of society [79][80][81]. In the process of population urbanization, the change in social population structure will improve the basic platform of the individual [10,62], and the individual human capital will be enhanced [75]. In the process of land urbanization, integrating land resources will drive the construction of enterprise resources [82] and provide employment opportunities for labor to promote human capital and family capital at the same time [83].…”

“…Life satisfaction is not only the preferred index to describe happiness but also an important index to describe the quality of life [6], which can evaluate the individuals' life status at that period [7]. With the emergence of the global aging problem, sociological research has focused on the elder, paying closer attention to their demographic characteristics [8], physical health status [9], human capital [10], family capital [11], living environment [12] and social care [13] for the elderly. Some current research results show that with the increase in age, individual life satisfaction will significantly decrease [14], especially when there is economic tension in old age [15].…”