Known as the key financial hub to Southeast Asia and one of the world’s most developed nations, Singapore has long maintained a tradition of embracing new work trends to stay ahead of the international curve and sustain economic growth. One major trend that has caught on among workers and enterprises alike is the “gig economy”, characterised by flexible contract work arrangements.
More companies are augmenting their in-house teams with help from freelancers, reaping the benefits in flexibility, cost savings, and wider talent pools beyond one’s jurisdiction. At the same time, freelancers welcome the opportunity to have greater control over one’s schedule and/or work arrangement all while earning a liveable or even lucrative wage.
To concretise just how far this creative freelance industry has developed and showcase how freelancing can be a sustainable career path for creative professionals, the State of Creative Freelancers in Singapore Survey Report 2023 was conducted. Here are the results.
While we did not manage to survey the entirety of Singapore, the Ministry of Manpower’s (MOM) annual Comprehensive Labour Force Survey shows that the number of individuals engaged in “own account” work has risen steadily from 228,200 in 2020 to 248,500 in 2021 and subsequently 257,300 in 2022. Own account work is a subcategory of self-employment, where workers choose not to engage with their employees on a continuous basis but instead work on projects that they manage completely on their own or with a partner.
Despite the challenges of freelancing, the number of individuals engaging in own account work by choice increased from 177,700 in 2021 to 188,600. An overwhelming majority cited flexibility (72%) as a pull factor, with freedom (41%) and having control over one’s career (27%) mentioned as well. These statistics were also corroborated by the CreativesAtWork in-house survey, where 84% of our freelancers confirmed that their participation in the gig economy was done by choice.
Owing to the recovering economic conditions of 2022, the number of freelancers relying on gig work as their primary source of income did fall as expected from 24,100 in 2021 to 14,000 in 2022. However, full-time freelancers still formed 8.3% of Singapore’s employed residency, maintaining the trend of 8% to 10% Singaporeans being full-time freelancers over the past decade.
The average age of freelancers surveyed by CreativesAtWork was 35 years old. Anecdotally, leaders and project managers within the agency have noted a growing number of younger freelancers entering the gig economy. That said, we must also stress that there are advantages to freelancing at a later age where one has accumulated more experience and connections within their industry.
The creative industry may be traditionally thought to attract more females, but interestingly, 3 out of 5 freelancers surveyed by CreativesAtWork identified themselves as male, with the number of females falling just short of half at 40%.
Are freelancers considered to be qualified professionals?
61.2% and 28.6% of freelancers in CreativesAtWork hold a degree and diploma respectively. Often, the freelancer’s education supports the work that they engage in, whether it be in Communications, Digital Marketing, 3D Animation, Design, or other creative fields.
In addition, 55.1% of freelancers at CreativesAtWork have at least five years of professional experience, with 20.4% of the entire pool having worked in the gig economy for more than a decade.
Singapore’s high cost of living is world renowned. Software company ECA International ranked Singapore as the 8th most expensive expatriate location in 2022 shortly before Swiss banking corporation Julius Baer Group gave the city the unenviable title of being the world’s most expensive location in 2023.
Coupled with global inflationary pressures, it’s easy to understand why more risk averse individuals may be deterred from the seemingly less secure path of freelancing. Undeniably, freelancing income can be irregular from month to month, but a closer look at the numbers reveals a surprising picture.
40% of freelancers at CreativesAtWork earn more than $5,000 per month. That’s comparable to the median salary of $5,070 for full time workers in Singapore. The number of freelancers earning beyond the $3,000 threshold stands at an impressive 76%, a sum that is sizably more than the median $2,600 salary brought home by Polytechnic graduates in 2022.
Bearing in mind that the majority of freelancers have multiple sources of income, some of which includes full-time jobs, it is likely that the average freelancer’s take-home pay exceeds the average worker by a significant sum.
Even in the case of full-time freelancers, what they don’t bring home in cash may be made up for in time. That is, freelancers are likely to earn much more on an hourly basis, allowing themselves to take home a comparable salary to their full-time counterparts without pulling the same amount of hours in overtime.
Take a Website Developer who pockets an average of $2,750 per website, for example. One website alone is enough for them to nearly hit the $2,906 living wage benchmark purported by a 2021 study from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKYSPP). Furthermore, the developer has the freedom to decide whether he wishes to multiply his earnings by taking on more web building projects simultaneously, or take home a smaller sum each month in exchange for more free time.
Such flexibility makes the freelancing career path suitable for individuals with caretaking responsibilities, health ailments, and other personal commitments that prevent them from working traditional 9-to-5 roles at full capacity. The good thing about this flexibility is that individuals are free to scale up their efforts to rake in more earnings whenever their living situation turns around. More entrepreneurial freelancers may even opt to outsource repetitive projects to junior creatives so as to onboard more clients or dedicate themselves to fresh endeavors.
To learn more about how the gig economy is doing and how top freelancers are setting themselves up for success, download the full State of Creative Freelancers in Singapore Survey Report 2023.
If you’re a fellow freelancer, join the Freelancer Nation community to get featured and land gigs faster. To learn more about freelancing, visit our Freelancing 101 Elearning platform or listen to our Freelance Creative Exchange Podcast on Spotify. Finally, you may stay updated on the latest in freelancing by subscribing to our monthly newsletter.
The State of Creative Freelancers in Singapore Survey Report 2023 was conducted by CreativesAtWork, a Singapore-based full-service creative ecosystem for original content creation, project management, and training.
Launched in 2012, CreativesAtWork (also known as CAW) boasts a curated network of over 1,500 freelance creative professionals, one of the largest in Asia. More than just a middleman, CAW frequently partners with government, labour agencies, and private businesses to train and upskill freelancers who step through the CAW door. To date, the CAW family has completed over 3,000 projects worth more than S$12 million in total project value.
