Jobs can be rollercoasters: one minute you're stressed out then the next you're happily trucking along.
Insurance website Insurance Quotes recently surveyed more than 1,000 working Americans across different career types and generations to uncover how they feel about their work. The study compared the feelings of people by employment type, including freelancers, self-employed workers, salaried employees, hourly employees and people who have a base pay plus tips.
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From work-life balance to job security, different career paths have different negatives and positives. Here are some facts about how people in different job types feel about their work.
Turns out people enjoy being their own boss. Entrepreneurs and other self-employed workers are some of the happiest working Americans today. On a scale of 1 to 7, self-employed scored 5.4 on the happiness spectrum, placing them above salaried and hourly workers.
Out of all employment types, freelancers are far more stressed than other workers -- even the self-employed. According to the survey, almost all freelancers (92.9 percent) said they were unhappy about the stress their jobs bring. However, all of the surveyed freelancers said they were happy with their job's flexibility.
Bad co-workers can be a nightmare. And employees who earn a base pay plus tip say that their co-workers are one of the worst aspects of their job. In fact, nearly two-thirds said their co-workers made them unhappy.
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Today, more and more people are juggling multiple jobs -- in fact, approximately 7.6 million Americans do, according to Bureau of Labor statistics. Overall, when it comes to most job aspects such as flexibility, work environment, responsibilities and stress, people who have more than one job are happier. However, people with more than one job are more negative when it comes to work-life balance and pay rate.
When it comes to affording a medical checkup or medical emergencies, people with multiple jobs are not as confident than people with one in their ability to pay for these events. Sixty-six percent of people with one job say they are comfortable paying for routine medical checkups, while only 58 percent of workers with multiple jobs said this.
People who only have one job were found to be more confident in their finances when it came to growing or starting a family and saving for retirement. Only one in four workers with multiple jobs felt comfortably about growing a family, while 34 percent of people who only work one job said so.
Across generations, baby boomers who are either self-employed or freelancing are most likely working two jobs. Compared to millennials and gen Xers, twice as many freelancing baby boomers have more than one job at a time.
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Compared to other generations of workers who carry multiple jobs, gen Xers are bringing in the most weekly income from their side hustles. Twenty-one percent of these gen Xers are bringing in $300 or more every week, while only 13 percent of millennials and 18 percent of boomers bring in this much.
