Millennials, Generation Z: Money-chasers or survivors of the gig economy?

Unlike Korea's baby boomers, who prioritize lifetime jobs, individualistic younger generations juggle multiple jobs

By Lee Gyu-lee

Korea's baby boomers were educated to focus all their energy on one particular area of interest, at which they excelled and outperformed all others. They would keep honing their skills to be the best in one area of specialization. Lifetime job security in that field was assumed.

Unlike their parents' generation, Millennials and Generation Z, or "MZ," a portmanteau covering the two younger generations (born between 1981 and 2012), take on multiple jobs to figure out which area suits them best. Taking on multiple jobs doesn't necessarily lead to them having a single focus on one profession. Living in the gig economy, in which large numbers of people are part-timers, independent contractors or freelancers, they know all too well about job insecurity in the labor market, thus they try to prepare for their own future by diversifying their income sources.

The preponderance of the younger generation juggling several different jobs has created the new Konglish term, "N-Jobber," which refers to a person who holds "N" number of jobs.

Freelancer Merry Seo, whose real name is Seo Eu-ra, is one of these N-jobbers. She is identified professionally with six different jobs: she is the author of several books, a self-publisher, a translator, an illustrator, a lecturer and a content creator with her own YouTube channel, which has 76,000 subscribers.

"The main reason I have six different jobs is that I wanted to do more than one thing. In the past, people were advised to choose 'one job well' ― probably the most plausible and profitable ― to dig into it, and to give up the rest of the things you want to do," Seo told The Korea Times.

"But nowadays, with the expansion of different platforms and more access to information, there's no need for us to stick to only one job."

According to a survey, last month, by local job portal Albamon, of 1,324 current full-time employees, 22.3 percent said they had a side job or engaged in multiple jobs, while the 68.9 percent of those who said they hadn't added that they were interested in or seeking an additional job.

Regarding the reasons behind their choice to take on a side job or multiple jobs, nearly half of people in their 20s and 30s answered that they wanted "to try out different types of work," followed by those who responded that they did so "for self-fulfillment."

Seo explained that the biggest advantage of juggling different jobs is that she can explore different options to find her abilities and the work that fits her best.

"There are things in our life that we'll never be able to find out unless we try them directly. Although I wasn't sure at first, I came to discover my talents in certain fields while actually experiencing them myself," she said.

Suh Yong-gu, a professor of management at Sookmyung Women's University, noted that the digital-friendly, individualistic character of members of the MZ generation has fueled the trend of them working side or multiple jobs.

"The MZ generation has distinctive characteristics: they have less loyalty to the company or organization they belong to and rather have higher loyalty towards themselves," he said. "At the same time, they are a generation of (economic) instability."

The professor explained that Korea's low-growth, volatile economic situation, with a growing inflation rate and skyrocketing housing prices, has raised the anxiety levels of the younger generation.

"The MZ generation is understood to have an unstable future. For example, they aren't able to buy a house even if they save 100 percent of their income over many years working at a company…. So, unlike baby boomers, they don't want to commit themselves to one job, because they know it's not going to work," he said.

"They are the generation that spent their childhood during the era of Korea's rapid economic growth, meaning that they have high standards and expectations in terms of their lifestyle, as well as a tendency to be keen on high-end goods such as luxury brands. But these goods are becoming more and more expensive."

In order both to quell their economic anxieties and fulfill their desire for professional satisfaction, the younger generation is seeking to diversify their work portfolios, to diversify them in terms of risk and to get a higher return on their labor.

"They are exploring different jobs, similarly to how corporations diversify their business portfolios, to increase their chances of being successful, because they don't know which of their jobs will hit the target," he said.

With the growing MZ generation population seeking multiple or side jobs, gig working platforms are booming and new platforms and services are emerging to offer diverse sources of income.

The number of users registered as delivery workers through the Baemin Connect service has grown five-fold since 2019. Courtesy of Woowa Brothers

The popular food delivery app, Baedal Minjok, launched the Baemin Connect service in 2019, which allows people to work as part-time delivery workers using the transportation means of their choice: by car, bicycle, electric scooter or foot. The service now has about 50,000 users registered as delivery workers, which is five-fold that of pre-pandemic times: only 10,000 in December 2019.

Retail giant Eland teamed up with tech giant Kakao to start the e-commerce platform, Qual Qual, and has been running the beta service since February before its official launch. The platform allows users to send a link for a product to their friends through Kakao's messaging app and to collect a percentage of the sales if a friend purchases the product.

Kakao launched another platform, Kakao View, on its messaging app earlier this month. The collective platform provides a page that includes links to various content, ranging from news and blog posts to music and videos.

The service offers users cash-like incentives for users to make their own boards, curated with different categories of content ― similar to making their own playlists ― and to share them with other users.

Seo noted that the easier access to different sources of income has contributed to the growth of this trend.

"Having more than one job has become much easier than before. It's become easier to search through the internet or to start a business with little or no base costs through various platforms, including social media," she said.

Professor Suh added that he believes that this trend may settle into the labor market as a pattern. "Living a portfolio life with multiple, diverse jobs may continue into the future even after the MZ generation," he said, adding that it was crucial to set some standards in order to balance between gig jobs and primary employment, in order to carry out all of them efficiently.