Free Agent Nation

1999 study by economists David Blanchflower of Dartmouth College and Andrew Oswald of the University of Warwick found that the self-employed have greater job satisfaction than any other group of U.S. workers. 23

“These are all byline occupations,” Charles Handy says of independent workers, “meaning that the individual is encouraged to put his or her name on the work.”

in the 1950s, due to the rise of television and a U.S. Supreme Court anti-trust decision that forced studios to divest themselves of their theaters, the studio-centered system crumbled and power shifted. The individual became preeminent, and the industry adapted itself to the individual’s rise. Today, the movie business works on a different model.

If you’re not worried about food, shelter, and other basics, then you might as well do something you enjoy, something that satisfies some higher needs. With many corporate environments still so

The buyer doesn’t purchase the person; the buyer rents that person’s abilities. Or in the case of a microbusiness like a taco stand, or a soloist like a freelance speechwriter, the buyer purchases not the person, but the artifact of the person’s abilities. Talent—performance, skill, and results—is what organizations and other buyers seek and what f

Large permanent organizations with fixed rosters of individuals are giving way to small, flexible networks with ever-changing collections of talent.

Thirty or forty million people attempting to self-actualize is staggering, if not a bit scary. And it has broad economic consequences, because for reasons that Maslow himself discovered as far back as 1962, one of the best—perhaps the best—mechanism for achieving self-actualization is work. “All human beings prefer meaningful work to meaningless wo

Working hard for a far-off reward is often a valuable exercise, but the act of work itself should produce its own intrinsic rewards. And since no position is permanent—but other positions are usually available and destitution is not around the bend—you might as well enjoy what you do. Produce quality work that’s a genuine reflection of who you are.

“Our work ethic? Work where and when it makes the most sense, doing the things you do better than anyone else.