This is how the text exchange ends.Not with an explicit farewell but with a two-day pause followed by a thumbs-up-emoji reaction. This is how the career ends.Not with a retirement party and a gold watch but with a second career in the gig economy. This is how doing laundry ends.Not with crisp, clean bedding but with your sheet coming out of the dryer balled up in your duvet cover, still soaking wet.
In theory our map should guide a worker through a route that is the best route they should take," Goldstein, a one-time top spokesperson for former Mayor Bill de Blasio, told Council members. "We don't take into account the speed of the delivery. What we look at is if the route that the worker took matches the route that we recommended.
"Adjustments related to tips from earlier periods may relate to different reasons depending on your impacted tips, including cases where customers were not charged for those tips," the message read.
Your $45K starting salary looked decent on paper until reality hit. The reality is that's the same $15/hour everyone was making in 2008. And it sucked then. Rent swallows half your paycheck before you even think about groceries. Student loans demand their monthly tribute like a financial overlord. And that emergency fund your parents keep mentioning? Please. This isn't an avocado toast issue. This is a laptop is required to function at work... even apply to work... issue.
Ansari plays Arj, a struggling documentary editor in L.A. who makes money by working part-time at a hardware store and a Taskrabbit-style company called "Task Sergeant," where his tasks can range from waiting in line for people who want viral cinnamon buns to organizing messy garages. It's grueling and demeaning work which leaves Arj subject to the whims of unforgiving clients who stiff him on payment for things that are outside of his control (the cinnamon buns run out before his turn in line.)
In writer / director Julian Glander's new animated sci-fi feature Boys Go to Jupiter, a young gig worker named Billy 5000 ( Planet Money's Jack Corbett) hoverboards his way through life in Florida with only one thing on his mind: he needs $5,000 and is willing to deliver as much food as it takes to make the cash. At first, the delivery guy's semi-magical, "let's get this bread" style of thinking seems to stem from his fixation on a hustlebro streamer's videos.
Daniel Medved, a single dad of three in Seattle, said his situation limits him to only fully remote roles, which shrinks his application pool. He said his company has been more than helpful when it comes to raising his family. "Flexibility has been the single most powerful retention tool that my company has had," Medved said. He needs to get his two daughters and son ready for school daily and "If you add a commute to that, the math doesn't work."
Megha Yethadka, global head of Uber AI Solutions, revealed the new gigs in a Thursday LinkedIn post in which she said drivers sometimes have downtime during the day or might want to make some extra cash after hours. Yethadka said the work can involve reviewing photos, counting objects, classifying text, recording audio, or digitizing receipts. She said the gigs are "Powering our enterprise customers worldwide for their gen AI models or consumer applications."
The gig economy isn't just about food delivery or ridesharing anymore. It's grown into a space where skilled workers can turn expertise into real, sustainable income. Many of the best opportunities now go beyond quick cash and offer meaningful, long-term potential. Successful gig workers today aren't just chasing tasks; they're building client relationships and honing specialized skills that pay more. This shift transforms gig work from side hustles into thriving independent careers. Here are 12 gigs that can truly be worth your time.
In a surprising deal that was somewhat brokered by Gavin Newsom, Uber and Lyft are going to let their 800,000 California rideshare drivers unionize and get collective bargaining rights, though drivers can still refuse to join the union. According to the union group SEIU California, there are now 800,000 rideshare drivers in the state, and that's one out every 24 California workers who are at least sometimes gig drivers. And Uber and Lyft have traditionally been notoriously resistant to giving them minimum wage guarantees or any form of job benefits.
Here's what astonishes me: sometimes those with the most are the least generous. One DoorDash shift, I delivered a $40 order to a family in an upscale neighborhood - almost a 20-minute drive from the restaurant, with homes easily worth over $1 million. They tipped $3. After accounting for the distance from the store to the customer's home, I made the equivalent of $8.50 an hour for that Panera run.
DoorDash has called the proposal "extreme" and said it "puts delivery and the benefits it brings at risk." And "when app lobbyists talk, many Council members pay close attention," writes The City's Claudia Irizarry Aponte.
It was super structured and ran like a well-oiled machine; I needed a little more ownership and a little more chaos. After about three years, I quit to scale my side business: I'm a full-stack email marketer who creates email campaigns - including email copy, design, development, and implementation - for direct-to-consumer and business-to-business companies globally. I use the platform Fiverr to find clients. My prices range from $100 for a single brief to $3,000+ per month for a done-for-you service.
"Have a Grubby day!" is a frequent refrain in Julian Glander's Boys Go to Jupiter. It's the catchphrase for Grubster, a Grubhub-esque food-delivery service for which Billy works, reflecting his life's humiliations in the gig economy.
I was born into and raised by people who struggled to set goals and provide for their kids, so I knew I wanted something better for my own when I decided to settle down. Unfortunately, to give my son the best future possible, I had to give up any concept of retiring.
I started as a freelance crowd worker on Amazon Mechanical Turk...Now, I do everything from training AI voice assistants to rewriting chatbot responses.
