Having a single job no longer seems enough for an increasing proportion of workers in the United States. The phenomenon that for years has been associated mainly with people who needed to complement low wages now spreads among middle-income employees, professionals with university studies and young women.
Recent data shows a change in the profile of those who have more than one job. The search for additional income no longer only responds to the need to reach the end of the month, but also to the desire to have greater economic protection against a labour market that has become less predictable.
A Richmond Federal Reserve analysis found that the distribution of workers with multiple jobs was much more uniform before the pandemic. At that time, people with low, middle and high incomes had relatively similar rates of multiple employment. The situation began to change in the following years.
Medium-income workers have become one of the groups that is most resorting to a second source of income. According to the analysis of the Richmond Federal Reserve, they are currently more likely to have multiple jobs than low-income workers and are close to the levels observed among those with higher incomes.
The change is significant because it breaks with the traditional idea that having two or more jobs is mainly a strategy used by households with less resources.
For part of the middle class, second employment can represent a way to accumulate additional money, reduce dependence on a single salary, or have an alternative source of income in case of loss of the main job.
Another major change is at the educational level. During the 1990s, people with university studies accounted for approximately 35% of workers with multiple jobs. By 2024, that group already exceeded half of those who had more than one job, according to the analysis of the Richmond Federal Reserve.
The data points to a transformation in the profile of the worker seeking additional income. Having a university degree and occupying a professional position no longer means necessarily relying on a single source of income.
In some cases, the second job may be related to skills acquired in the professional career; in others, it may be completely different activities aimed at generating an additional income.
The phenomenon also has a gender dimension. The latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) shows an increase in the number of women who have more than one job. As a result, the gap between men and women within the multi-employment labour market has expanded.
Among people aged 20 to 24, multiple employment has gained presence in recent years.
This behavior coincides with other changes recorded in the labour market. Women already outperform men in the number of people with university degrees and, in certain sectors and age groups, some young workers have reached higher incomes than their male peers.
The decision to have two jobs does not necessarily mean that a person is going through immediate economic difficulties. For some workers, motivation may be related to uncertainty about what may happen to their primary job.
The job market has experienced major redundancies and changes in certain sectors, while artificial intelligence is raising concern among office workers about the impact it could have on some jobs.
In this context, relying on a single salary can feel like a higher risk.
If the primary job disappears, a second source of income could function as a backup while the worker seeks a new opportunity.
The growth also appears in surveys on secondary jobs. A Bankrate measurement shows that the percentage of Americans reporting having a secondary job rose from 19% in 2017 to 27% in 2025.
However, official statistics may not fully capture the magnitude of the phenomenon.
One reason is that BLS measurement on multi-employment workers focuses on people who have at least one traditional wage employment. Occasional activities, independent work, small, or certain self-employment tasks may be excluded from this calculation.
Therefore, the actual number of people who generate income through more than one activity could be higher than what is reflected in traditional labor statistics.
The trend can also be understood from the perception that workers have about the labour market.
A person who leaves his current position to accept another opportunity may find himself in greater difficulty if the new job does not work as expected.
At the same time, workers perceive that convincing someone to leave a stable job has become more complicated. In an uncertain scenario, keeping the main job and adding an additional activity may seem like a less risky alternative.
So, instead of putting everything in a job change, some employees choose to keep their job and build a second source of income in parallel.
Multiple employment growth shows that having a second source of income is no longer a practice associated exclusively with lower-wage workers.
The data point to an increasing participation of middle-income workers, university graduates and women, groups seeking new ways to strengthen their financial position.
The strategy can respond to different goals: earning more money, saving, paying expenses, increasing economic independence or simply having an alternative to a possible loss of the main job.
In a labor market marked by redundancies, technological changes and increased uncertainty, the second employment is acquiring a different function. For many workers, it is no longer just a way to earn more, but also a way to reduce dependence on a single income and build a larger financial mattress.
