COMP NEWS – A new study by 99designs, a freelance design platform, recently uncovered that nearly half of all freelance designers turned down work in 2021. The number one reason for turning down work was a disagreement on a social issue.
…according to the freelance design platform 99designs, nearly half of all freelance designers turned down work last year. Why? It wasn’t due to money or project scope. It was that the designers disagreed with a client’s stance on a social topic they cared about.
The finding comes from a massive annual poll run by 99designs, which gauges responses from over 10,000 freelance designers to create something of a State of the Union on the industry
Here are the 8 issues that are most important to freelance designers:
- Healthcare/public health
- Climate change
- Racial justice
- Income equality
- Child welfare
- Immigration
- Food security
- LGBTQA+ equality
The survey results also show that nearly one-third of all designers working for agencies quit their job in 2020. Almost half of the designers working for agencies claimed to have considered quitting.
These findings are particularly salient, because designers are part of the Great Resignation we’re seeing across industries since COVID-19 began. One in five designers on 99designs actually works for an agency, yet nearly half of them said they considered leaving their job last year. And among freelancers who reported working at agencies, a third actually quit their job last year.
At the same time that designers are refusing work, nearly two-thirds of the work designers do for social justice organizations is performed free of charge.
Indeed, 76% of polled designers said they would like to do work for a social justice organization, while nearly a third currently do; 66% of that philanthropic work is done pro bono.
To read more about 99designs’ survey, click here.
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