The path to financial freedom used to be pretty straightforward. You could work a steady job and live well below your means while investing in safe stocks and bonds, then pull out a large sum of money years later and enjoy a relaxed lifestyle. Nowadays, things are a bit different. The best route to financial freedom is by working two full-time remote jobs.
NATIONAL | Overemployed.com is making waves for its controversial and surprisingly common doctrine. Rather than work your way up the corporate ladder, just get multiple full-time entry-level jobs in a remote field and collect a combined yearly salary in the high 6-figures. While this approach seems like it is teetering on the line of legality, it is not a criminal offense and carries no legal repercussions, provided that you are not bound to an NDA or similar contracts.
Those that take part in this “overemployment” are usually in the tech field and can manage this feat by leveraging the lack of workers in the specialized software development industry. Due to the nature of this industry, finding employees who can complete the work is difficult. This results in employers choosing to keep low-production employees because the alternative would be to have no employees at all. The extra security this provides for the workers allows them to partake in “overemployment.” The over-employed workers will then choose which jobs require minimal effort and which jobs require more. From here, the employee can decide which job is more important and give the selected job extra attention for a sense of security, or they can choose to find even more minimal effort positions and net an even higher end-of-year salary.
Whereas a traditional job would have candidates consider advancement opportunities and pay raises. Overemployed workers look to secure severance packages. To the over-employed, getting fired from a job is not a cause for concern but rather a pay bump before they find their next position. The endless amounts of tech jobs available on the market allow for these employees to shift seamlessly from job to job, even after losing one.
How Do Overemployed Workers Manage This?
As stated prior, the fact that employers are willing to keep a low-production employee over the absence of one is a major factor in “overemployment” being possible from the corporate standpoint. Another aiding factor is that many jobs are tracked via a task list rather than the time clock. Meaning that employers are looking to see if the assigned task was completed, not that the employee worked 8 hours. From the individual stance, it can be a bit tricky. To pull this off, over-employed workers must have rather high levels of stress management – being able to track multiple projects and bounce between meetings and calls. However, Overemployed.com provides workers with tips and guides on how to handle these situations, even providing guidance on what to do when there are two meetings going on at the same time.
“Overemployment” is an interesting new concept to come into the spotlight. However, it is yet to be considered good or bad. While it does allow for individuals to complete the work asked of them and collect high yearly salaries, it also takes advantage of companies and their other employees who may have to pick up the slack of an individual who is not working to their full capability. As time proceeds, we will surely hear more about the subject and be better able to label it as justifiable work practice.
