

“I think that having a side hustle and then transforming it in a business, if it works, is probably the best and easiest way to make money and build wealth in the long term. Masetti’s intention with being open about her side income is to inspire other people to build long-term wealth. Individuals view side hustles as new opportunities that they can share with others to entice others to join them in their success.” “In short, individuals are proud of what they are accomplishing. “Side-hustles release the ‘inner entrepreneur’ in individuals – so talking about their earnings is one way to demonstrate their success,” says Jennifer Nahrgang, a professor of management and entrepreneurship at the University of Iowa, US. She posts on Twitter about how she grows her websites and makes money from them through ad revenues, which average to £3,500 ($4,365) per month. She started the venture as a hobby in the pandemic, and saw the potential of turning it into a lucrative income stream.

In Spain, remote-worker Sira Masetti, 34, a quality auditor at Amazon, maintains an online side hustle publishing websites about niche topics such as self-improvement and relationships. What’s driving the difference – and will it change? Yet there’s a flip side – as open as these side hustlers are about their off-hours income, many still stay tight-lipped about how much they earn from their 9-to-5 jobs. Many of these people report disclosing their entrepreneurial incomes to inspire others to grow their own ventures, or encourage them to build long-term wealth. On TikTok, the hashtag "pay transparency" has amassed 511.1m views and “side hustle income” 7.6m views, respectively, as of this writing. It’s not just Gen Z participating in this – people across different age groups now have the platforms to publicly disclose their income, and advocate for pay transparency as well. She says it’s because she has creative freedom and control over her work, unlike in a corporate job where she has a fixed role, and must meet the company’s expectations and operate within the parameters set by them.Īs the number of people with side hustles increases, especially among young workers, so has the trend of earnings transparency among some of them. Yet she feels entirely differently about discussing earnings around her secondary career. “I've always grown up just assuming that you're not allowed to discuss salaries with your colleagues … I've just never questioned it because no one ever discusses it.”

“It was only maybe a few years ago I even realised that it wasn’t illegal to mention how much you earned to colleagues,” she says. However, she has never publicly disclosed her corporate salary: even though she’s transparent about her side-hustle earnings and £36,000 debt elimination, she still believes discussing pay with full-time colleagues is taboo.

She believes talking about side income could help others meet their financial goals. Through her YouTube channel, Frimpong, 35, openly shares her financial journey. She’s on a mission to make £25,000 ($31,423) each year from her side hustles – and she wants everyone to know. But in addition to her corporate role, she is a content creator and financial coach, earning income from freelance writing, brand partnerships, affiliate marketing and one-to-one financial coaching. During her 9-to-5, Tolu Frimpong is a marketing manager based in south-east London.
