2001 Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangements — 2001-05-24

From February 1999 to February 2001, the proportion of U.S. workers holding contingent jobs edged down, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Contingent workers are persons who do not expect their jobs to last or who report that their jobs are temporary. Using three alternative measures, contingent workers accounted for 1.7 percent to 4.0 percent of total employment in February 2001, compared with 1.9 percent to 4.3 percent in February 1999. (See table A.) The broadest measure of contingency is well below that recorded in February 1995 (4.9 percent), when the survey was first conducted. The drop in the contingency rate over the period coincided with declining unemployment and increasing employment. The analysis in this release focuses on the broadest measure of contingency, which includes 5.4 million workers who do not expect their current job to last.