Unemployment Benefits for Self-employed
Suggested by 
Tremayne Tatem
almost 4 years ago
"Aflac for the self-employed compensation."
Self-employed individuals want to have access to an insurance product that protects them against financial risks such as economic downturns or personal circumstances that prevent them from generating income.
This way they can feel confident that they have a safety net in place to support themselves and their families just in case of unexpected financial challenges and can focus on growing their business and pursuing their entrepreneurial goals.
- Many are turning to freelance: The Great Resignation isn’t just about workers moving from one full-time job to another; 20%, or 10 million Americans, are considering freelancing. Among those, 73% cite the ability to work remotely or flexibly as a reason why.
- Growth in the freelance workforce: The 10 million people considering freelancing would represent a significant 17 percent increase in the total freelance workforce when compared to the 57 million people that freelanced in all of 2019.
The Great Resignation, or the trend of workers moving from one full-time job to another, has resulted in 20% of Americans, or 10 million people, considering freelancing. Of those considering freelancing, 73% cited the ability to work remotely or flexibly as a key reason for doing so.
CEO @ Exotic Systems
Can insurance in the future be based on blockchain, smart contracts and Web3 without an insurance organization behind it?
Lead Product Manager @ Self Employed
Since self-employment is likely to increase in the future, this problem will only get worse. Almost all self-employed/sole proprietors try to collect their tax returns by the end of the year. Having affordable accounting services could allow them to deduct their expenses each month so that they have more capital to allocate for insurance. You can access cheaper insurance in CA with covered California, and you do not lose your insurance if you don't make a payment for up to 4 months. This problem is partially solved in CA.
Operations, Strategy & Culture @ Coterie
The biggest challenge here from an insurance perspective is defining the insurable event. Freelancers don't get laid off and they don't have a single source of income that starts/stops all at once. I have researched this pretty extensively and a true unemployment product requires "employment" to function.
GigEasy and other similar ideas can help address the underlying risk of episodic income that freelancers face, but it won't be unemployment, per se, is my view. You could also insure specific gigs, ie provide a payment if a contracted gig is cancelled, but, again, not the same as true unemployment insurance. The other challenge is making this affordable for the intended customer. Many are living way too hand-to-mouth to dedicate monthly cashflow to the "what ifs"