No JSS or Badges can save us

[df8e60a9]

I wish everyone good luck in their work.

Software developers working with very low hourly wages are increasing day by day. And in the end, we can't find a job even at a very low price. Working cheaply to get business only works for the client. In this ocean, a client can already work with a freelancer. A low-price policy saves the day, but you can't make a profit in the long run.

We need to get away from this approach as soon as possible. There is nothing more absurd than doing the most popular job of the past 50 years for 3-5 dollars. We are not iron or wood masters who have been made for 1000 years. Even database data entry freelancers work for $30-40 an hour. I don't underestimate anyone's work, I just want to raise awareness of what we do.

Maybe you're aiming to make $3 an hour for a whole year, but stop for a second and think. What if you worked all year for $30 an hour? Same client, same platform. If no one bids low, everyone wins!

Unless we talk about this issue, we will always lose as freelancers.

Please give yourself and your business the value you deserve.
You cut the branch of the tree you are sitting on. You are sending us all into a swirling pit in the ocean.

No more work after this! No JSS or badges can save us.

Thank you for taking the time to read. I am not angry or offended by anyone. I am aware that we all have difficult living conditions.

[spectralua]

This is the market. Even if we collude and bet 100 each then the third one will come and bet 80. He will get his 80 and we will not get anything. You can't do anything with it.

[tjmisny]

Well said.  When you debase yourself by working for less than your worth you devalue the work of ALL freelancers / artists on the platform.  

The trouble is: Upwork incentivies us to debase ourselves to work more cheaply.

The "BEST MATCH" feature highlights a freelancer to a client who is one of, if not the cheapest option who has some kind of status on the platform.  Upwork nudges the freelancer to hire that cheaper option.  This creates tension where all more exeprienced/expensive freelancers feel pressure to lower their rates to get that job.

This is unlike the real world, where there is no "invisible hand" nudging a client to choose one product or service over another.  

Upwork should nudge clients towards more eperineced, talented workers and educate clients on seeing the value in experinece/skill/training/expertise.

Instead, Upwork just wants cheap labor because they know cheap labor is a quicker, easier buck to make.

The system is sick

The system is broken.

We must only work for what our true worth is.  

[tlsanders]

"you devalue the work of ALL freelancers / artists on the platform." 

I've been hearing people make this silly claim for the whole 32 years I've been freelancing. There's never been a moment that people weren't running around waving their arms and shouting about how people who worked cheap or free were ruining the market and the whole industry was due to collapse any minute because of it. Meanwhile, all of the professional freelancers I know have continued to steadily raise their rates across those years. 

[martina_plaschka]

Even database data entry freelancers work for $30-40 an hour.

No, jobs offering these rates are all scams. More like 3-5 per hour. 

[tlsanders]

"Same client, same platform. If no one bids low, everyone wins!"

This is silly. Do you honestly think a significant percentage of clients offering $120 for a full-time week will simply bump that to $1200/week if they don't get any bids low enough for their budget? A few will, perhaps, and some others may bump up to $5 or even $8...but the average client who wants to pay $6,000/year is not going to simply increase that to $60,000--many of them aren't even making $60,000 themselves.