Outsourced

How bad must things be when you see a third world freelancer complaining about the low payments being offered for online jobs? I’m just asking because it’s actually happening right now in front of your eyes. I am a Brazilian, and as such I am used to low wages, but even I am disgusted by the state of affairs in the web freelancing market.

When I first began to work through the oDesk system I was quite impressed. Finally I had a way to offer my skills world-wide and work under a flexible time schedule – an important thing when you’re trying to conciliate work and studies. I thought I’d take a couple of jobs for a low income, just to try the system out. After a while, though, better opportunities came my way in the real world – you know, the one that exists whenever we get a chance to look away from the screen -, so I decided to step away from the web market for a while. Now, I come back to oDesk to find a myriad of almost disrespectfull payments for jobs due to the competition against countries even poorer than my own. A result of economic crisis? Maybe… or maybe it’s a sign of the end of days. Filipinos, Indians and others, clutching themselves for the priviledge of working for three dollars an hour! I saw people accepting to work for as low as two dollars an hour in the website. My cleaning lady got payed more than that, and she doesn’t even know how to use a mouse! If things keep going this way, I might be looking for cleaning jobs around real soon.