Apr

27

More moonlighting for U.S. workers?

Posted by Dan

April 27, 2009 |

My dad worked as a typesetter and proofreader at a Chicago-based printing company for most of my childhood. The money was steady, and my father enjoyed the work.

Of course, that didn’t stop him from driving a schoolbus in the mornings. Any extra money helped when raising a family. (We kids liked when he got to park the schoolbus outside our house. We’d run inside and jump around the seats and run down the aisles. I walked to school as a kid, so a schoolbus was pretty exciting stuff.)

I’m thinking of following my father’s example and doing a little moonlighting of my own. I already have my freelance writing and my editing job at a Chicago trade-magazine publisher. But I’m hoping to add one more full-time editing job to my plate. That way, I can replace some of my freelance work.

Because that freelance work is getting a bit dicey. Many of the print publications that I write for are either out of business or relying solely on in-house writers, all thanks to our bad U.S. economy and the dismal times publishing companies are now facing.

Like my father, I’d like a bit of extra steady income. Unlike my father, I’d like that steady income to come from something I actually enjoy.

Is that asking for too much? Maybe in this economy it is. Maybe I should be happy that I do have one full-time, steady job and that I do still have a good amount of freelance writing coming in.

But I can see the future, and scrambling for jobs from print magazines looks to be an increasingly tough way to make bucks.

I’m trying to be proactive here. It’s something I recommend to anyone in the working world. Don’t wait for things to happen to you. If moonlighting is the key to stability for you and your family, go for it.


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