In this economy, many count themselves fortunate to have one job. So you might say that 5 percent of the American workforce is doubly lucky.
Or maybe just desperate?
About 6.9 million Americans juggle two or more jobs to keep their households afloat, forging new and unconventional professional paths as the U.S. unemployment rate sticks at stubborn highs.
People have multiple jobs for a variety of reasons, said Gary Burtless, an economist with the Brookings Institution.
“For some it is a good one: they love what they do,” he said. “Then there are people for whom this is a desperation measure; they need to have two part-time jobs to make ends meet.”
By and large, workers who work two jobs only do so because they can’t find one high-paying gig, he said.
In Sunday's newspaper, the AJC takes a close look at metro Atlantans who hold down multiple jobs. It's a story you'll get only by picking up a copy of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution or logging on to the paper's iPad app . Subscribe today .
