From News To Moves
W-2 jobs are fading, freelancing is mainstream, and cities are shaking down gig platforms for millions. Here’s your finance play on the gig economy trends.
By Austin Payne
The city of Seattle just squeezed Uber Eats for about $15 million in a settlement over alleged violations of pay and disclosure rules. More than 16,000 couriers will get a slice of that pie. This settlement is the largest labor enforcement action in Washington state’s history and a clear sign that the gig economy has grown up.
We are way past the “beer money” days of side-hustles. Driving, coding, or delivering food through an app is now like a core labor market with regulation, real margins at risk, and real opportunity.
Upwork pegs U.S. freelance earnings at $1.5 trillion in 2024. That is larger than Spain's GDP. Millions of Americans have ditched the W-2 for 1099 income and fractional roles, and it is projected that freelancers will make up half the workforce within a few years.
Zelle moved nearly $1 trillion in 2024, while PayPal handled another ~$1.7 trillion. That is almost $3 trillion flowing through just those two peer-to-peer pipes. Think of them as toll roads collecting fees on every transaction.
Criminals follow the money, and right now they are winning. Consumers lost $12.5 billion to fraud in 2024, up 25% year over year, according to the FTC. Credit-card fraud leads the pack, with more than 323,000 reports in the first half of 2025 alone. Georgia logged 241.8 reports per 100,000 residents.
That is a leaderboard nobody wants to win. As more transactions shift to apps, hackers have more incentive to break in. That creates a secondary boom in fraud prevention and identity protection.
W-2 jobs are fading, gig work is scaling, and trillions of dollars are flowing through digital payment systems. With cyberfraud rising, investors should position in the following platforms that move money and the cybersecurity firms that protect it, owning both the toll booths and the shields. Choose a ticker below to see why it’s one of our top picks:
As traditional jobs vanish, digital payments and gig income surge. Visa and Mastercard collect tolls, fintech platforms like PayPal and Block run the pipes, and cybersecurity firms lock the gates. ETFs spanning rails, pipes, and shields let investors capture the full digital paycheck economy with diversified exposure.
Trump’s federal takeover of D.C. policing is being met with protests, but he is firm in his decision and vows to unleash massive budgets and personnel to clamp down on crime in other cities. Here’s how to profit from a law-and-order trade.
When states cut arts funding, it’s a signal of deeper budget stress. Here’s how you can rotate into resilient federal and private sectors before the next fiscal knife falls.
A sweeping tax overhaul in the 2025 Big Beautiful Bill locks in lower individual brackets and larger standard deductions. This will boost take-home pay and after-tax cash flow for many Americans, altering what you can afford, where you want to save, and which assets attract more capital flows.
Next article
An assault in Cincinnati going viral highlights growing concerns about urban safety and the financial ripple effects in the real estate market. Here’s how you can position your portfolio with broad REITs exposure.
By Joseph Sherman
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