by Kirk Ram­per­sad

In the Unit­ed States, a strik­ing 61 per cent of work­ing pro­fes­sion­als ei­ther al­ready have or are ac­tive­ly build­ing a side hus­tle to sup­ple­ment their in­come. This in­sight, re­vealed by a 2023 FlexJobs sur­vey of over 2,200 work­ers, un­der­scores a pro­found shift in work cul­ture and in­come strat­e­gy. Even more re­veal­ing is that near­ly half of these in­di­vid­u­als have con­sid­ered or al­ready left their full-time jobs to pur­sue en­tre­pre­neur­ial ven­tures.

These fig­ures may seem like dis­tant da­ta points but they hold po­tent rel­e­vance for us here in T&T. Ours is a coun­try of re­silience, cre­ativ­i­ty and hus­tle — from dou­bles ven­dors up be­fore sun­rise to graph­ic de­sign­ers build­ing clien­tele on­line af­ter hours. But what can we re­al­ly learn from the US side-hus­tle boom and how can we ap­ply those lessons to our own so­cio-eco­nom­ic con­text?

US side-hus­tle trends at a glance:

* Six­ty-one per cent of US pro­fes­sion­als have or are cur­rent­ly build­ing a side hus­tle;

* Forty-one per cent have con­sid­ered or al­ready left full-time work to fo­cus on these ven­tures; and

* Among them, 57 per cet say their side hus­tle must earn at least 75 per cent of their full-time in­come be­fore mak­ing the leap.

These num­bers re­flect more than just fi­nan­cial stress. They rep­re­sent a grow­ing de­mand for flex­i­bil­i­ty, in­de­pen­dence and pur­pose-dri­ven work in a post-pan­dem­ic world.

Rel­e­vance to T&T: A mir­ror or a map?

The ris­ing side hus­tle move­ment in Trinidad and To­ba­go is less for­mal­ly doc­u­ment­ed but vis­i­bly grow­ing. Whether it is food de­liv­ery, free­lance mar­ket­ing, on­line teach­ing or craft pro­duc­tion, more Trin­bag­o­ni­ans are lever­ag­ing skills and pas­sions to sup­ple­ment in­come.

What we lack in wide­spread da­ta, we make up for in ob­serv­able eco­nom­ic re­al­i­ty. Our in­for­mal econ­o­my ac­counts for ap­prox­i­mate­ly 27 per cent of to­tal em­ploy­ment, ac­cord­ing to the Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice (CSO, 2023). That is near­ly one in three work­ers op­er­at­ing out­side the for­mal busi­ness and tax sys­tem. The side hus­tle is not just a cul­tur­al sta­ple. It is an eco­nom­ic ne­ces­si­ty.

What US trends re­veal and how we can ap­ply them lo­cal­ly

1. Eco­nom­ic pres­sures dri­ve cre­ativ­i­ty

In the US, wage stag­na­tion and ris­ing liv­ing costs are prompt­ing a shift to­ward en­tre­pre­neur­ship. Here in T&T, the min­i­mum wage in­creased from $17.50 to $20 per hour in 2024. While wel­comed, this still equates to TT$800 a week be­fore tax­es — bare­ly sus­tain­able amid ris­ing gro­cery and food prices.

With youth un­em­ploy­ment hov­er­ing around 12.5 per cent (CSO, 2023), many young peo­ple are seek­ing al­ter­na­tive paths. We see this in the growth of youth-run cloth­ing brands, Tik­Tok con­tent cre­ators and mi­cro-re­tail­ers lever­ag­ing What­sApp to reach cus­tomers. The con­di­tions are ripe for grass­roots in­no­va­tion but in­sti­tu­tion­al sup­port lags be­hind.

2. De­sire for au­ton­o­my grow­ing

The US trend re­flects grow­ing dis­sat­is­fac­tion with tra­di­tion­al 9-to-5 roles. Like­wise, in T&T, flex­i­ble work­ing arrange­ments — ac­cel­er­at­ed dur­ing the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic — have opened new doors for free­lancers, cre­atives and ser­vice providers.

Sec­tors like fash­ion, mu­sic, an­i­ma­tion, dig­i­tal mar­ket­ing and culi­nary arts show enor­mous side hus­tle po­ten­tial. How­ev­er, our dig­i­tal in­fra­struc­ture and ac­cess chal­lenges — like high in­ter­net costs (av­er­ag­ing US$43 per month, among the high­est in the Caribbean) and fre­quent pow­er out­ages — pose re­al bar­ri­ers to scale.

3. Cal­cu­lat­ed risk over reck­less aban­don

Many US work­ers re­quire that their side hus­tle gen­er­ate the ma­jor­i­ty of their in­come be­fore leav­ing for­mal jobs. This bal­anced ap­proach is equal­ly valu­able here. With lim­it­ed ac­cess to cred­it and volatile in­come streams, risk man­age­ment is es­sen­tial.

Yet our small busi­ness ecosys­tem of­ten over­looks the “mid­dle ground” en­tre­pre­neur — those not yet ready for full-time self-em­ploy­ment but past the hob­by phase. A new pol­i­cy cat­e­go­ry of “tran­si­tion­al mi­cro-en­tre­pre­neur” could un­lock tai­lored fi­nan­cial prod­ucts, tem­po­rary na­tion­al in­sur­ance re­lief and busi­ness ad­vi­so­ry sup­port.

T&T: Hus­tling amid unique chal­lenges

A few press­ing chal­lenges fac­ing lo­cal side hus­tlers in­clude:

* Dig­i­tal di­vide: De­spite de­cent broad­band cov­er­age, high in­ter­net costs and un­re­li­able ser­vice dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly af­fect rur­al ar­eas. This lim­its ac­cess to e-com­merce, on­line train­ing and re­mote gig plat­forms;

* Mar­ket ac­cess: For many side hus­tlers, scal­ing be­yond friends and fam­i­ly is dif­fi­cult. Lim­it­ed dig­i­tal mar­ket­places, poor lo­gis­tics (es­pe­cial­ly in­ter-is­land) and lack of ex­port-readi­ness mean great ideas of­ten plateau pre­ma­ture­ly;

* Reg­u­la­to­ry bar­ri­ers: For­mal­is­ing a mi­cro-en­ter­prise can be bu­reau­crat­ic, time-con­sum­ing and in­tim­i­dat­ing. Re­quire­ments for na­tion­al in­sur­ance reg­is­tra­tion, busi­ness name ap­proval and tax com­pli­ance are not de­signed with “small-but-se­ri­ous” en­tre­pre­neurs in mind; and

* Pow­er Sup­ply: Un­pre­dictable elec­tric­i­ty out­ages — es­pe­cial­ly in rur­al ar­eas — threat­en pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, par­tic­u­lar­ly for dig­i­tal-first en­tre­pre­neurs who re­ly on sta­ble con­nec­tiv­i­ty and equip­ment

How we can sup­port lo­cal side hus­tles

A. Re­frame side hus­tles as mi­croin­no­va­tion

Too of­ten, side hus­tles are viewed as a stop­gap rather than a step­ping stone. In re­al­i­ty, they build en­tre­pre­neur­ial com­pe­ten­cies, strength­en com­mu­ni­ties and serve niche mar­kets.

Whether it is Ayan­na, a sin­gle moth­er sell­ing home­made sauces via In­sta­gram, or Joshua, a tech-savvy teen of­fer­ing ba­sic web­site de­sign, these ven­tures de­serve more than ap­plause. They de­serve pol­i­cy at­ten­tion.

B. For­malise the in­for­mal

The Min­istry of Youth De­vel­op­ment and Na­tion­al Ser­vice has rolled out ini­tia­tives like the Youth Agri­cul­tur­al Home­stead Pro­gramme and MIC’s Youth Ap­pren­tice­ship Pro­gramme, both of which sup­port skills de­vel­op­ment. But we need a stronger bridge be­tween train­ing and mon­eti­sa­tion.

A cen­tral gov­ern­ment plat­form: let us call it Side­Hus­tleTT, could link train­ing, grant ac­cess, le­gal guid­ance and mar­ket vis­i­bil­i­ty. This would re­duce fric­tion and in­cen­tivise for­mal­i­sa­tion with­out de­mand­ing full-time com­mit­ment up­front.

C. Ex­pand grant and mi­cro­fi­nance ac­cess

The Na­tion­al En­tre­pre­neur­ship De­vel­op­ment Com­pa­ny (NED­CO) and oth­er agen­cies al­ready of­fer fund­ing op­tions. How­ev­er, ap­pli­ca­tion re­quire­ments of­ten favour tra­di­tion­al SME struc­tures.

We need new mi­cro-grants — $5,000 to $15,000 — paired with three-month men­tor­ships. Tar­get groups could in­clude youth, women and rur­al en­tre­pre­neurs. This mod­el has proven suc­cess­ful in Ja­maica and Guyana un­der sim­i­lar eco­nom­ic con­di­tions.

D. Pro­mote “Buy lo­cal, sup­port hus­tle” Cul­ture

A na­tion­al cam­paign could spot­light re­al side hus­tlers and en­cour­age cit­i­zens to sup­port lo­cal val­ue chains. This could in­clude:

* A “Hus­tle Spot­light” TV and web se­ries pro­fil­ing en­tre­pre­neurs

* On­line di­rec­to­ries and maps of ver­i­fied mi­cro-ven­dors

* Na­tion­al Side Hus­tle Awards dur­ing SME Week

Re­al peo­ple, re­al pos­si­bil­i­ty

Take Re­nee, a preschool teacher who runs a week­end bak­ing busi­ness from her kitchen in Tu­na­puna. With a $3,000 oven up­grade and some help from a so­cial me­dia con­sul­tant, her or­ders have tripled.

Or Ke­mar, a bar­ber in Point Fortin who be­gan of­fer­ing mo­bile hair­cuts via What­sApp book­ings. He has since ex­pand­ed in­to men’s groom­ing kits, now sold at two phar­ma­cies in his area.

These are not ex­cep­tions. They are ex­am­ples of the mas­sive un­tapped en­er­gy that can dri­ve eco­nom­ic re­cov­ery from the ground up.

A na­tion­al hus­tle ecosys­tem: What is need­ed now

A co­or­di­nat­ed mul­ti-sec­tor ap­proach could help side hus­tlers thrive. Here is a blue­print:

* Work­shops and train­ing: Short, ac­ces­si­ble cours­es in dig­i­tal mar­ket­ing, pric­ing, reg­is­tra­tion and client man­age­ment, of­fered on­line and through com­mu­ni­ty hubs

* Mi­cro-fi­nance and nen­tor­ship: Pub­lic-pri­vate part­ner­ships to de­liv­er seed cap­i­tal and busi­ness men­tor­ship, tai­lored to part-time en­tre­pre­neurs

* Af­ford­able work­spaces: Re­pur­pose un­der­utilised gov­ern­ment build­ings in­to cowork­ing spaces for week­end and evening use, with Wi-Fi, desks and shared equip­ment

* Dig­i­tal Mar­ket­places: Sup­port plat­forms that en­able prod­uct and ser­vice dis­cov­ery lo­cal­ly and link qual­i­fied side hus­tlers to glob­al free­lance plat­forms like Fiverr, Up­work and Ama­zon Hand­made

From side hus­tle to struc­tur­al shift

As 61 per cent of pro­fes­sion­als in the Unit­ed States em­brace side hus­tles and 41 per cent are al­ready shift­ing or plan­ning to shift in­to full-time en­tre­pre­neur­ship, the writ­ing is on the wall: in­come di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion is no longer a fringe trend. It is a de­lib­er­ate, fu­ture-fo­cused re­sponse to the de­mands of a chang­ing glob­al econ­o­my.

In Trinidad and To­ba­go, the en­tre­pre­neur­ial spir­it is abun­dant and vis­i­ble in our com­mu­ni­ties, cul­ture and dai­ly com­merce. Yet tal­ent alone is not enough. With­out the right in­fra­struc­ture, en­abling poli­cies and tar­get­ed sup­port, the full po­ten­tial of our hus­tlers will re­main un­tapped.

We must now reimag­ine the side hus­tle as more than an in­di­vid­ual act of eco­nom­ic sur­vival. It is a col­lec­tive en­gine of in­no­va­tion, em­ploy­ment and long-term na­tion­al re­silience. To­day’s side hus­tlers are not on­ly sup­ple­ment­ing in­comes. With the right sup­port, they can be­come the next gen­er­a­tion of SME lead­ers, ex­porters, job cre­ators and con­trib­u­tors to our GDP.

This is our op­por­tu­ni­ty to tran­si­tion from in­for­mal re­silience to for­mal eco­nom­ic pow­er. Let us no longer see the side hus­tle as some­thing done af­ter hours or on week­ends. Let us el­e­vate it as a pil­lar of our de­vel­op­ment strat­e­gy — a dy­nam­ic force ca­pa­ble of trans­form­ing liveli­hoods, com­mu­ni­ties and the econ­o­my at large.

The side hus­tle is not a back­up plan. It is a bold, strate­gic lever for in­clu­sive growth in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Kirk Ram­per­sad is an ex­ec­u­tive busi­ness and mar­ket­ing pro­fes­sion­al with over 25 years of ex­pe­ri­ence lead­ing brand growth, mar­ket strat­e­gy and dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion. A colum­nist for the Trinidad and To­ba­go Guardian, he de­liv­ers in­sights on mar­ket­ing trends, brand po­si­tion­ing, busi­ness in­no­va­tion and strate­gic growth.

Email: kirkram@hot­mail.com LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/kirkram­per­sad