I’m not sure if this started out as the plan; but ‘side hustle’ also has the convenient property of sounding totally different than ‘informal sector’ or ‘informal economy’; which helps prevent awkward comparisons.
If you use some ugly phrase about pervasive underemployment driving dependence on the informal sector and human capital underutilization it all starts to sound like a BBC piece on a dusty country with UN peacekeepers and tropical parasite worms, or a World Bank writeup on why somewhereistan needs to liberalize its tax brackets and incentivize foreign investment. That’s totally awkward if you are describing life at home.
Thankfully, talking about ‘side hustles’ as though they are some sort of hobby craze among kids these days offers ample distinction; if perhaps not quite as much difference.
