Freelance Minimum Rates: Lessons for Platform Work

16 March 2026

A minimum tariff or wage offers protection for workers, particularly at the ‘bottom’ of the labour market. For employees, a minimum is set by the minimum wage or via collective agreements. But for the self-employed, this is not regulated. This is despite the fact that as many as 46 per cent of the global working population have no employer. How do you calculate a minimum hourly tariff for freelancers, and how do you ensure that a figure actually makes an impact? During the webinar, organised by the WageIndicator Foundation, I discussed this with Milen van Boldrik of the NVJ (Dutch Association of Journalists) and Paulien Osse, co-founder of the WageIndicator Foundation.

A minimum rate for freelance journalists

The market for journalists in the Netherlands is characterised by a fragmented supply of many self-employed journalists and a fairly concentrated demand, where two major media companies together constitute the largest clients. This means that freelance journalists have limited bargaining power. This prompted the union and professional association NVJ to unite journalists and fight for a minimum rate. The union maintains constant contact with members via various WhatsApp and Signal groups.

Diversification as the key to success

The union’s strategy for achieving this minimum rate boils down to three elements: a broad strategy, staying the course, and ultimate solidarity. In parallel with negotiations with clients over the tariff, collective actions were organised involving public campaigns and protests; efforts were made to lobby strongly for a new interpretation of competition law for self-employed entrepreneurs; and legal proceedings were brought. The result: freelance journalists earn at least 170 per cent of the gross salary that a journalist in a comparable salaried position would be entitled to under the collective agreement. The tariff is enforceable because it forms part of a collective agreement and is set out in a contract between the NVJ and the clients.

Solidarity as a unifying force and catalyst

In the webinar, Milen explains that solidarity played a crucial role in the success achieved. Solidarity among freelance journalists makes sense: with just two major clients, the individual journalist’s bargaining position is limited, and it quickly pays off to join forces. Less common, but all the more important, was the solidarity between freelance journalists and employed journalists. Employed journalists also have a stake in good minimum rates in the market, as low tariffs for freelancers ultimately put pressure on employees’ salaries and can also contribute to a shift from employment to freelance work. Finally, there is also solidarity between journalists with high tariffs and those with low tariffs. The logic behind this: protecting the bottom of the market outweighs the potential disadvantage for a small group of top earners. Solidarity sometimes means that not everyone benefits to the full. But the alternative – a race to the bottom – is ultimately worse for everyone.

How data can contribute to a better negotiating position

The 170 per cent tariff of the wage agreed in the collective agreement is the result of a negotiation. Milen’s key tip: “start high, because you know you’ll always end up lower”. A practical approach, but I believe data can contribute to a stronger starting position in a negotiation. Data was therefore central to the second contribution to this webinar: Paulien Osse from the WageIndicator Foundation. The foundation’s aim is to fuel the labour market debate with factual data to contribute to a better-informed labour market debate. Many of Milen’s insights resonated with Paulien, who has been involved for years in discussions about ‘livable’ pay for workers through the Living Wage and Living Income, but also by providing transparency via databases on labour law and collective agreements worldwide.

Paulien is also one of the creators of Living Tariff, which is based on the Living Wage methodology. Living Tariff is a methodology for calculating the minimum an self-employed worker should earn based on the cost of living in a particular region. After all, in order to survive, an income must also be sufficient to pay taxes and social security contributions. To arrive at this calculation, data on prices is collected every quarter across 185 countries and 4,000 regions. The Living Tariff could help trade union negotiators and workers to substantiate their case. The key lesson, according to Paulien: “Figures will never be perfect; you mustn’t let that hold you back. Every day you spend worrying about perfect figures, you’re failing to make progress for workers who need it.”

What platform work can learn from the NVJ

Minimum rates for self-employed workers are also a key topic in discussions surrounding platform work, particularly in light of the Platform Work Directive and the ILO Platform Work Convention. The markets for journalism and platform work share a number of similarities. For instance, in both markets the supply of work is highly fragmented, whilst over the years the demand side (the client) has become centralised. In journalism, this is due to mergers and acquisitions; in platform work, it is due to the emergence of large platforms that have come to stand between the worker and the client. Both have the same effect: less autonomy, less scope for initiative and a weaker bargaining position for the worker. That said, organising workers in the platform economy is more challenging than in journalism: the workforce is more heterogeneous, the tasks are standardised (making workers more easily interchangeable), assignments are often very short, people often only work in the sector for a short period and many compete with an informal to-consumer market.

Nevertheless, the platform work sector can learn a great deal from this case: by investing in organisation and solidarity, by having a doverse strategy and by uniting effectively for lobbying, real progress can be made for workers.

To conclude

What this discussion ultimately makes clear is that the future of (self-employed) work is not just about flexibility or entrepreneurship. It is about institutions. About solidarity and agreements, collective agreements and new forms of organisation that fit a labour market in which more and more people are working independently. Experience from the world of journalism shows that change is possible. But it also takes time. As Paulien Osse put it so matter-of-factly: structural improvement rarely begins with a revolution, but with a million small steps. And usually it starts with one simple question: what is a living wage or tariff that allows workers to cover their basic costs?