Love’s labour’s found? A data-driven exploration of job quality among UK-based freelance translators

1.Introduction

For anyone who follows the fortunes of translators, whether that be via industry reports, research, or even social media feeds, it should come as no surprise that freelance translation is facing significant upheaval. For all the vaunted benefits of self-employment, working as a freelancer is proving to be a double-edged sword for some. One of the participants of the research reported in this article remarked that their work had “stopped feeling challenging or meaningful,” while another described it as a “labour of love.” Both comments flag clear issues and echo well-documented concerns over the longer-term sustainability of the industry (Lambert and Walker 2024Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2024 “Thriving or Surviving: Motivation, Satisfaction, and Existential Sustainability in the Translation Profession.” Mikael: Finnish Journal of Translation and Interpreting Studies 17 (1): 89–104. Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2024 “Thriving or Surviving: Motivation, Satisfaction, and Existential Sustainability in the Translation Profession.” Mikael: Finnish Journal of Translation and Interpreting Studies 17 (1): 89–104. ), which we explore in detail in this article. We achieve this by engaging on a preliminary basis with the European Foundation for Living and Working Conditions (henceforth, Eurofound) classification of job quality and the concept of ‘meaningful work’ (Spencer 2015Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. ). In doing so, we bolster the growing body of literature blending ideas from Translation Studies (TS) and labour economics. Indeed, our approach adds a new dimension to TS engagement with ‘work’ and ‘labour’ (e.g., Zwischenberger and Alfer 2022Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “ Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. ) as it brings new data to bear on a range of intrinsic and extrinsic criteria that allow us to evaluate UK freelance translators’ job quality. As such, we address an important gap in the literature (see Zwischenberger and Alfer 2022Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “ Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. , 218; Fırat, Gough, and Moorkens 2024Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens 2024 “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 422–440. Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens 2024 “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 422–440. , 425) as we use empirical data to interrogate prior conceptual arguments and more anecdotal vox-pop surveys, such as Slator’s (2024)Slator 2024 “How Popular is Machine Translation Post-Editing?” https://​slator​.com​/how​-popular​-is​-machine​-translation​-post​-editing/Slator 2024 “How Popular is Machine Translation Post-Editing?” https://​slator​.com​/how​-popular​-is​-machine​-translation​-post​-editing/ claim that many translators consider post-editing “tedious and mind-numbing.” Our approach allows us to reflect on the meaningfulness of freelance translation in the UK and to situate it in the wider spectrum of job quality, inviting further reflections within and beyond the realm of translation.

We begin by reviewing key components constituting the meaning of work, exploring concepts including sustainability, translator job satisfaction and motivation, and ‘work’ in TS, before turning to labour economics and the Eurofound framework. We then employ this framework to analyse the survey data from our exploratory Chasing Status project.11.See https://​ahc​.leeds​.ac​.uk​/directory​-record​/1872​/chasing​-status​-the​-sustainability​-of​-the​-freelance​-translation​-profession​-in​-the​-united​-kingdom. Our findings suggest that the basis for meaningful work (i.e., underlying job quality) is being seriously eroded and recent developments may soon lead to a tipping point for many UK-based freelance translators.

2.Contextualising the meaning of work for translators

3.Job quality and (meaningful) work

Spencer (2015Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. , 675) bemoans the fact that mainstream economics mostly defines work as “an activity people do in order to satisfy their consumption wants.” Work is thus primarily a “disutility” in that “people suffer some personal loss through the act of work that leads them to demand some compensation for the time they give to work” (676). In contrast, Spencer contends that Marx, for instance, would view work “as an activity through which people can express their creativity and achieve self-realisation” (681). However, Marx also stressed that, in capitalist societies, a lack of control over the work activity or the means of production can alienate workers (Fayard 2021Fayard, Anne-Laure 2021 “Notes on the Meaning of Work: Labor, Work, and Action in the 21st Century.” Journal of Management Inquiry 30 (2): 207–220. Fayard, Anne-Laure 2021 “Notes on the Meaning of Work: Labor, Work, and Action in the 21st Century.” Journal of Management Inquiry 30 (2): 207–220. , 209). Were we to apply Marx’s definition of work to UK freelance translators, the reported lack of control over the type of translation work they do, or how they produce it, would suggest that they can no longer realise themselves through their work.

Despite this backdrop, Zwischenberger and Alfer (2022Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “ Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. , 212) argue that the relatively high satisfaction rates mentioned above are perhaps “indicative of translation being experienced as satisfying, meaningful and humanising work.” However, they rightly add that this could also reflect among translators

a narrative that foregrounds work and its emotional and social rewards while strategically masking the dimension of labour operative in producing translations whose exchange-value is appropriated by those holding substantial stakes in the means of production, resulting in […] the “voluntary servitude” that characterises translators’ professional habitus.(212–213)

Instead of opposing work and labour, of seeing freelance translation either as just work or just labour, we agree with Zwischenberger and Alfer (2022)Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “ Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. that translation constitutes both work and labour. To this end, using the indicators developed by the European Foundation for Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound 2012Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union., 2025Eurofound 2025 European Working Conditions Survey 2024: First Findings. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2025 European Working Conditions Survey 2024: First Findings. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.) to explore job quality could help us move beyond such dichotomies. It could help us to approximate where translation sits on a cline of job quality (in relation to other job profiles), to pinpoint factors contributing to or diminishing quality, satisfaction, and motivation, and ultimately to reflect on whether being a freelance translator can be seen as “meaningful work” in Spencer’s (2015)Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. terms.

Meaningful work is work that “not only meets our consumption wants but also meets our needs for freedom and creativity; it is work that enables us to develop and realise our potential” (Spencer 2015Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. Spencer, David 2015 “Developing an Understanding of Meaningful Work in Economics: The Case for a Heterodox Economics of Work.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 39 (3): 675–688. , 676). This concept “entails seeing work in terms of the needs of workers and asks us to consider whether work matches up to those needs” (685). While recognising that the meaningfulness of work will also “be dependent on the context of work,” (683) Spencer nonetheless believes that it is possible to define meaningful work “in relation to the characteristics of jobs that exist in the economy,” (ibid.) with reference to certain (quasi-)objective markers of job quality. According to Spencer, it is important for work to remain meaningful for individuals because meaningless work (i.e., work that is “mundane and repetitive”) has been shown to negatively impact individuals’ wellbeing, leading to “boredom,” “fatigue,” “stress,” and acute mental and physical health problems (684).

Empirical measurement of such concepts, however, can prove problematic. In sociological and economic studies focusing on the future of work, increasing attention has been paid to “job quality” (Berg et al. 2023Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. ), a conceptualisation that recognises the influence of various job characteristics on the fulfilment of different personal and professional needs. As Berg et al. (2023Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. , 350) note, job quality is strongly related to “decent work” (elaborated by the International Labour Organization, now incorporated into the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals), but also shares touchpoints with concepts that have begun to be addressed by TS scholars. One example is “fair work” (Fairwork 2022Fairwork 2022 Translation & Transcription Platform Ratings. https://​fair​.work​/en​/fw​/publications​/fairwork​-tt​-report​-2022/Fairwork 2022 Translation & Transcription Platform Ratings. https://​fair​.work​/en​/fw​/publications​/fairwork​-tt​-report​-2022/; see Fırat, Gough, and Moorkens 2024Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens 2024 “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 422–440. Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens 2024 “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 422–440. ), which operates more from the perspective of an enterprise fulfilling statutory duties than an individual worker enjoying what are often seen as preferential facets of work afforded by progressive human resource policies. Job quality also sits at the heart of a constellation of related concepts (see Figure 1), as explored by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development in a comprehensive literature review of concepts encompassed by “job quality” (CIPD 2017CIPD 2017 “Understanding and Measuring Job Quality. Part I — Thematic Literature Review.” https://​www​.cipd​.org​/uk​/knowledge​/reports​/measuring​-job​-quality​-report/CIPD 2017 “Understanding and Measuring Job Quality. Part I — Thematic Literature Review.” https://​www​.cipd​.org​/uk​/knowledge​/reports​/measuring​-job​-quality​-report/, 3). In this review, the CIPD explain that job quality is ultimately an umbrella term covering a number of sub-concepts (white triangles in Figure 1), which range from ‘needs’ (at the bottom of the pyramid) to ‘wants’ (at the top), and also tend to be protected via legal frameworks (at the bottom of the pyramid) but move upwards to preferential decisions and policies to support worker culture (at the top of the pyramid). Despite variations and differences in terminology across these concepts, the CIPD considers job quality to be the most comprehensive, holistic term that sits at the centre of this conceptual space as a means to describe influences on an individual’s experience of their working conditions.

Job quality, as defined by Eurofound (2012)Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union. and later adopted by the European Parliament to monitor labour market conditions (Berg et al. 2023Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. , 350), comprises three extrinsic factors — earnings, working time quality, and prospects — and four intrinsic factors — skills and discretion, work intensity, social environment, and physical environment.

On the extrinsic side, earnings covers levels of pay (earnings, for self-employment) and the degree to which income needs support a certain standard of living. It also encompasses pay being commensurate with the effort, skill, and risk involved in the job. Working time quality should be viewed “in relation to the expected extent to which the working time meets workers’ needs for work-life balance” (Eurofound 2012Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union., 14). Factors affecting this criterion are “duration” (weekly working hours), “scheduling” (e.g., antisocial hours), the degree of “discretion over working-time arrangements,” as well as “short-term flexibility” (e.g., ability to take time off for family reasons) (24). Finally, prospects (21) covers both job security (likelihood of job loss) and career prospects more generally, with “good prospects […] found in jobs which offer high job security and the potential for future earnings growth” (Berg et al. 2023Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. , 350).

For the intrinsic factors, skills and discretion considers workers’ use of their skills, including “task complexity, problem-solving, computer use frequency, employer-provided training, on-the-job training, and learning participation” (Eurofound 2012Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union., 22). An important facet of this factor is worker discretion “over both the work itself and its timing” (22). Work intensity “refers to the intensity of labour effort during work time” (14) and covers having to work at very high speed and/or to tight deadlines, having enough time to get things done, and the number of sources of work pressure (23). The third intrinsic factor is social environment, as a job’s social environment contributes to “meeting people’s needs and […] generating well-being” (14). While support from line managers, colleagues, or clients contributes to a good social environment, abusive workplaces make for toxic social environments. For the purposes of our research, we include in this criterion social isolation, a recurrent issue in freelance translation specifically, which can have a detrimental effect on psychological wellbeing (Penet 2024Penet, J. C. 2024 Working as a Professional Translator. Abingdon: Routledge. Penet, J. C. 2024 Working as a Professional Translator. Abingdon: Routledge. ). We have also expanded Eurofound’s definition (relating primarily to employers and coworkers) to cover the wider social environment of the general public, and how this influences the environment in which translators operate. The final intrinsic factor, physical environment, is related to environmental hazards and posture-related risks (Eurofound 2012Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2012 Trends in Job Quality in Europe. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union., 23).

In the sections that follow, we apply this framework to freelance translation in the UK, with a view to evaluating job quality among this group, first beginning with an explanation of how the data were collected and some of the characteristics of our survey sample.

4.Data collection

An online questionnaire was distributed to a sample of Institute of Translation and Interpreting (ITI) and Chartered Institute of Linguists (CIOL) members in October 2023. For the ITI, 1100 members (excluding student members) were chosen at random and contacted by email; for the CIOL, all members were invited to participate via the CIOL’s regular “Monthly Update” email. In total, 331 usable responses were collected.33.Ethics approval for this project was granted by the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures Research Ethics Committee of the University of Leeds on 28 June 2023 (reference LTSLCS-163). Here, we have limited our analysis to data from UK residents only (n = 216). The questionnaire collected demographic and professional characteristics alongside insights into respondents’ perceptions of income, status, working conditions, and general feelings about the profession collected via a mixture of closed and open questions. While some of the questions were newly designed, specifically with the objectives of this research project in mind, many questions were adapted from, or at least inspired by, the questionnaires employed by Dam and Zethsen (2008Dam, Helle V., and Karen Korning Zethsen 2008 “Translator Status: A Study of Danish Company Translators.” The Translator 14 (1): 71–96. Dam, Helle V., and Karen Korning Zethsen 2008 “Translator Status: A Study of Danish Company Translators.” The Translator 14 (1): 71–96. , 2011Dam, Helle V., and Karen Korning Zethsen 2011 “The Status of Professional Business Translators on the Danish Market: A Comparative Study of Company, Agency and Freelance Translators.” Meta 56 (4): 976–997. Dam, Helle V., and Karen Korning Zethsen 2011 “The Status of Professional Business Translators on the Danish Market: A Comparative Study of Company, Agency and Freelance Translators.” Meta 56 (4): 976–997. , 2016Dam, Helle V., and Karen Korning Zethsen 2016 “ ‘I Think It Is a Wonderful Job’: On the Solidity of the Translation Profession.” Journal of Specialised Translation 25: 174–187. Dam, Helle V., and Karen Korning Zethsen 2016 “ ‘I Think It Is a Wonderful Job’: On the Solidity of the Translation Profession.” Journal of Specialised Translation 251: 174–187. ) and Ruokonen and Mäkisalo (2018)Ruokonen, Minna, and Jukka Mäkisalo 2018 “Middling-Status Profession, High-Status Work: Finnish Translators’ Status Perceptions in the Light of their Backgrounds, Working Conditions and Job Satisfaction.” Translation & Interpreting 10 (1): 1–17. Ruokonen, Minna, and Jukka Mäkisalo 2018 “Middling-Status Profession, High-Status Work: Finnish Translators’ Status Perceptions in the Light of their Backgrounds, Working Conditions and Job Satisfaction.” Translation & Interpreting 10 (1): 1–17. and by our previous conceptual exploration of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (Lambert and Walker 2024Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2024 “Thriving or Surviving: Motivation, Satisfaction, and Existential Sustainability in the Translation Profession.” Mikael: Finnish Journal of Translation and Interpreting Studies 17 (1): 89–104. Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2024 “Thriving or Surviving: Motivation, Satisfaction, and Existential Sustainability in the Translation Profession.” Mikael: Finnish Journal of Translation and Interpreting Studies 17 (1): 89–104. ).44.The full list of questions in the questionnaire can be consulted at https://​ahc​.leeds​.ac​.uk​/download​/downloads​/id​/1006​/questionnaire​-and​-focus​-group​-prompts​.pdf.

5.Findings

6.Job quality for UK-based translators: Still meaningful work?

Overall, the picture painted around job quality is a worrying one: the sentiment expressed by UK freelance translators is, on balance, negative towards all seven job quality criteria but one (working time quality). Independence and control over working conditions are clearly aspects of job quality that UK freelance translators value considerably and still enjoy in their work. However, their sentiment towards the other two extrinsic job quality criteria (earnings and prospects) is overwhelmingly negative. Dissatisfaction with earnings and prospects seems to be a result of industry trends, and technology in particular. This conclusion corroborates Berg et al.’s (2023Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. , 351–352) assertion that these two criteria are the most likely to be affected by technological change. Even though technology can positively influence earnings and prospects (e.g., technology specialists can increasingly find gainful employment), in our case the perceived impact for freelance translation is clearly negative and can be linked to fear of worker displacement, gig-economy-style working conditions, and skills obsolescence.

The fact that so many UK freelance translators stay in the industry despite regarding their earnings as below average and having limited career prospects might suggest that, besides the working time quality afforded by the job, there are other, intrinsic pull factors motivating them to stay in the job. This argument would align with previous studies that have evidenced “translators’ dissatisfaction with their working conditions (extrinsic factors) but satisfaction with the intrinsic factors (such as the task of translating)” (Sakamoto et al. 2024Sakamoto, Akiko, Darren van Laar, Joss Moorkens, and Félix do Carmo 2024 “Measuring Translators’ Quality of Working Life and Their Career Motivation: Conceptual and Methodological Aspects.” Translation Spaces 13 (1): 54–77. Sakamoto, Akiko, Darren van Laar, Joss Moorkens, and Félix do Carmo 2024 “Measuring Translators’ Quality of Working Life and Their Career Motivation: Conceptual and Methodological Aspects.” Translation Spaces 13 (1): 54–77. , 57). And yet, our data reveal mostly negative sentiments towards all four intrinsic criteria, albeit only marginally so. Indeed, a number of positive statements coded under skills and discretion mention the variety and creativity of translation work, factors undoubtedly contributing to many freelance translators still seeing their work as fulfilling or meaningful. Worryingly, though, many of the negative statements concerning skills and discretion again point to technology as a disruptor undermining enjoyment of work and freelance translators’ ability to work on their own terms. The fear of being turned into post-editors looms large, and the negative role of technology features prominently across other intrinsic criteria. Automation has led to an intensification of work, with “a race to the bottom” in the industry leading to ever tighter deadlines. In fact, some of our respondents’ feeling of being “a number/resource” recalls Moorkens’s (2024Moorkens, Joss 2024 “ ‘I Am Not a Number’: On Quantification and Algorithmic Norms in Translation.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 477–492. Moorkens, Joss 2024 “ ‘I Am Not a Number’: On Quantification and Algorithmic Norms in Translation.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 477–492. , 487) observation that “there is a frustration and a diminution of agency when confronted with a faceless mathematised process as a basis for inscrutable decisions.” Overall, our data seem to illustrate quite neatly Berg et al.’s observation (2023Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. Berg, Janine, Francis Green, Laura Nurski, and David A. Spencer 2023 “Risks to Job Quality from Digital Technologies: Are Industrial Relations in Europe Ready for the Challenge?” European Journal of Industrial Relations 29 (4): 347–365. , 351–354) that digital technologies can risk replacing certain tasks that were formerly the domain of skilled workers, increase work time demands by squeezing deadlines, reduce the need for knowledge-sharing and interaction between colleagues, and give rise to new forms of ergonomic health concerns.

The negative picture described above is further corroborated by quantifying the strength and polarity of sentiment for each of the job quality criteria (i.e., how frequently was each criterion mentioned and what was the average sentiment?). Given that participants were not explicitly asked about these criteria and we were, instead, reliant on participants responding to different open-text questions and evoking these job quality criteria in their responses, there was an element of self-selection at play in the criteria and themes evoked (also bearing in mind the potential impact of social desirability bias). This meant that, for some criteria (e.g., physical environment), minimal data were collected, and therefore, both the frequency and the intensity of sentiment needed to be adjusted accordingly. Figure 2 visualises the strength of feeling for each of the job quality criteria. However, we must stress that these sentiment scores are based on our thematic coding and not respondents’ own evaluation. By averaging the sentiment of each coded mention of the corresponding job quality criterion (−1 = negative, 0 = neutral, 1 = positive), and then weighting this average sentiment to account for the relative frequency of the codes (i.e., the average was multiplied by the proportion of responses coded under each criterion), Figure 2 highlights a strong negative valence among respondents around prospects and earnings. Other criteria — skills and discretion, physical environment, social environment, work intensity — were negative in sentiment, but the strength of (negative) sentiment is somewhat assuaged by the relative infrequency with which they were evoked. While this does not eliminate these criteria as sources of dissatisfaction, it suggests that respondents were drawn more towards the positives of being a freelance worker (e.g., flexibility, reflected under working time quality), offset by current and forward-looking challenges (namely, prospects and earnings).

Figure 2 echoes Eurofound’s (2017Eurofound 2017 Sixth European Working Conditions Survey — Overview Report (2017 Update). Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.Eurofound 2017 Sixth European Working Conditions Survey — Overview Report (2017 Update). Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union., 128) five modelled job-quality profiles (“high flying,” “smooth running,” “active manual,” “under pressure,” “poor quality”). No Eurofound chart matches Figure 2 exactly, but the closest is “poor quality,” characterised by job insecurity, unsatisfactory career prospects, poor contractual arrangements, and low earnings (129). Two differences matter: Eurofound’s “poor quality” profile scores negatively on all criteria, whereas our data include one positive score (working time quality) and a few marginal cases (notably skills and discretion). Even so, these marginal positives only shift Figure 2 slightly towards Eurofound’s “under pressure” profile.

The visualisation in Figure 2 also serves to highlight the broad trends at play in UK freelance translators’ perspectives on job quality, especially given the self-selection inherent in the collection of the open-text data. The chart offers a useful barometer of the issues of greatest concern (or that offer greater satisfaction) when not constrained by specific questions. Despite the negative picture, our survey data bore out the paradox between underlying job quality and translators’ sense of fulfilment. When asked whether they found their freelance work fulfilling, 69.3% of respondents said it was very or somewhat fulfilling (n = 215). Likewise, 52.8% were very or somewhat satisfied with working conditions, 18.2% indifferent, and 29.0% very or somewhat dissatisfied (n = 214). This pattern counters the narratives emerging from qualitative coding and illustrates freelance translators’ motivation-satisfaction paradox (Lambert and Walker 2024Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2024 “Thriving or Surviving: Motivation, Satisfaction, and Existential Sustainability in the Translation Profession.” Mikael: Finnish Journal of Translation and Interpreting Studies 17 (1): 89–104. Lambert, Joseph, and Callum Walker 2024 “Thriving or Surviving: Motivation, Satisfaction, and Existential Sustainability in the Translation Profession.” Mikael: Finnish Journal of Translation and Interpreting Studies 17 (1): 89–104. ). As one respondent (S282) noted: “It’s a strange combination of very positive feelings about the work itself and quite negative feelings about the profession (in terms of its future, its ability to financially support me, etc.).”55.It is important to be mindful of the potential for selection and response biases. While our question design was intended to avoid any leading questions and to frame topics in a neutral manner, we cannot rule out the possibility of respondents overstating negative feelings.

Given the number of negative technology-related sentiments, we should interrogate how far automation challenges some, if not all, of the job quality criteria that make freelance translation work meaningful. According to Spencer (2024Spencer, David 2024 “Automation and the Lightening of Work.” AI & Society 40: 1237–1247. Spencer, David 2024 “Automation and the Lightening of Work.” AI & Society 401: 1237–1247. , 1241), even though automation has arguably “lessened drudgery and increased the scope for meaning in work,” it has also left some workers “with hard and demeaning work to do.” The main reason is that, in the present neoliberal age, “capitalist employers decide on technology without direct regard to the well-being of workers” (Spencer 2022Spencer, David 2022 “Automation and Well-Being: Bridging the Gap between Economics and Business Ethics.” Journal of Business Ethics 187: 271–281. Spencer, David 2022 “Automation and Well-Being: Bridging the Gap between Economics and Business Ethics.” Journal of Business Ethics 1871: 271–281. , 272). Spencer’s comments evoke Fırat, Gough, and Moorkens’s (2024)Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens 2024 “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 422–440. Fırat, Gökhan, Joanna Gough, and Joss Moorkens 2024 “Translators in the Platform Economy: A Decent Work Perspective.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (3): 422–440. findings about the lack of ‘decent work’ for translators in Turkey, especially in the platform economy. Our data suggest that the building blocks of meaningful translation work in the UK are being undermined. Although working time quality and skills and discretion are viewed more positively and less negatively, respectively, eighty-five respondents reported “little” (36.4%) or “no control” (3.2%) over working conditions (n = 214). Their reasons echo Carreira’s (2024aCarreira, Oliver 2024a “Market Concentration in the Language Services Industry and Working Conditions for Translators.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (5): 889–904. Carreira, Oliver 2024a “Market Concentration in the Language Services Industry and Working Conditions for Translators.” Perspectives: Studies in Translation Theory and Practice 32 (5): 889–904. , 897) observation that freelancers working for LSPs “have almost no market power to establish their working conditions.” This assertion may explain why 48% of respondents (n = 215) were very (21.5%) or somewhat (26.5%) unlikely to recommend translation as a career, while only 26.5% were somewhat (22%) or very (4.5%) likely to do so.

7.Conclusion

“I would have recommended a translation career wholeheartedly up to about five years ago, but not anymore” (S024), one of our respondents concluded. For them, “earning potential has decreased significantly, as has job satisfaction,” and our findings echo this view. Our preliminary explorations, showing multiple recurring — but sometimes paradoxical — themes, suggest that recent developments may soon lead to a tipping point for UK freelance translators concerning job quality. For many, it is easy to see how what was formerly a love of their job may be turning into a labour of love. This labour of love was a key strand in our findings and combines a love for, and fulfilment from, the work itself with the alienating feeling of being a machine-like, replaceable worker as embedded in the concept of labour.

While it is positive to see that most translators considered their work fulfilling, the overwhelmingly negative profiling of freelance translators’ job quality contrasts starkly with these positive sentiments and clearly illustrates the paradoxical nature of feelings translators express about their work. However, our data also highlight that the basis for meaningful work (i.e., underlying job quality) is being seriously eroded. Such a shift is closely tied to ongoing automation and technological disruption, in turn affecting industry practices and the wider perceived social value of translation. Echoing the quotation that opens this conclusion, many of the translators suggested that underlying conditions were becoming such that either the positive pulls of the work no longer counteract these negative effects or that they can no longer make a good living and are forced out of the profession. While our respondents addressed positive aspects such as the agency, pride, and satisfaction that they feel in aspects of their work, as well as the positive impact of relationships and professional communities, others tackled the negative role of current industry business models.

We must therefore wonder to what extent the positive pulls have in fact played a damaging role in “masking” fundamental, underlying issues (echoing Zwischenberger and Alfer 2022Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “ Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. Zwischenberger, Cornelia, and Alexa Alfer 2022 “Translaboration: Translation and Labour.” Translation in Society 1 (2): 200–223. , 212) that are now prompting some to question their place in the profession. Ultimately, if such departures multiply more widely, this will pose a significant threat to the long-term sustainability of the industry. There is thus a dire need for empirical research on numbers leaving the profession and their reasons for doing so.

Another powerful strand also worthy of future exploration lies in situating freelance translation in the wider context of, for instance, job quality among the self-employed more generally. In this vein, Eurofound’s (2024)Eurofound 2024 “Self-Employment in the EU: Job Quality and Developments in Social Protection.” https://​www​.eurofound​.europa​.eu​/en​/publications​/2024​/self​-employment​-eu​-job​-quality​-and​-developments​-social​-protectionEurofound 2024 “Self-Employment in the EU: Job Quality and Developments in Social Protection.” https://​www​.eurofound​.europa​.eu​/en​/publications​/2024​/self​-employment​-eu​-job​-quality​-and​-developments​-social​-protection report on job quality and developments in social protection among self-employed workers in the EU suggests that several of our themes are not unique to translation. They explain that “some self-employment is characterised by low and intermittent incomes and high financial insecurity, often combined with poor working conditions and prospects,” and comment on the blurred boundaries between employment types, particularly for workers “who depend on one or a limited number of clients and whose autonomy and ability to set prices is restricted” (2), exacerbated by the growth in platform work. In their “policy pointers,” Eurofound highlight the importance of safety nets built upon a “strong and sustainable system (partly) based on contributions that recognises the specific nature of self-employment” to “cushion the risks associated with self-employment,” and call for the criteria determining employment status to be clarified (2). There are clear parallels with the needs of the translation industry in these insights, and collaboration on a wider level could lead to greater collective agency to challenge current developments.

Challengingly, in his exploration of “bad business practices” in the translation industry, Carreira (2024bCarreira, Oliver 2024b “Bad Business Practices in the Language Services Industry.” Translation Spaces 13 (2): 1–21. Carreira, Oliver 2024b “Bad Business Practices in the Language Services Industry.” Translation Spaces 13 (2): 1–21. , 16–17) concludes with an appeal to translators to use the agency that they do have and also calls for translator trainers to teach business skills. We can see the value of such pedagogical approaches, especially when combined with developing trainee translators’ awareness of the “activism programs” he mentions (ibid.). However, we must agree with Jalalian Daghigh and Shuttleworth (2024Jalalian Daghigh, Ali, and Mark Shuttleworth 2024 “Introduction: Moving Translation Studies into Dialogue with Neoliberalism.” In Translation and Neoliberalism, edited by Ali Jalalian Daghigh and Mark Shuttleworth, 1–29. Cham: Springer. Jalalian Daghigh, Ali, and Mark Shuttleworth 2024 “Introduction: Moving Translation Studies into Dialogue with Neoliberalism.” In Translation and Neoliberalism, edited by Ali Jalalian Daghigh and Mark Shuttleworth, 1–29. Cham: Springer. , 17–18) that focusing on individual responsibility in such a way risks further entrenching the neoliberal practices that have already “indelibly marked [the translation] profession” with “deteriorating working conditions, intensified competition, diminished compensation, and pervasive job insecurity.” The fact that many professionals already have limited agency and are barely making ends meet may explain why Carreira (2024cCarreira, Oliver 2024c “Neoliberal Practices Endangering the Sustainability of the Translation Profession: Non-Standard Forms of Work, Labor Monopsonies, and Technology as a Catalyst for Precarization.” In Translation and Neoliberalism, edited by Ali Jalalian Daghigh and Mark Shuttleworth, 187–202. Cham: Springer. Carreira, Oliver 2024c “Neoliberal Practices Endangering the Sustainability of the Translation Profession: Non-Standard Forms of Work, Labor Monopsonies, and Technology as a Catalyst for Precarization.” In Translation and Neoliberalism, edited by Ali Jalalian Daghigh and Mark Shuttleworth, 187–202. Cham: Springer. , 194) later argues for “informed policy-making based on collective action by the community of language professionals.” Equally, while there is an urgent need to address emerging developments in training contexts, aspiring translators risk having even less agency or will to change industry practices, particularly as the status quo becomes further established. There is a shared responsibility for experienced translators with a platform, associations, translation trainers, academics, and perhaps even governments to collectivise, to discuss these concerns, and to push back.