THE FREE-LANCER : 34.3 Million Americans Are Now Self-Employed or Working at Home, an Arrangement That Allows Workers to Choose Jobs, Hours and Pay More Freely and Gives Companies More Flexibility

People have been doing it for years, but now it’s everywhere.

The corporate secretary who, for a fee, will type your personal manuscript at home over the weekend.

- The graphic artist who last year worked on seven different teams that created advertisements for 15 clients.

- The film cameraman who says he only accepts jobs that take him out of the United States because he doesn’t want to be tied down.

- The journalist who, wanting to stay home with her young children, now sells individual articles to magazines, newspapers and occasionally writes copy for public relations agencies.

They’re free-lancers, individuals who sell their services to employers without a long-term commitment. And because there are so many more of them than ever before, they appear to be on the cutting edge of a new employment trend--particularly in Southern California. B. Sam Scheele, president of Social Engineering Technology, a West Los Angeles management consulting firm, cites figures compiled by the nonprofit Conference Board showing that 34.3 million Americans, nearly a third of the labor force, are either part-time or temporary workers, self-employed or working at home.

The long-term growth in free-lancing, he says, “will come as people do it less and less as isolated individuals, which is the case today. Rather, they will form teams, groups which do special purpose activities.” In Southern California, that already appears to be happening.

Improved communications and personal computers make it much easier to work at home, he says. And those communications will make it possible for people to find other, non-traditional areas in which to free-lance, such as banking and insurance.

What with the region’s large movie, aerospace and construction industries--to name just a few businesses that rely heavily on free-lancers--Southern California, Scheele suggested, may be the free-lance capital of the United States.

If that’s true, it may also have something to do with the nature of Southern Californians: their penchant for freedom, the offbeat and anything new. The trend toward more free-lancing in the economy plays naturally off the deeply held yearnings of many Southland residents.

For here, it’s not all that difficult to find people such as Ted Schmitt, who 12 years ago left a $100,000 a year job in financial public relations to sink his money and fortune into the then-failing Cast Theater in Hollywood. Last year as the theater’s producer-artistic director, he earned only about $6,000 from a variety of individual productions.

Or Robert Badal, who three years ago quit his job as a successful commodities broker with nothing in mind except that he was miserable with what he perceived as the warped values of the people he worked with. Today, Badal conducts seminars in such diverse subjects as “50 Romantic Things to Do in Los Angeles,” “Building Assertive Social Skills,” “Small Theater in Los Angeles” and assorted fields of finance at 11 colleges and institutions in the Los Angeles and Orange County area.

You also have to be quick to survive with several part-time sources of income instead of one full-time job, he says. Within days after the Los Angeles Festival was first publicized earlier this year, Badal had contacted Santa Monica City College and proposed a class about the international arts festival. He then publicized it through his own mailing list and the course was sold out even before the college was able to list it in its catalogue.

Until this year, when Badal really started getting bookings, the seminars brought him about $6,000 a year. He also makes about $30,000 yearly selling rare coins through an arrangement with wholesale coin brokers Ron and Dennis Gillio. Then there are his newsletters, one on romance and the other on financial advice, and the aerobics class he teaches twice weekly.

If Badal’s life sounds far more hectic than if he were in the corporate world, it is. Last year, he only got two weekends off. His first year as a free-lancer was “the hardest of my life,” he said. But even though he may have no time to just lay down and enjoy, “it’s great. I’m getting paid to do all the things I love.”

Schmitt readily concedes that his was “not a rational decision” to leave the corporate world for the theater. “I sacrificed a real comfortable situation. I suffered from a certain amount of social approbation, though certainly I’m more lionized now. I sacrificed the travel I’d like to do. I live in a small apartment in Hollywood, drive a 1965 Mustang. . . . But I regained my soul.”

Becoming a free-lancer is a classic case of trade-offs. The free-lancer is his own boss, picking and choosing assignments according to his interest and schedule. “From an intellectual perspective, it’s very rewarding,” economist Palmer says. But he adds that the risk is tremendous--not only with income, but the absence of benefits.

The employer, meanwhile, has flexibility in the terms of the size and skills of the people he may use on a project. He may spend more per hour for a free-lance engineer, for example, but he saves on benefits and office space. On the other hand, Palmer says, the employer doesn’t necessarily have the resources right there when you need them.

“In theory, though, the more flexible your labor force, the more efficient your operation.”

The broader effects on Southern California’s economy of increased free-lancing are subject to debate. Some believe that the trend could reduce traffic congestion, especially during rush hours, and reduce demand for office or factory space. And some think that free-lancers will be the first to suffer in an economic downturn, especially without the benefits provided by a large employer.

But Scheele believes that free-lancers respond quicker to economic changes and are used to dislocations. “While a full-time employee may stick with his company until the bitter end, the free-lancer will abandon ship faster. And just maybe, come out ahead because of it,” he says.

For employers, the benefit is “substituting scheduleable people for contract people,” Scheele says, and that should have a significant effect on the amount of office or factory space needed.

At CHILD, an acronym for Clearinghouse & Information on Learning Disabilities, a social service agency in West Los Angeles, the organization is run on the free-lance principle. Four job descriptions are needed: psychologist, case coordinator, therapist and agency director. There is budget for two slots. Rather than have two people juggling everything, CHILD has four part-time employees--each a specialist in one particular field.

Says Sandra Driver Gordon, who puts in three days a week as CHILD’s case coordinator and volunteers the rest of her time at Independence Center in West Hollywood: “I think we really have a very smooth operation. It allows all of us to do what we do at CHILD really well, yet allows us to have other projects. And it really helps with the energy.”