It's apparently not enough for Americans to have "a job" these days—increasingly workers in the U.S. are juggling multiple jobs with multiple income streams. And although about a third are working in multiple forms of employment out of financial necessity, about 48 percent say they're doing it to earn extra money—but even so, not all of them are doing so because they need the money.

So says a New York Times report on the increasingly large share the gig economy plays in Americans' lives. While Canada and France aren't experiencing the same financial need that drives many to engage in nontraditional work arrangements—likely due to stronger social safety nets and less inequality—in the U.S. workers are seeking out extra opportunities that don't fit the traditional employment picture in a way that suggests the workers themselves are driving the trend.

The Gallup Great Jobs Demonstration Survey, which asked about multiple jobs and employment relationships, found that 36 percent of workers are "not in the traditional one-job-for-one-employer relationship," and 11 percent of all workers are "both self-employed and working for an employer, similar to I.R.S. data showing that 10 percent of tax filers fall into that category."