pieceworker

1 6.1

A person paid for each thing they make instead of by the hour

noun
/ˈpiːsˌwɜːrkər/

: trabajador a destajo

There is always the possibility that any weaver may rise from his or her place as a pieceworker or petty commodity producer, like Moctezuma rises from the dead in the dance, to claim or reclaim his or her rightful place in the world.

Examples

Her name was Poppy Skurnik; she was an orphan, and she worked way downtown as a pieceworker in a shirtwaist factory.

Fiction book (1992)
One reason that costs were so high was that only a substantial wage, comparable with the earnings of the fastest pieceworkers in "agricultural tasks," could make spray work attractive to new recruits.

Academic text (2002)
As a pieceworker, she earned more when she completed extra assignments for the factory.
Many pieceworkers are motivated to work harder since their earnings depend on the number of items they produce.
At the assembly plant, the pieceworkers were paid based on the number of units they finished each week.

How Well-Paid

executive

659 4.5

manager

∞ 1.6

salariat

Specialized

9.3

pieceworker

1 6.1

Surface Forms

pieceworker singular

pieceworkers plural

Morphology

pieceworker = piecework (transparent) = piece + er

The word is a straightforward agent noun formed from 'piecework' plus the suffix '-er'.

Etymology

The word pieceworker comes from piece ('each item' or 'a part') and worker ('someone who works'), so a pieceworker is paid for each item they make rather than by the hour.