Online jobs can be found worldwide. In some regions it is institutionalized and common, in others more novel. Some regions have experienced recent growth in this employment pattern, for a variety of not yet fully explained reasons. This type of work arrangement, including the actual work undertaken for pay or profit, either as wage laborer or business owner, as well as factors such as amount of earnings and influences on other aspects of one’s or one’s family’s life, appear to be tied to gender. Some activities or occupations are considered more masculine in nature, some more feminine. What is considered as an appropriate job for women in one region might be more appropriate for men in another region, or in another historical period in the same region. The impact of this employment on use of time, family relationship quality, quality of life, and standard of living also appears to vary by gender within and across different cultural regions, and within different households.

Theoretical and empirical understanding of online jobs has been attempted through use of several conceptual frameworks, including household adjustment and adaptation, occupational segregation, rural economic development, household strategies, systems, family management/ecology, and feminism or gender . However, a great deal of the research on this subject appears to be descriptive or conceptual in terms of its explanatory mechanisms, answering questions concerning the type, frequency, and people of online jobs. Theoretical explanations offering "because" answers to "why" questions concerning online jobs phenomena are relatively lacking. Consequently, more appears to be known worldwide about the "whats, whens, and whos" of online jobs than about theoretical explanations of gender and the dynamics of online jobs. It also appears that many studies of home-workers outside the United States take a more critical approach, whereas many studies of online jobs in the United States are of a "scientific, detached" variety.