It doesn't come without a couple of downsides. The first downside is the lack of security. The second downside is the extra time you have to spend seeking out gigs and polishing up skills that are in demand right now; the extra time spend creep can be unbound and defeats the goal of working less.

I believe those downsides are enough to rule out working freelance for me. Obviously they are workable for some people, because there are a lot of satisfied freelancers.