If a shift to hourly happens, I suspect we're going to see reluctance from a lot of businesses to pay actually-equivalent hourly rates, which will give them sticker shock ("$200/hr!? I was only paying about $100/hr before with salaries!" Right, but your workers were only spending an average of half their time on stuff that will count as hourly-billable work—numbers exaggerated for ease of calculation, but that's the reaction I expect, in general), coupled with a lot of newbies willing to take those too-low rates because they haven't done the math, and think the rates look high, especially if we're talking (as we most likely are) contract-type work without any kind of benefits. IOW I expect a reduction in total effective comp for the sector, at least for the first few years, if that shift is widespread.