Earlier quoted context omitted.
During college I had a job in a coffee shop, and one day after a slow afternoon the bossman came in and later called me over to his computer, where he was reviewing his CCTV footage, and said "Look at how long it took you to make this cappucino, this is simply unacceptable!". I walked out.
Now imagine if your family relied on you having this job? How awful would that be.
Yup. And to be honest, the surveillance was not even the worst part, the guy was just generally a shitbag.
But yeah, considering all the scandals and such involving corporations spying on employees, it's probably safe to say that it's mostly the most vulnerable people who have to put up with it.
But IT freelancing is probably too much of a niche for there to be any public outrage about stuff like spying on contractors.