
The gig economy is quietly undermining a century of worker protections - bsg75
https://qz.com/1556194/the-gig-economy-is-quietly-undermining-a-century-of-worker-protections/
======
jacquesm
I take issue with the word 'quietly'. The gig economy is pretty much designed
to do an end-run around worker protections, starting off by denying the
workers so much as an employment agreement.

The difference is all the more striking in countries that had above average
worker protections in place. A large contributing factor here is that due to
the internet's international nature it is very well possible that the enabler
is in a jurisdiction that is entirely different from the one where the work is
carried out.

Free-market fanatics see this all as a good thing but I'm really not happy
with this rapid return to piece-work, which was outlawed in favor of hourly
rates and minimum wages.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piece_work](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piece_work)

~~~
erikpukinskis
In my own life, I've found the total cultural embrace of "full-time"
employment to be a vector for voluminous abuse.

It's specifically because we draw income from one company that they have
leverage to abuse us.

It saddens me how this (to me) plain fact is left out of the debate about gig
workers and their protections.

I think employee protections are crucial, but I think the notion that gigs are
abusive in and of themselves is a misattribution of blame.

~~~
pembrook
The real problem, if you look at it from first principles, is the lack of US
government protections/services for _all_ workers.

If our government provided healthcare, eduction, a real pension program, non-
terrible unemployment programs, etc. (as it works in most other developed
countries) it would not matter if you are a gig worker or full-time employee.
There would be no way to exploit you and gain a competitive advantage by
hiring you as a contract worker. Companies and workers would be free to
arrange employment simply around money and time. Benefits would not matter,
and thus, the employment market would become more efficient.

The fact that US companies are wholly responsible for the quality of life of
their employees is totally hilarious in a modern world where you don't work
for the same company for your entire career. You can go from a 1st-world
standard of living to a 3rd-world one simply by changing employers in the US.
It's absurd.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
> If our government provided healthcare, eduction, a real pension program,
> non-terrible unemployment programs, etc. (as it works in most other
> developed countries) it would not matter if you are a gig worker or full-
> time employee.

The issue with most of these things is that governments, _especially_ the US
government, are generally worse at providing things than competitive
businesses. For people who actually have health insurance, outcomes in the US
system are better than in most other countries, the US higher education system
is generally considered one of the best in the world, etc.

The key is not to nationalize services, it's to provide a baseline of support.
Pay everyone a UBI. Then if you need healthcare, you have money, go buy
healthcare. If you want to go to school, go to school. You don't actually need
the government to operate the school, and you _especially_ don't need it
telling people what to spend the money on. (See also student loans and home
loan interest subsidies and the effect on education and housing costs.)

~~~
danmaz74
The US health care system is the least efficient of all the developed world,
in terms of results vs expense. In many sectors, a competitive market gives
the best results. In health care, that's just not the case. The free market
isn't the be all, end all solution that free market advocates want people to
think it is.

~~~
trentnix
First, US health care is hardly a free market. Second, the free market
certainly isn’t a be all, end all solution. Most advocates of free market
economics would agree with you.

It’s just simply better than any of the other solutions man has dreamed up so
far, that’s all.

~~~
danmaz74
Is the free market the best solution to have an army? Or a judiciary system?
It's not. So, it's not better than any other solutions _for all problems_.

~~~
ernst_klim
>Is the free market the best solution to have an army?

It definitely is. As in "I'm not going to pay for bombing other countries,
thanks."

------
zwkrt
It isn't doing it quietly, it's running around yelling in the streets banging
pots and pans. Outside the bay area I have never had an Uber driver that did
not drive as their full-time job. (Actually my most strange memory of San Jose
was being driven by a dad going to pick up his son from school.) But what's
someone to do if their other option is not to work at all?

My mom used to work two jobs in the early 2000s, and it was always a struggle
because so many retail jobs (or at least retail managers) will intentionally
randomize schedules, such that even if you are working 30h/week you can't hold
another position because in any given week the schedules are likely to
overlap. The gig economy is a weaponized response to this variability IMO.

~~~
smsm42
> But what's someone to do if their other option is not to work at all?

So, let's imagine all wishes of Uber opponents came true and Uber doesn't
exist anymore. What does it mean for that "someone" \- back to "no work at
all", right? Do you think that change improved his situation?

> so many retail jobs (or at least retail managers) will intentionally
> randomize schedules

Why? What advantage does it provide to them? Also, isn't retail job the very
one that has centuries of protections and, as the topic article claims, must
survive and serve as a model while Uber jobs must be gone?

~~~
zwkrt
1\. We are agreeing, not sure why the argumentative tone.

2\. If you have 10 employees, late shift only twice a week, only 3 of them are
trained to open the store, and employees constantly swapping hours, it can be
hard to provide consistent hours for everyone. "Intentionally randomize" could
have been restated as "regularly unstable"

~~~
smsm42
I am still not getting the last part. I understand that if small number of
employees only can take care of a vital function, then they must be carefully
scheduled so that the vital function is covered all the time. How exactly
randomizing is achieving this? If I planned it, I'd say randomizing is the
worst method ever to achieve it, so I wonder what I am still missing - what
advantage the employer gains in randomizing the hours? I can't see any.

~~~
StanislavPetrov
Low-wage employers often don't generate or issues schedules far in advance.
The longer they wait to issue a schedule the more flexibility the employer
has. Often this involves giving shorter but more frequent shifts to keep
workers who work 4 or 5 days a week from accruing enough hours to be consider
a full-time workers (and qualifying for benefits).

~~~
smsm42
What you have described sounds logical, but it's not randomizing. It's giving
out shifts by specific and well-defined criteria (maybe unethical or undesired
by the worker, but hardly random).

------
patrickaljord
On the other hand, while worker protections had their use a century ago, they
have increased cost of labour by a lot, making many low skilled workers
unemployable (the very people they were supposed to protect). I've talked to
many gig workers and they all told me that without these jobs, they would have
nothing. Sure, we can start imposing strong "protections" on the gig economy,
but these jobs would just disappear and those workers would be out of jobs
again. No one plans a career on doing gigs their whole life, but for many it's
a better source of revenue than just being unemployed and they feel less stuck
in unemployment and more accomplished than they used to, which is better for
moral and making them want to improve their skills/get back in the labour
force.

~~~
zwkrt
If the current way we structure our economy and society is failing large
swaths of people, gigs might be a good stop gap, but how many people can be
gigified before the whole thing breaks? What is the acceptable percent of
people for whom it is ok that they will never have healthcare?

~~~
Creationer
We aren't failing people: unemployment hasn't been this low in 20 years.

We have spent 28 trillion dollars on welfare, yet the poverty rate is
unchanged over decades. The only thing that supports people is work, and we
need to eliminate as many impediments to it as possible: over-regulation,
payroll taxes, income taxes. Make huge cuts to welfare with the savings and
streamline healthcare to provide cheap, basic services to every citizen (in
line with disallowing citizenship by birth).

Then, regulate the supply of labour by barring immigration from poor countries
(establish a liberal visa regime with countries in the HDI top 30 though, to
allow legitimate talent to come to America). You have the recipe for a
reasonable, modern life for any American willing to work. It could be a
blueprint for the whole Western world.

~~~
maxsilver
> unemployment hasn't been this low in 20 years.

This is not really accurate. Unemployment is at a 40 year high. (where
"unemployment" means "percent of working-aged people without a job")

[https://www.theatlas.com/charts/B1SUWjSx7](https://www.theatlas.com/charts/B1SUWjSx7)
(that big drop is people losing their jobs). The last time the numbers were
this bad was back around 1979.

~~~
burfog
One can read a lot into that chart, depending on one's own bias.

For example, if jobs get better, then families can live on one income. This is
good. We're still way above the workforce participation of the 1950s, which
generally was a better time for family life in the USA.

~~~
ska

       which generally was a better time for family life in the USA. 
    

I suspect a good chunk of the population would dispute that statement. In
general I think there is a lot of rose colored glasses about that period of
time.

Regardless - I haven't seen any evidence that we are returning to a general
viability of supporting a family on one income, at least supporting it well.
Do you know of any?

------
hedora
Universal health care would drastically improve the situation by removing a
big percentage of the competitive advantage of gig companies.

More generally, regulation is needed that removes all financial incentives to
prefer gig workers and contractors over full time employees. This would be
good for both gig workers (better benefits), and full time workers (less wage
pressure from competition from workers with unsustainable compensation).

~~~
allendoerfer
The way universal healthcare is implemented in Germany, it does not undermine
the gig economy by itself. Freelancing where the employer does not pay for
healthcare is still possible and also removes the need to pay minimum wage.

It comes down to stricter rules around employment. Gig-Employers are risking
to get sued by there defacto employees and them being granted employment
status, which then makes them entitled to receive minimum wage, healthcare,
pension payments etc. even in hindsight.

So a "gig" has to be exactly that, it cannot be an actual job.

~~~
wongarsu
To elaborate on this: In Germany if you are a contractor but all your
contracts amount to effectively working like an employee for a single company
it can be ruled that you _are_ an employee. There are obviously exceptions,
like seasonal work, and the system can be gamed. But trying to game the system
means you can't keep your good workers because you can only contract them for
so long before offering employment.

------
smsm42
What we are having here is an experiment. There are two classes of jobs, which
provide nearly the same service - e.g. driving people from one place to
another. One set of jobs has "century of worker protection", the other does
not. People seem to flock to the second one, even though it requires certain
level of investment and skill (owning a car, knowing how to drive, having
reasonably clean driving record, being personally nice to clients, etc.) and
offers no guarantees. Moreover, they don't just lukewarmly think about maybe
trying it out - they rush to do it so eagerly that companies organizing it
make billions, despite all efforts of various governments to suppress and
limit their business. It looks dangerously like something people want to
participate in...

The obvious conclusion that people seem to be making in that the second class
of jobs is evil and must be destroyed, and only the first class of jobs -
clearly leaving a huge unsatisfied need from both producers and consumers of
the service - should be allowed to exist.

~~~
StanislavPetrov
Worker protections are expensive and come with industry regulation.
Corporations have figured out that they can simply shift their business model
to the "second class of job" and ignore regulations and worker protections.
The companies organizing it rake billions while the workers make less than a
living wage and often rely on public subsidies to survive, which is
effectively a subsidy for these corporations who rake in billions off the
backs of these workers.

~~~
smsm42
If you ban these jobs, would people that subsist on job+subsidy consume more
public subsidies or less? Note that you assumed these people are very poor and
have no alternative jobs. Now you have taken away their only (albeit low)
income they had. Would it lead to consuming more of public subsidies or less?
Would absence of taxes paid by corporations make providing these subsidies
easier or harder?

------
carapace
I just mentioned this the other day in a thread about Uber:

[https://www.ianwelsh.net/the-market-fairy-will-not-solve-
the...](https://www.ianwelsh.net/the-market-fairy-will-not-solve-the...)?

> Here is the thing about Uber and Lyft (and much of the “sharing economy”).

> They don’t pay the cost of their capital.

> The wages they pay to their drivers are less than the depreciation of the
> cars and the expense of keeping the drivers fed, housed, and healthy. They
> pay less than minimum wage in most markets, and, in most markets, that is
> not enough to pay the costs of a car plus a human.

> These business models are ways of draining capital from the economy and
> putting them into the hands of a few investors and executives. They prey on
> desperate people who need money now, even if the money is insufficient to
> pay their total costs. Drivers are draining their own reserves to get cash
> now, but, hey, they gotta eat and pay the bills.

------
spunker540
One of the interesting aspects of the gig economy (speaking mostly about ride-
sharing) is sure the pay may be bad and the hours may be bad for certain
regions/areas/drivers. But Uber and Lyft don't impose any sort of
requirements. You can work exactly when and how much you want to work. That in
and of itself is a huge win for workers. Part of the problem is Uber and Lyft
also don't limit how many drivers drive at any given time, which results in
some inefficiencies (which are mostly just felt by the drivers). If there are
too many drivers on the road, fares go down which is good for everyone but the
drivers: Uber will keep taking it's cut; riders get cheap fares quickly.

I think the fact that people can drive 15 hrs a week if that fits their
childcare schedule or drive 60 hrs of week to pay for a vacation is incredibly
valuable.

~~~
eterm
"freedom not to work" is not a freedom it's a threat.

~~~
everdev
It can be a freedom for some people.

People raising kids might love to work a couple days a week a couple months of
the year (to match the school schedule).

Many of them would never consider a 9-5 FTE job.

~~~
eterm
Part time employment is very different from 'unpredictable hours with no
certainty and poor workers' rights' which is what much of the gig economy
actually is.

Part time employment with flexible working hours is a good thing, but that's
not a benefit that the gig economy delivers, in fact quite the opposite.

An unregulated wage economy suppresses wages to the point that workers must
work ever increasing hours to make a living wage. If that stops being the
case, there will be someone willing to work a little longer for a little less.
This feeds into a cycle where wages are suppressed right down to the point
where to make a living wage you actually have to be working all the time.

Far from gaining control to "set your own hours" you actually get pressured
into more and more hours.

Contrast to regulated industries where you are either salaried, or supply is
restricted so that workers can genuinely earn and set their own schedules
without feeling like they'll lose out by taking any breaks.

Describing the gig economy as some kind of workers' nirvana is just deceptive
and wrong.

~~~
everdev
> workers must work ever increasing hours to make a living wage.

That sounds like trying to use the gig economy to make a living. I'm sure some
people could do it, but it's hard like you mention.

The gig economy is designed for short, flexible gigs to supplement your income
not replace it entirely. The people that are trying to make a full income
entirely from piecing together tons of small gigs I'm sure are struggling
because that's not what it's claiming to do. It's primary function is
flexibility, not keeping up with the Joneses.

FTE is for building wealth, the gig economy is for flexibility. The gig
economy filled a much needed gap for people that only want to work a few hours
a week or like variety in their work. It's not supposed to be the cure to fill
time employment, just an alternative.

It's like complaining that a "tiny house" isn't big enough. It's not what it
was designed to do.

~~~
gshdg
But the fact is that a lot of people ARE trying to use the gig economy to make
a living. In many cases because it's the only option open to them.

When gigs represent an ever-increasing percentage of the employment available
and steadier work is becoming harder to find, how are people expected to make
a living?

------
DoreenMichele
_They were not employees and so had no health insurance_

The gig economy casts light on the fact that America fundamentally fails to
take care of its citizens in this important metric. Gig work would be less
problematic in the US if we didn't expect employers to provide healthcare.

My life works at all when it shouldn't because of gig work. There are myriad
issues making my life challenging, from serious health issues to sexism and
classism. I get aggravated when I see people who are part of the problem in
that regard vilifying the gig work that has allowed me to survive, problem
solve, get back into housing etc.

Certainly, there are abuses. We should strive to make gig work a more positive
thing generally.

But we should also strive to not throw the baby out with the bathwater.

------
thejerz
> The gig economy is quietly undermining a century of worker protections

An _economy_ is an inanimate object; it can't #{active_verb} something. This
may sound nitpicky, but: language carries meaning; language influences
perception; and, in this case, language ascribes blame.

Insofar as Ameirica is concerned, the contractors working for gig apps, like
Uber or Postmates, have _chosen_ not to exercise their rights to worker
protections. Even as contractors, giggers have a legal right to unionize,
collectively bargain, and form a cartel to demand better compensation. These
people have _chosen_ not to.

That's not to say organizing is "easy" \-- especially when you're living
paycheck-to-paycheck -- it's not. But, to the degree that contractors are
upset enough to act, organizing is feasible and achievable.[1] Self-
organization is the free-market solution to a person feeling exploited or
trampled upon by his boss. No government intervention is required.

Given that the right to exercise collective bargaining is a _choice_ , and
afaik the majority of giggers do _not_ collectively bargain, the rational
conclusion is that these gig contractors aren't upset enough about the terms
of their gig to take action.

[1] [https://drivers-united.org/](https://drivers-united.org/)

~~~
toyg
_> the contractors working for gig apps, [...] have chosen not to exercise
their rights_

It's sad to see this sort of propaganda on HN.

Gig workers choose to take up a gig job _in alternative to starvation_ , in
most cases. There are big socioeconomic problems undermining the misguided
notion that it might be a rational choice, _in the overwhelming majority of
cases_.

This is why the State, in a modern society, is supposed to step in and forbid
employers from taking advantage of workers.

These are lessons that were first learnt in the XIX and early XX century.

~~~
smsm42
> Gig workers choose to take up a gig job in alternative to starvation

Would like to see a source on the claim that Uber drivers' only alternative is
starvation. Uber has been founded in 2009, I am old enough not to remember
mass starvation anywhere in the US before that. I am also vaguely aware of
something called welfare state in the US that collects massive taxes exactly
to prevent people from starvation (among other things), and I don't remember -
before 2009 - any claims that this system has failed so much that people are
suffering starvation in the US on the massive scale, or were until Uber came
along to rescue us.

Moreover, to work for Uber, you must have a car (and a driver's license). Not
just any junker clunker car barely moving around - a relatively nice car that
a passenger would be fine with sitting it. Usually people literally starving
do not have those, I think. In most cases.

My personal experience with Uber drivers (and other gig workers, like
TaskRabbit or Fiverr) also does not match the description that they were
starving before they had this job. Of course, this is only a personal
anecdote, so I would very much like to see your source to that claim. Though I
suspect you do not have one.

~~~
toyg
There is no need to be disingenuous, you know very well what I meant.

Gig workers, at least in the UK, are overwhelmingly from minority and
disadvantaged backgrounds; they don't do it out of choice, but because they
have little or no alternative.

 _> to work for Uber, you must have a car_

This is the same as for regular taxi work (there are various arrangements, but
in most cases drivers end up paying for their vehicle one way or another). In
fact, Uber lowered requirements since you don't need a specific type of cars
(like UK cabs) or paint jobs/registrations (in most countries). And that's why
it got popular: it lowered standards even further, in a sector already
predominantly staffed by the worse-off.

 _> My personal experience with Uber drivers [...] also does not match the
description_

Of course; they want your five stars, they'll all try to look and sound happy
and successful - not unlike many entrepreneurs.

~~~
smsm42
> they don't do it out of choice, but because they have little or no
> alternative.

If they have no alternative, that means removing these jobs would leave them
with literally no income at all. How can anyone think it's a good thing?

> This is the same as for regular taxi work

No, it's not, at least not in the US where taxi medallion (completely
government-imposed cost) could cost over a million before Uber, and even now
can cost hundreds of thousands. Uber medallion costs $0 - they give you the
windshield decal for free, as I heard.

> In fact, Uber lowered requirements since you don't need a specific type of
> cars (like UK cabs) or paint jobs/registrations (in most countries)

And that's bad because it allows those with no other alternatives to earn
income access these jobs without impossibly high upfront investment, which
also allows to better serve customers, which is obviously bad because.... ? I
can't finish this phrase.

> Of course; they want your five stars, they'll all try to look and sound
> happy and successful

And that's bad because... ? Anyway, you can't be starving and dirt-poor and
"look" an owner of an upscale Mercedes - you'd need the Mercedes at least. You
can't just "look" like having one - you have to actually get one.

------
umvi
Before Uber/Lyft existed, I _never_ took a taxi. It was just prohibitively
expensive compared to buses/walking. If Uber is forced by the government to
provide all drivers with a living wage and health coverage, I imagine I'd
immediately stop using the service since it would become prohibitively
expensive again, just like the old system.

~~~
zaarn
I'd rather prefer a society that values someone being able to live comfortably
of their work over you being able to get a cheap taxi with the least amount of
effort.

~~~
savanaly
Before Uber and Lyft came along, did we have either?

~~~
zaarn
So why does that mean we should prefer the worse option? Uber and Lyft enable
the exploitation of self employed workers, that shouldn't be allowed.

------
reilly3000
Gig work and mortgage underwriting are pretty incompatible. Access to
financing to own property is one of the most secure ways to build at least
modest wealth in the long term. Permanent renting and perpetual
unpredictability in income doesn’t buy much freedom at all.

------
erlangNewb
It undermines protections but allows execution of projects that wouldn't
otherwise be possible for such a small budget. My company would not exist
without the Fiverr contractors i paid early on, hiring devs was a no go. My
fiverr devs are efficient and they all negotiate their rate. My specs are
clean and actually complete enough to deliver working code that I hook into my
existing platform. I'm pretty sure the fiverr devs I pay are making more per
hour than they would full time. One difference is that they probable dont have
time to bullshit with coworkers or surf reddit half the day.

~~~
ilaksh
How much did you pay them and for what tasks? Do you think your fivers paid
taxes or had health insurance?

------
formalsystem
My take is that gig economies are a band aid solution over the fact that a
large fraction of the workforce needs to retrain itself in tech. I'm
optimistic about universal basic income to help people get started but let's
be real tech is gonna be a huge pie and I find comments like there's no way a
truck driver can learn how to program extremely cynical. Relative to a 1,000
years ago any human today is a technological genius so we shouldn't
underestimate humans.

~~~
theoh
"Tech" is not going to provide jobs for people who previously did manual or
clerical work. It's intrinsically geared towards automating away those classes
of labour, without any guaranteed provision of a one-for-one replacement of
'old' jobs with tech jobs. I would be surprised if the level of technical
skills of the population increases over the next few years. There's really no
reason to expect that it should.

~~~
FartyMcFarter
Yeah, it's pretty ridiculous to expect a one-to-one replacement.

Let's imagine a large bank that closes down 1000 branches with 10 employees
each, due to online banking becoming more prevalent. Does this mean that the
bank suddenly (or ever) needs 10,000 _extra_ developers working on their
online banking? Not even close!

------
jimrhods23
You can replace 'gig economy' with 'contractor'. The idea of contracting has
been around for many years before Uber and Lyft and is different than the
worker rights you get when you are a full-time employee.

I also don't see it replacing anything. Every company isn't going the gig
route. It's just not practical.

"They were not employees and so had no health insurance, workers’ compensation
protections, employer contributions to Social Security and payroll taxes, paid
time off, family leave protections, discrimination protections, or
unemployment insurance benefits"

This was never part of the deal. I don't get any of this selling my items on
Ebay either.

"Sometimes, this gig work also requires an initial outlay of capital. (My own
neighbor just traded in her old vehicle for a new car, taking on thousands of
dollars in debt so that she can make extra money driving for Lyft."

So no actual research before diving in and buying a new car? Not a smart move
and not Lyft's problem.

"Platform algorithms are designed to downgrade those who aren’t always
available, making it ever-harder to pick up gigs"

As a Lyft customer, would it make sense to have someone pick me up that may
not even be there? That would be a horrible customer experience.

"Uber, for example, offers email communications to drivers, a service that is
not nearly as responsive as the taxi cab dispatcher, say"

Was this article written by the Taxicab unions? You can regulate and force
companies like Lyft to make all of the drivers employees, pay them a good
wage, and give them benefits. But, this will cut the workforce significantly
because the bar will be much higher to become a driver. Many of the people
driving now will be out of work.

“The disruption offered by the sharing economy is simply a hustle.”

It really depends on your goals. The gig economy allows more people to make
less money. Just like any market, there will be a small percentage making the
most money, some in the middle, and some making a small amount.

Do you think the workers now would rather make a little bit of money or none?
Assuming every current worker will just be converted to a full time employee
with benefits is not realistic.

------
enterx
Worker protection comes from the deductions from the salary of their own or
the salaries of other workers.

Workers pay to be protected.

Minimum wage is a total hoax and another topic. But bear in mind that most of
the minimum wage workers do not pay this protection at all and still enjoy it.

There should be no difference in taxation of the gig vs regular wage payouts.
a dollar here is equal to a dollar there.

------
Wh1skey
Working conditions a century ago were very different than they are today.
Worker protections were initiated to balance the scales between employees and
employers. Since then, living conditions have improved ten-fold. The gig
economy is an effective solution that supports both employees and employers.
The economy would be performing less optimally without it.

------
tenaciousDaniel
Is there any gig economy app that simply creates a marketplace (like
Craigslist)? This seems like it would be far preferable, because otherwise
you're just asking people to be an employee without any employee protection.

In a marketplace system, these people aren't employees; they're owners of
their own business.

~~~
JoshTriplett
> Is there any gig economy app that simply creates a marketplace

TaskRabbit and similar.

~~~
tenaciousDaniel
I disagree. Task Rabbit places demands on their providers, such as requiring
them to respond within a particular time frame. If any such demand is placed
on you, you are an employee.

~~~
JoshTriplett
A big part of the _point_ of a marketplace of contractors would be to do some
form of vetting. Contracts can have standardized terms. People may want
insurance or other protection. Contracts are more than just "X pays Y, Y does
work for X".

A marketplace making a requirement that contractors on their platform must
respond to messages within N hours doesn't inherently make the contractors
into employees. "We don't list people unless they meet these requirements"
serves as a major selling point. "We list anyone who shows up" makes for a
noisy, lower-value marketplace.

------
RickJWagner
Question for Hacker News readers outside the USA:

Is the gig economy global? Do these forces exist elsewhere?

------
anonymous5133
If you read the theories or Karl Marx, his theories are pretty accurate in
terms of explaining why people work "gig jobs" even though worker protections
are basically non-existent. Marx basically described a class of people as
being the "industrial reserve army of the unemployed"...obviously these are
people who are either unemployed or unemployed. For these people, they are
basically going to fight for whatever job they can get because having a
terrible job is better than no job at all. Thus, as long as this class exists,
people will work terrible jobs without much ability to fight back. It is also
important to note that the industrial reserve army of the unemployed exists
for each relevant skill set. For obvious hard to get skillets....the reserve
army is basically non-existent. It also explains why all of these "gig
economy" type startups almost entirely focus on services that are low-skill by
nature.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyrhoHtSkzg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyrhoHtSkzg)

~~~
smsm42
If Uber drivers are supposedly all unemployed and so poor they have to grab
any terrible job they can find, how can they afford those nice cars I'm
seeing? I am employed in high-tech and I've been in Uber cars better than mine
numerous times. People driving didn't look desperately hungry either.

~~~
telchar
What, you've never heard of debt?

~~~
smsm42
I heard of debt. I actually made and paid off some. Turns out, those debt
distributors (some people call them "banks") actually care about getting their
money back and require proof of income and employment before they give you
that sweet debt.

------
bsenftner
Any "quiet" on this front is due to the advertising power to suppress articles
examining the extreme worker inequality present in the gig economy.

------
LanceH
The first of the worker protections it is undermining is the protection from
competition from those that aren't invited to participate.

------
ghobs91
And just like it did in the early 1900s, the government will again adapt with
new regulations that take the gig economy into account.

------
naveen99
I wonder if they’ll make a non-immigration visa for gig workers similar to the
seasonal farm workers program... basically let the current farm workers have
the option of driving a taxi instead. Just require that they only work half
the year and go back to their country for the other half (stay seasonal).

------
purplezooey
One might ask the question, why do these worker protections exist in the first
place? There are good reasons. We've been undermining many things like this
lately: vaccines, the EPA, anti-trust laws, voting rights. It will be our
undoing.

------
techrich
that’s the point of the gig economy, the big corps that run the world. don’t
want to have to pay worker protections. pension contribution, sick pay. pain
holiday, it cuts down on their bottom line. better if everyone is a contractor
they can get rid off.

------
mruts
The gig economy is exactly what the world needs: flexible, fungible work that
provides opportunities to people who might not otherwise be able to get full-
time jobs. College students, mothers, elderly, etc. Anyone who needs
tremendous flexibility in their schedules.

This is a great thing and I’m not sure what all the hate is about.

~~~
eterm
That's what it _should_ be, and what proponents say it is.

But the reality is that established fulltime jobs are being supplied by "the
gig economy" creating a class of worker who previously would work full time
but now work similar jobs doing mostly similar hours but without the
protection they previously had.

If full time jobs are being replaced by ZH contracts to fill the same role,
it's not workers' who benefit, it's companies.

~~~
mruts
Could you give examples besides taxi drivers (who are a terrible example of
full-time work)?

~~~
eterm
Absolutely, there are plenty[1]. A lot of previously minimum wage employees
have been 'converted' to ZH contracts in particular:

* Care home assistants and other social care

* Retail staff

* Food manufacturing

* Farm labour

* Package and food delivery

* Food service industry (restaurant staff)

And many, many others.

Most of the gig economy is not facilitated through tech companies and apps
like uber or deliveroo but instead managed and provisioned through outsourcing
companies.

Huge swathes of the low-knowledge service economy have been replaced by these
zero-hour contracts which characterise the "gig" economy. The workers have a
very asymmetric relationship where the work-provider is generally free to
offer or not very short-term contracts or 'gigs' while the worker is generally
pressured to accept everything else risk being effectively black-balled by the
work-provider.

This is typically all done through a third party provider and further
increases the 'distance' between the worker and the actual service being
provided. This has really damaging long term effects for both the worker and
the business.

Outsourcing isn't particular new but the rate at which 'zero-hour' contracts
and the wider gig economy has been alarming. It has gone from less than 1% to
double-digit percentages of workers in some sectors on ZH contracts.

I believe that any such outsourcing is damaging, a worker who works for (and
not even employed by) a third party outsourcing company is unlikely to feel
the same pride than a direct employee, but more concerning is that domain
expertise is not kept and nutured within the company but instead diluted.
There is less opportunity for knowledge sharing across domains if different
job roles within the workplace are not just siloed but actually fulfilled by
different outsourcing companies. Having a sense of shared ownership and an
opportunity for casual knowledge sharing between different parts of a business
is essential for 'eureka' type moments to bring breakthroughs in improvements
to ways of working or problem solving.

In the outsourcing model people are seen a merely a resource to be managed. It
doesn't matter who is turning up to do that role as long as someone does.

Zero hours and the gig economy stretches this to breaking point. Both ends of
the equation lose stabilty. The business no longer has stability of knowing
which employees will be around next week, so is therefore less likely to
invest in upskilling, and the workers don't have the stability of knowing if
they'll be offered any hours the following week so lack the stability to make
long term decisions.

The accountants back at head offices of course see it as a win/win. The
busiess, e.g. a restaurant no longer has to worry about whether they'll have
to recruit for staff at short notice because of high turnover, because it's a
different company's problem to find and supply the staff and the reduced risk
that brings, and not directly employing staff reduces the overhead of managing
payroll or even if they are managing the contracts reduces some tax overhead
(e.g. employers NI contributions).

You might not recognise this as the 'gig economy', especially if you work in
an "at will" state in the USA, but in the UK these zero-hour contracts are a
large part of what we see as the gig economy because it differs so much to the
established rights that we enjoy as employees.

In fact legislators worked hard to establish new "workers' rights" to increase
rights for workers without needing full employee rights so workers at least
get some protection.

All of this also contributes to lower social mobility. The ability for someone
to climb up from the lowest 'rung' of an organisation was a rare but treasured
part of corporations. Many older companies have such stories as part of their
folklore. But in the outsourced gig economy, what were the bottom rungs of the
ladder are no longer there, and instead provisioned by a third party. There's
no ladder any more, the workers are kept at arms length from the management.

[1]
[https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwor...](https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/articles/contractsthatdonotguaranteeaminimumnumberofhours/mar2017)

~~~
perl4ever
"All of this also contributes to lower social mobility. The ability for
someone to climb up from the lowest 'rung' of an organisation was a rare but
treasured part of corporations."

I was looking for temp jobs recently, and I went to an interview for a
mailroom job. I thought of the cliche of the mailroom employee who works their
way up to CEO, and when I got to the interview, you guessed it - I wasn't
interviewing with the company I thought I was, but a contracted provider of
services in the same building. So, no CEO potential.

I also used to work for a division of a Fortune 500 company and noticed that
the janitors were, again, outsourced and not employees of the company.

Something I don't see you mention, though, is that governments are taking
advantage of outsourcing too. I am in fact working for a state government at
the moment as a temp. I'm basically doing the same thing as an employee would,
but without the civil service protections. There may or may not be
opportunities as a result.

------
username223
> The disruption offered by the "sharing economy" is simply a hustle.

I would say "an evil" rather than "a hustle." Paying a few programmers six
figures to write an app that commands lots of other people to work for less
than minimum wage as "independent contractors" is evil. Calling it "sharing"
or "tech" doesn't make it smell more sweet. Labor laws may not be perfect, but
they have been built from centuries of experience, and sometimes blood[1,2].
It's a shame to see them being successfully ignored by a handful of morally
bankrupt programmers.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangle_Shirtwaist_Factory_fi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangle_Shirtwaist_Factory_fire)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_massacre)

