On-Demand Digital Economy: Can Experience Ensure Work and Income Security for Microtask Workers?

Rani, Uma; Furrer, Marianne

doi:10.1515/jbnst-2018-0019

Cited by 28 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…The motivation for performing crowdwork in developing countries despite its low levels of skill is due to lack of employment opportunities, as about 43% of the new entrants on platforms were unemployed before they started crowdwork (Rani and Furrer, 2019). So, in the absence of quality jobs that would match their skill requirements, many workers in developing countries performed tasks on these platforms either to earn incomes or to complement their incomes.…”

Section: Research Methods and Descriptive Statisticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Thus, while crowdwork provides opportunities, there are concerns with regard to outcomes – remuneration, access to work and working time flexibility. In addition, there are also concerns with regard to career progression as these tasks do not require enhanced skills (Rani and Furrer, 2019), and the educational capacity of the workers is not fully utilized. These findings are quite similar to what was observed with the BPOs and call centres in the early 2000s in terms of under-utilization of skills.…”

Section: Digital Labour Platforms For Microtasks: Impacts On Workers mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Digital labour platforms and new forms of flexible work in developing countries: Algorithmic management of work and workers

Rani

Furrer

2020

Competition & Change

Self Cite

122

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Digital technologies have led to the emergence of new forms of flexible work, such as crowdwork or information and communication technology-enabled mobile work, over the past decade. This is considered as a positive development for its high flexibility in hours and place of work, and also for providing employment opportunities to workers in developing countries, individuals with disabilities or those with care responsibilities. This article examines the on-going trend in outsourcing low-skilled work to the crowd through online platforms, and how platform design features and algorithmic management are used by digital labour platforms to assign, monitor and evaluate work. The paper argues that these distinctive features of digital platforms have an impact on working conditions in terms of access to tasks, remuneration and working time flexibility. The paper draws on a global survey of 675 workers on five globally operating platforms in 27 developing countries. Its findings highlight the need for transparency in platform architecture, design and algorithms to ensure that workers are protected from the vulnerabilities they face with digital work.

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Section: Research Methods and Descriptive Statisticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Digital Labour Platforms For Microtasks: Impacts On Workers mentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital labour platforms and new forms of flexible work in developing countries: Algorithmic management of work and workers

Rani

Furrer

2020

Competition & Change

Self Cite

122

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“…Both men and women, across all age groups, participate in paid work in the platform economy. The ILO survey observed that the gender distribution was quite skewed with one out of three workers being women (Rani and Furrer, ).…”

Section: Challenges For Social Protection In the Digital Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…On average, women performed fewer hours of paid work, though the number of hours spent on unpaid work was quite similar to that of men. Due to low pay and lack of social protection, workers had to constantly look for work, and adapt to the temporal distribution of jobs depending upon their location (Rani and Furrer, ). This often meant a high intensity of work, as they worked long hours, especially during evenings and nights, making flexibility and work‐life balance quite illusory (Berg et al, ).…”

Section: Challenges For Social Protection In the Digital Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

Social protection systems and the future of work: Ensuring social security for digital platform workers

Behrendt

Nguyen

Rani

2019

Int Social Security Review

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Digitalization is transforming societies and economies worldwide at an unprecedented scale and pace. In the wake of automation and digitalization, new forms of employment have been emerging in various occupations and sectors, such as the digital platform economy. The emergence of new forms of employment, such as work on digital platforms, requires that existing social protection systems adapt to the specific situation and needs of such workers, as to realize the human right to social security for all. Current social protection coverage for workers on digital crowdwork platforms reveals significant gaps in social security coverage. Where such coverage exists, it is often provided through the workers’ previous or additional jobs, or indirectly through their spouses or other family members. This raises questions about digital platforms free riding on the traditional economy with regard to the financing of social security. How can social protection systems adapt to changing forms of work to ensure full and effective coverage for workers in all forms of employment, including those in “new” forms of employment? How can workers in all types of employment, including those on digital platforms, be protected in an adequate and comprehensive way, combining contributory and non‐contributory mechanisms and based on equitable and sustainable financing mechanisms, so as to ensure adequate social protection to all?

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“…Throughout these debates, public administrators, market regulators, lawmakers and consumer organizations have been left scrambling to provide adequate policy responses to resolve the on-going conflict and the new challenges of supporting enterprise while protecting consumers and workers (Fernández-Trujillo, 2020;Rani & Furrer, 2019). In addition, recent studies have shown the complexity of measuring the impact of specific platforms, such as Airbnb and Uber, on their competititors in the traditional economy (Dogru et al, 2020;Skok & Baker, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The measurement of the economic, social and environmental impact of Peer to Peer online platforms: The case of collaborative consumption

López¹,

Rivera²,

Cassidy³

2020

EMP

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Over the last decade, the rise of peer-to-peer online markets has become a major sociocultural and economic phenomena and been described as a collaborative or sharing economy. However, understanding their impact has been mired in controversy and disagreement. Proponents of the sharing economy hail its potential to be a panacea for many of the world’s problems, but more critical perspectives point to research that undermines these claims. The rapid growth of this type of activity has placed public administrators in particular under pressure to develop appropriate policy and regulation. However, policy development is severely hindered by a lack of data and suitable measurement techniques. Work to develop appropriate data measurement tends to focus on economic measurement at the expense of social and environmental impact. This research paper seeks to contribute to understanding this problem area by taking a comprehensive triple impact perspective (economic, social and environmental) of the object of study. Employing a Delphi technique, the research developed forty-seven impact indicators across the three areas of measurement.A lo largo de la última década, el crecimiento de las plataformas de intercambio entre iguales, descritas como economía colaborativa, representó un de los fenónenos económicos y socio-culturales más importantes. Los defensores de la economía colaborativa resaltan su potencial para convertirse en la panacea de los grandes problemas mundiales, mientras que las perspectivas críticas apuntan a investigaciones que contradicen estas ideas. El rápido crecimiento de este tipo de actividad ha puesto a la administración pública bajo la presión de tener que desarrollar medidas de regulación adecuadas. Sin embargo, el desarrollo de regulación en este sentido adolece gravemente de la falta de datos y de técnicas adecuadas para medir el impacto. Los intentos por medir este impacto están por lo general concentrads en producir indicadores económicos, a expensas de la medición del impacto social y medioambiental. Esta investigación trata de contribuir a esta cuestión desde una perspectiva holística que estudia el triple impacto (económico, social y medioambiental) de este objeto de estudio. Recurriendo a un estudio Delphi esta investigación ha desarrollado 47 indicadores de impacto en estas tres aéreas de medición.

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On-Demand Digital Economy: Can Experience Ensure Work and Income Security for Microtask Workers?

Cited by 28 publications

References 25 publications

Digital labour platforms and new forms of flexible work in developing countries: Algorithmic management of work and workers

Digital labour platforms and new forms of flexible work in developing countries: Algorithmic management of work and workers

Social protection systems and the future of work: Ensuring social security for digital platform workers

The measurement of the economic, social and environmental impact of Peer to Peer online platforms: The case of collaborative consumption

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