The business model of the sharing economy depends on using cheap armies of freelancers or self-employed workers with far fewer rights and little to no holiday or sick pay
A worker coughs into her arm as she accepts pizza from a delivery driver at the Life Care Center of Kirkland, where two of three confirmed coronavirus cases in the state had links to the long-term care facility in Kirkland, US, on March 1 2020. Picture: REUTERS/DAVID RYDER
The grim reality for gig workers is that they know they can’t afford to get sick. While most people ordering burritos in self-imposed isolation have the comfort of relying on benefits, sick pay and employment law to protect them, those delivering the meals usually don’t. The services based on matching customers to cheap labourers seem happier with quick-fix measures rather than reassuring or compensating workers. In China, food deliveries come with the body temperatures of those who handle them; ride-hailing firms have installed protective sheets separating drivers from passengers.
The long-term solution will inevitably involve securing more rights for these workers, but that is a gradual multiyear process. A new law in California aiming to convert gig workers from independent contractors to employees with benefits is being challenged by firms such as Uber and Postmates, while in the UK a legal fight over the employment status of Uber drivers backed by the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain will be taken to the supreme court.
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