Is the gig economy working?
newyorker.com
Is the gig economy working?
1–10 of 16 posts
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#2I'll go with Betteridge's law of headlines: NO.
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#3Absolutely not. "Working" would require at least something to go well: well-compensated workers, high profits, technical innovation, a diversified market -- something! Instead we've got 1099 contractors making barely minimum wage, lawsuits instead of self-driving cars, local taxi companies being driven out of business. And to top it all off, the "unicorns" like Uber are not even profitable. It's just VCs spending their own money to wreck up existing markets instead of creating a viable business.
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#4Absolutely not. "Working" would require at least something to go well: well-compensated workers, high profits, technical innovation, a diversified market -- something ! Instead we've got 1099 contractors making barely minimum wage, lawsuits instead of self-driving cars, local taxi companies being driven out of business. And to top it all off, the "unicorns" like Uber are not even profitable . It's just VCs spending t…
It's working alright for consumers
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#5Absolutely not. "Working" would require at least something to go well: well-compensated workers, high profits, technical innovation, a diversified market -- something ! Instead we've got 1099 contractors making barely minimum wage, lawsuits instead of self-driving cars, local taxi companies being driven out of business. And to top it all off, the "unicorns" like Uber are not even profitable . It's just VCs spending t…
It's working alright for consumers
Charity from VCs to consumers isn't viable long-term.
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#6I feel like the gig economy would work better in a socialized healthcare system.
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#7I feel like the gig economy would work better in a socialized healthcare system.
Most economies do, since it reduces friction and allows workers to better allocate labor across the market.
Socialized healthcare, and more broadly social safety nets and services, lubricate the economy to prevent labor movement friction from causing inefficiency.
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#8Absolutely not. "Working" would require at least something to go well: well-compensated workers, high profits, technical innovation, a diversified market -- something ! Instead we've got 1099 contractors making barely minimum wage, lawsuits instead of self-driving cars, local taxi companies being driven out of business. And to top it all off, the "unicorns" like Uber are not even profitable . It's just VCs spending t…
Don't forget the workers' lack of access to health care in a post-ACA world.
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#9It's set up a bunch of middle men, but undercuts local businesses and leads to a lot of desperate and impoverished workers. When you create a just-in-time labor system, this creates a huge amount of stress for workers, as their hours and wages are unpredictable. This is fine if you don't need the money or are just supplementing a full-time income. But you can't live that existence if you have fixed bills and want to have a stable middle-class existence
Re: Is the gig economy working?
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's working alright for consumers
Charity from VCs to consumers isn't viable long-term.
Someone with a broader view on the long term success of VC than I have needs to chime in, but although I agree with your earlier statements, you made me think twice about this one.
What if it IS a viable long term strategy? VC was always "moonshots", 9 out of 10 fail, 1 goes big. While Uber is having issues, I've been hearing the profitibility issue raised for years now. Other startups, while not doing necessarily unicorn-esque in the "real world", have still IPOd or sold off. I imagine the VC's aren't idiots, if they looked at their balance sheets and saw a trend of throwing money into a bonfire they would have stopped a long time back. Are we breaking even? (I honestly don't know.) If we are, then perhaps the consumer 'charities' are a new norm for userbase building, for one strata of company growth strategy. "want to grow faster, throw money at it" has always been a technique, and I see the charity as just a new way of spending that money to gain userbase. The relevant question is whether it's more or less effective than prior/future methods.