A World Bank report released today shows online gig work is growing globally, particularly in the developing world, creating an important source of employment for women and young people in poorer countries where jobs are scarce, according to the Associated Press. That rise is generating concern, though, among worker rights advocates about the lack of strong job protections in the gig economy, where people work job to job with little security and few employment rights.
While location-based gig services such as Uber, Lyft, and TaskRabbit require labor like moving and delivery, online gig assignments can be largely done at home. Tasks include image tagging, data entry, website design, and software development.
The World Bank report estimates the number of global online gig workers at as many as 435 million people and says demand for gig work increased 41% between 2016 and the first quarter of 2023. Roughly 90% of low-income countries’ workforce is in the informal sector, according to the report. In the United States, gig workers, both online and on-site, represent a growing portion of the workforce, and there is ongoing contention about worker rights on these platforms. Transportation and delivery companies Uber, Lyft, and Grubhub have been entangled in dozens of lawsuits over minimum wage, employment classification, and alleged sexual harassment.
Worker advocates stress the precariousness of gig work and the lack of job security, accountability from management, and other social protections to workers’ health and retirement.
A 2021 Pew Research study, the latest available, shows that 16% of U.S. adults have earned money through an online gig platform, and 30% of 18- to 29-year-olds have done so.
