Worker’s Rights

As tech platforms expand the gig economy in a range of sectors, workers’ rights are weakened and companies circumvent labour rights through out-of-date legislation.

Gig economy contracts infringe on workers’ rights through insecure and unsafe work with little legal recourse. A growing part of the workforce has been turned into precarious workers, dependent on gigs from a few large platforms. An UberEats rider, for example, often makes less than minimum wage, has few rights as a contractor, and is in constant competition with their colleagues. Tech platforms side-step labor regulations and offload precarity of the market to the worker by hiring riders as contractors, or self-employed workers, instead of full employees.

Here we share some stories – mostly by local newspapers – on the impact these developments are having on people’s lives.