Contract workers struggle as Silicon Valley on-demand companies soar
Source: San Jose Mercury News
Companies such as Uber and TaskRabbit have promised a new on-demand labor economy where workers are free from the restrictions of a 9-to-5 schedule and will still earn enough money to pay Bay Area rents.
A report released Wednesday, however, tells a more discouraging story about this growing class of contract workers -- the thousands of people who work for on-demand tech companies as freelance labor and not regular employees. As the valuations and profits of these companies soar, few benefits are trickling down to the laborers, creating a workforce that lacks the security of employee benefits and struggles with financial uncertainty.
"These companies talk a kind of political correctness about the new economy and about making things fairer and offering people new opportunities, but they aren't living up to it," said Andrew Keen, a commentator on the tech industry and author of "The Internet Is Not the Answer."
The report, called the "The 2015 1099 Economy Workforce Report," referring to the name of the tax form for independent contractors, offers one of the first sweeping views of the conditions of contract labor across a broad variety of on-demand companies. Among the findings in an extensive worker survey:
- The average pay is a relatively low $18 per hour.
- More than one-fifth of on-demand workers work more than 40 hours a week.
- About a quarter of workers age 25 and older don't have health insurance.
- More than a quarter say their income from these jobs represents nearly all or the entirety of their household income.
Perhaps one of the most surprising findings of the survey is that 8 percent of respondents who work for a ride-hailing company and 16 percent of respondents who work for a delivery company do not have car insurance.
Read more: http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_28151345/contract-workers-struggle-silicon-valley-demand-companies-soar
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