Measuring Alternative Work Arrangements for Research and Policy (2020) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
1 Introduction: Motivation for the Study
1 Introduction: Motivation for the Study
Pages 15-32
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 15... ...
1 The economist and labor historian Audrey Freeman, whose original work helped motivate the CWS, first used the term "contingent" in 1985 as shorthand for the shift toward temporary or conditional employment with little or no attachment between the employee and the employer (Polivka and Nardone, 1989)
|
From page 16... ...
In w 2017, questions on work performed through mobile apps or online platforms, such as Mechanical Turk, Uber, and Lyft, were added to capture this new and rapidly growing type of work arrangement. The BLS does not label part-time work as an AWA, but instead measures part-time work through the questions asked on the monthly Current Population Survey (CPS)
|
From page 17... ...
Reports indicate, for instance, that temporary workers, contract employees, and vendors account for more than half of Google's workforce, while Amazon relies heavily on independent contractors to take orders and to process and deliver goods and on contract companies to staff its warehouses.5 Moreover, the advent of online platforms and mobile apps such as Uber, Lyft, and Mechanical Turk represents a new, technology-enabled business model whereby the platform company, like a temporary agency, mediates the employment relationship by connecting workers to clients and handles their payment. Unlike the typical arrangement at a temporary help agency, at least under current law in most states, workers in these arrangements usually are not treated as W-2 2 Evidence from a Gallup survey is provided in Abraham, Hershbein, and Houseman (2019)
|
From page 18... ...
While using such technology may enable companies to better match workers with demand, it also means workers may be on-call or otherwise receive little advance notice of their schedules from week to week, and variable hours may translate into variable earnings. Claims about upheavals in the way people now work notwithstanding, research is mixed regarding the extent of change in employment relationships in the United States in recent years.
|
From page 19... ...
One of the justifications for expanding the CWS to cover secondary jobs is the high rates of independent contractor work found in that and similar surveys. Findings based on administrative data or financial data have the potential to provide further complementary insights that may help in the design of household surveys.
|
From page 20... ...
Additionally, informal work, often done under the table, is not well captured in official statistics but is of interest for policy, since it may disproportionately be performed by the most vulnerable segments of the population -- although data are needed to assess and quantify even this assertion. Although problematic job characteristics such as insecure work hours and lack of access to benefits can be found in jobs across the labor market, various outsourcing and scheduling practices are of special interest.
|
From page 21... ...
The key distinction regarding the former (including most of those who work for online platforms or mobile apps) is that such workers, because they are self-employed, do not typically receive the protections afforded by employment and labor laws, are excluded from many social insurance programs, and are not eligible for employee benefits.
|
From page 22... ...
14 See Administrator's Interpretation No. 2015-1 July 15, 2015, issued by the Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, concerning the Application of the Fair Labor Standards Act's "Suffer or Permit" Standard in the Identification of Employees Who Are Misclassified as Independent Contractors.
|
From page 23... ...
For participants in online platform work, attractive features may include the way the platform allows them to choose when they work, learn entrepreneurship skills, or transition back into work after extended absences. These flexible arrangements may be especially beneficial to people with otherwise limited labor market options, such as students, retirees, parents of small children, or those who can only find part-time work.
|
From page 24... ...
The Committee directs BLS to continue capturing data on contingent work and alternative work arrangements by conducting the Contingent Worker Supplement to the Current Population Survey on a biennial basis."16 At the same time, Congress and other policy makers will move forward on legislation and advocacy in some capacity with or without proper databased evidence to replace the assumptions currently in vogue. This policy climate makes it all the more urgent to improve the data infrastructure for studying how employment relationships are changing and the implications for workers and firms.
|
From page 25... ...
The latter cluster includes the work of independent contractors, contract company workers, on-call workers, day laborers, temporary help agency workers, and, in the 2017 survey, electronically mediated work (that is, work obtained through online platforms or mobile apps that mediates the payment from the customer to the worker)
|
From page 26... ...
In considering how the CWS could be reshaped to better measure additional aspects of AWAs, in the chapters that follow the panel addresses a number of questions, which are previewed next. Within the broad measurement objectives of the CWS, are the work arrangements or characteristics of work covered in the survey the most rel 19 Full documentation of the CWS survey, including the development and results for the four questions about independent work done through online platforms, is provided in Current Population Survey Staff (2018)
|
From page 27... ...
Several studies suggest that independent contractor or informal work arrangements, including work for online platforms, are often secondary work activities that are important to household income (Abraham and Houseman, 2019; Farrell, Greig, and Hamoudi, 2018; Robles and McGee, 2016)
|
From page 28... ...
The difficulty household survey respondents have in accurately reporting such intermediated work arrangements is well documented, and information about these arrangements may be better collected through other means. For data that should continue to be collected in the CWS, does the current survey instrument fully and accurately capture the desired information or are there ways the data could be improved?
|
From page 29... ...
Reflecting the potential of a multiple-source data approach, economic researchers have used surveys, tax reports to the Internal Revenue Service, data from the Social Security Administration, and transactions information from commercial banking accounts to measure different aspects of AWAs and, in particular, web platform work activity and income. Although new measurement challenges have arisen, especially with the use of "organically" generated commercial data -- for example, issues regarding their representativeness and their transparency21 -- there are also distinct advantages.
|
From page 30... ...
Presentations by BLS experts described the history, measurement objectives, and past performance of the CWS. Strengths and weaknesses of household surveys, and the CPS in particular, for the purpose of measuring contingent and alternative work arrangements were identified.
|
From page 31... ...
Many of these questions arise from concerns about the economic and health impacts of modern work arrangements on the population, which are rapidly evolving in response to emerging technologies, the changing sectoral composition of the economy, and the shifting boundaries of where, how, and by whom work is performed. The expert panel will carefully review measures of employment, earnings, and worker well-being in temporary and alternative work arrangements that can be estimated using household survey data, such as those generated by the CWS, as well as measures that can be produced using administrative, commercial, and combined data sources.
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.