By Stacey Payton
As the ‘sharing economy’ grows, so does the level of precarious work, which shifts the risks and burden to the worker, but none of the benefits. The digital tools used in these emerging economies are paving the way for future automation. Will this lead to the eventual erasure of the worker?
Each year, the Murphy Institute hosts a student-organized forum, held at Murphy during the spring semester and arranged by the Urban Studies and Labor Studies departments. The purpose of the forum is to give students an opportunity to apply the lessons being taught in our curriculum to our everyday lives.
This year, our team of students decided to focus on how changes in technology are having direct effects on worker, specifically drivers of the car service Uber. We sought to explore the ways this company is taking advantage of workers and the very communities it claims to be servicing.
The forum, called Reworking Labor: The Case of Uber and the Gig Economy, was held on April 4, 2016 and attended by over 90 faculty, classmates and community members. We’re extremely grateful to our all-star panel for challenging our ideas and expanding our understanding of the current landscape. Many thanks to:
- Deputy Director and Chief Economist James Parrot from the Fiscal Policy Institute
- Executive Director of New York Taxi Workers Alliance
- Uber partner Jorge Alvarez-Washington
- Katie Unger, Deputy Commissioner of the Mayor’s Community Affairs Unit, who recently published No Backspace: The Only Thing New About Uber is Who’s Making Money Off It (Moderator)
Stacey Payton is a current student in the MA in Labor Studies program at the Murphy Institute.
