Some 16% of Americans have ever earned money from an online gig platform. While most gig platform workers say they have had a positive experience with these jobs, some report facing on-the-job troubles like being treated rudely or sexually harassed.
Around half of Americans say the question of working conditions is indeed important to them, though fewer are actually willing to pay more to support businesses that are seen as worker-friendly.
Nearly a quarter of Americans say they’ve earned money in the digital “platform economy” in the past year, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. Perhaps surprisingly, though, the most commonly cited motivation for these workers is not the pay.
Americans who live in majority-minority communities are more likely than those who reside in predominately white neighborhoods to say that ride-hailing apps serve neighborhoods that taxis won’t visit.
The sharing and on-demand economy has grown in the U.S., and some Americans are “super users”: 7% have used six or more shared and on-demand online services.
We interviewed Arun Sundararajan, a professor of information, operations and management sciences at New York University, and a leading expert on the sharing economy. Sundararajan is the author of the recently released book “The Sharing Economy: The End of Employment and the Rise of Crowd-Based Capitalism.”