This paper empirically examines the insecurities faced by poor women in a developing country, Ind... more This paper empirically examines the insecurities faced by poor women in a developing country, India while they try to cope with the dual responsibilities of productive and reproductive work. The poor women in developing countries are burdened with the dual responsibility of taking care of housework and the need to supplement household income to meet the subsistence needs. The ongoing flexibalisation process world over has no doubt created new jobs, most of them informal, but they lie beyond the reach of labour legislation and social protection and are characterized by low incomes and high levels of insecurity. In such a context, this paper argues for a need to address the economic needs of the women and a need to reform the social security system to recognise the value of women's labour at home.
The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online fr... more The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online freelance work at scale. Five years after its creation, the OLI has become a point of reference for scholars and policy experts investigating the online gig economy. As the market for online freelancing work matures, a high volume of data and new analytical tools allow us to revisit half a decade of online freelance monitoring and extend the index's scope to more dimensions of the global online freelancing market. In addition to measuring the utilisation of online labour across countries and occupations by tracking the number of projects and tasks posted on major English-language platforms, the new Online Labour Index 2020 (OLI 2020) also tracks Spanish-and Russian-language platforms, reveals changes over time in the geography of labour supply, and estimates female participation in the online gig economy. The rising popularity of software and tech work and the concentration of freelancers on the Indian subcontinent are examples of the insights that the OLI 2020 provides. The OLI 2020 delivers a more detailed picture of the world of online freelancing via an interactive online visualisation updated daily. It provides easy access to downloadable open data for policymakers, labour market researchers, and the general public (www.onlinelabourobservatory.org).
The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online fr... more The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online freelance work at scale. Five years after its creation, the OLI has become a point of reference for scholars and policy experts investigating the online gig economy. As the market for online freelancing work matures, a high volume of data and new analytical tools allow us to revisit half a decade of online freelance monitoring and extend the index's scope to more dimensions of the global online freelancing market. While (still) measuring the utilisation of online labour across countries and occupations by tracking the number of projects and tasks posted on major English-language platforms, the new Online Labour Index 2020 (OLI 2020) also tracks Spanish- and Russian-language platforms, reveals changes over time in the geography of labour supply and estimates female participation in the online gig economy. The rising popularity of software and tech work and the concentration of freelance...
Despite considerable scholarly attention to the proliferation of gig work on digital platforms, r... more Despite considerable scholarly attention to the proliferation of gig work on digital platforms, research tracing the broad trends of labour relations is scant. Analysing interview and survey data on food-delivery workers in China between 2018 and 2019, this article demonstrates a trend of de-flexibilisation for workers, which contradicts the purported flexibility of platform-mediated work. It is argued that de-flexibilisation is achieved through intertwined labour management tactics, technological engineering, and the cultural normalisation of platform-dependent precarious jobs. Platform companies and third-party staffing agencies have jointly deployed algorithmic systems and communicative techniques to cultivate what we refer to as ‘sticky labour’. The study contributes to the current debate on working in platform capitalism by weighing the compound effects of labour management strategies, social impact of technological engineering of the work process, and the cultural normalisatio...
Platform business models emerged with the growth of the Internet in the 1990s and are conceptuali... more Platform business models emerged with the growth of the Internet in the 1990s and are conceptualized as two-or multi-sided markets, as they facilitate exchange between service providers, clients (business) and workers. This article focuses on the impact of COVID-19 on digital labour platforms, such as freelance online web-based platforms and location-based platforms (transportation and delivery platforms), which have grown exponentially over the past decade. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed immediately some of the vulnerabilities that the workers in the platform economy were facing as they were declared as part of the 'emergency services', and this note explores their conditions during the pandemic.
Web-based, digital labour platforms permit the real-time hiring of labour for a myriad of tasks f... more Web-based, digital labour platforms permit the real-time hiring of labour for a myriad of tasks from IT programming to graphic design to routine clerical tasks. The ease, flexibility and low-cost of outsourcing work to digital labour platforms has resulted in their growth, and this growth is likely to continue in the future. Yet these online activities pose important regulatory challenges that cannot effectively be addressed solely through national responses. Recognizing these difficulties, the ILO's Global Commission on the Future of Work called for an international governance system for digital labour platforms that could set and require platforms, and their clients, to respect certain minimum rights and protections for all workers. This paper will discuss the prospects and challenges
Technological change has brought about rapid changes in the world of work over the past decade. T... more Technological change has brought about rapid changes in the world of work over the past decade. The World Bank’s World Development Report 2019: The Changing Nature of Work is a welcome contribution as it discusses the transformations that are taking place and tries to advise governments on how best to adapt to them. The report also brings out the concern related to the growing risks associated with tax evasion by large corporations that control the market power and have an ever-greater share of economic activity. However, the report is flawed in many ways as it portrays these changes in the nature of work as essentially benign, requiring “adaptation” and skills acquisition by workers facilitated by the provision of skills and “universal” social coverage by governments, with the latter understood as a prelude to labour-market deregulation. Such a narrow perspective ignores the growing body of research that points to very serious risks and challenges faced by workers in ensuring decen...
This paper assesses empirically the employment poverty nexus in India. For this purpose, we inves... more This paper assesses empirically the employment poverty nexus in India. For this purpose, we investigate macro and micro-economic relations between employment and poverty. The focus is on the household and employment determinants of poverty for households at three time points, 1983, 1993/94 and 1999/2000. We use probit models to investigate the influence of industry, employment status and education level on poverty. We do the analysis for rural and urban areas separately. The results confirm the important role of employment for poverty reduction. Nevertheless, having employment in certain industry groups does not help the poor to reduce their poverty risks. Low educational levels of the workforce are the major impediment for more substantial poverty reduction. We find that employment status of a worker is also an important determining factor in poverty reduction. The use of multiple rounds allows the comparison of poverty determinants over time. We find that certain industry groups have become less pro-poor over time.
The poor women in developing countries are burdened with the dual responsibility of taking care o... more The poor women in developing countries are burdened with the dual responsibility of taking care of housework and the need to supplement household income to meet the subsistence needs. The on-going flexibalisation process world over has no doubt created new jobs, ...
I n 1999 the ILO set itself the challenge to achieve decent work for all by promoting " oppo... more I n 1999 the ILO set itself the challenge to achieve decent work for all by promoting " opportunities for women and men to obtain decent and productive work, in conditions of freedom, equity, security and human dignity " [ILO 1999:3]. Interest in achieving this outcome " for all " implicitly extended the ILO's reach from its traditional base of formal sector wage workers to include the self-employed and other workers outside traditional employee-employer relations. It extended its outreach to the informal economy. 1 In 2002 it made this expansion explicit through the International Labour Conference's focus on " decent work and the informal economy " [ILO 2002a]. Achieving decent work for informal workers is a complicated and challenging task in an environment characterised by global economic competition. However it is a necessary task if the majority of the world's workers are to escape conditions of poverty and vulnerability. Paid work, whe...
This paper empirically examines the insecurities faced by poor women in a developing country, Ind... more This paper empirically examines the insecurities faced by poor women in a developing country, India while they try to cope with the dual responsibilities of productive and reproductive work. The poor women in developing countries are burdened with the dual responsibility of taking care of housework and the need to supplement household income to meet the subsistence needs. The ongoing flexibalisation process world over has no doubt created new jobs, most of them informal, but they lie beyond the reach of labour legislation and social protection and are characterized by low incomes and high levels of insecurity. In such a context, this paper argues for a need to address the economic needs of the women and a need to reform the social security system to recognise the value of women's labour at home.
The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online fr... more The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online freelance work at scale. Five years after its creation, the OLI has become a point of reference for scholars and policy experts investigating the online gig economy. As the market for online freelancing work matures, a high volume of data and new analytical tools allow us to revisit half a decade of online freelance monitoring and extend the index's scope to more dimensions of the global online freelancing market. In addition to measuring the utilisation of online labour across countries and occupations by tracking the number of projects and tasks posted on major English-language platforms, the new Online Labour Index 2020 (OLI 2020) also tracks Spanish-and Russian-language platforms, reveals changes over time in the geography of labour supply, and estimates female participation in the online gig economy. The rising popularity of software and tech work and the concentration of freelancers on the Indian subcontinent are examples of the insights that the OLI 2020 provides. The OLI 2020 delivers a more detailed picture of the world of online freelancing via an interactive online visualisation updated daily. It provides easy access to downloadable open data for policymakers, labour market researchers, and the general public (www.onlinelabourobservatory.org).
The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online fr... more The Online Labour Index (OLI) was launched in 2016 to measure the global utilisation of online freelance work at scale. Five years after its creation, the OLI has become a point of reference for scholars and policy experts investigating the online gig economy. As the market for online freelancing work matures, a high volume of data and new analytical tools allow us to revisit half a decade of online freelance monitoring and extend the index's scope to more dimensions of the global online freelancing market. While (still) measuring the utilisation of online labour across countries and occupations by tracking the number of projects and tasks posted on major English-language platforms, the new Online Labour Index 2020 (OLI 2020) also tracks Spanish- and Russian-language platforms, reveals changes over time in the geography of labour supply and estimates female participation in the online gig economy. The rising popularity of software and tech work and the concentration of freelance...
Despite considerable scholarly attention to the proliferation of gig work on digital platforms, r... more Despite considerable scholarly attention to the proliferation of gig work on digital platforms, research tracing the broad trends of labour relations is scant. Analysing interview and survey data on food-delivery workers in China between 2018 and 2019, this article demonstrates a trend of de-flexibilisation for workers, which contradicts the purported flexibility of platform-mediated work. It is argued that de-flexibilisation is achieved through intertwined labour management tactics, technological engineering, and the cultural normalisation of platform-dependent precarious jobs. Platform companies and third-party staffing agencies have jointly deployed algorithmic systems and communicative techniques to cultivate what we refer to as ‘sticky labour’. The study contributes to the current debate on working in platform capitalism by weighing the compound effects of labour management strategies, social impact of technological engineering of the work process, and the cultural normalisatio...
Platform business models emerged with the growth of the Internet in the 1990s and are conceptuali... more Platform business models emerged with the growth of the Internet in the 1990s and are conceptualized as two-or multi-sided markets, as they facilitate exchange between service providers, clients (business) and workers. This article focuses on the impact of COVID-19 on digital labour platforms, such as freelance online web-based platforms and location-based platforms (transportation and delivery platforms), which have grown exponentially over the past decade. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed immediately some of the vulnerabilities that the workers in the platform economy were facing as they were declared as part of the 'emergency services', and this note explores their conditions during the pandemic.
Web-based, digital labour platforms permit the real-time hiring of labour for a myriad of tasks f... more Web-based, digital labour platforms permit the real-time hiring of labour for a myriad of tasks from IT programming to graphic design to routine clerical tasks. The ease, flexibility and low-cost of outsourcing work to digital labour platforms has resulted in their growth, and this growth is likely to continue in the future. Yet these online activities pose important regulatory challenges that cannot effectively be addressed solely through national responses. Recognizing these difficulties, the ILO's Global Commission on the Future of Work called for an international governance system for digital labour platforms that could set and require platforms, and their clients, to respect certain minimum rights and protections for all workers. This paper will discuss the prospects and challenges
Technological change has brought about rapid changes in the world of work over the past decade. T... more Technological change has brought about rapid changes in the world of work over the past decade. The World Bank’s World Development Report 2019: The Changing Nature of Work is a welcome contribution as it discusses the transformations that are taking place and tries to advise governments on how best to adapt to them. The report also brings out the concern related to the growing risks associated with tax evasion by large corporations that control the market power and have an ever-greater share of economic activity. However, the report is flawed in many ways as it portrays these changes in the nature of work as essentially benign, requiring “adaptation” and skills acquisition by workers facilitated by the provision of skills and “universal” social coverage by governments, with the latter understood as a prelude to labour-market deregulation. Such a narrow perspective ignores the growing body of research that points to very serious risks and challenges faced by workers in ensuring decen...
This paper assesses empirically the employment poverty nexus in India. For this purpose, we inves... more This paper assesses empirically the employment poverty nexus in India. For this purpose, we investigate macro and micro-economic relations between employment and poverty. The focus is on the household and employment determinants of poverty for households at three time points, 1983, 1993/94 and 1999/2000. We use probit models to investigate the influence of industry, employment status and education level on poverty. We do the analysis for rural and urban areas separately. The results confirm the important role of employment for poverty reduction. Nevertheless, having employment in certain industry groups does not help the poor to reduce their poverty risks. Low educational levels of the workforce are the major impediment for more substantial poverty reduction. We find that employment status of a worker is also an important determining factor in poverty reduction. The use of multiple rounds allows the comparison of poverty determinants over time. We find that certain industry groups have become less pro-poor over time.
The poor women in developing countries are burdened with the dual responsibility of taking care o... more The poor women in developing countries are burdened with the dual responsibility of taking care of housework and the need to supplement household income to meet the subsistence needs. The on-going flexibalisation process world over has no doubt created new jobs, ...
I n 1999 the ILO set itself the challenge to achieve decent work for all by promoting " oppo... more I n 1999 the ILO set itself the challenge to achieve decent work for all by promoting " opportunities for women and men to obtain decent and productive work, in conditions of freedom, equity, security and human dignity " [ILO 1999:3]. Interest in achieving this outcome " for all " implicitly extended the ILO's reach from its traditional base of formal sector wage workers to include the self-employed and other workers outside traditional employee-employer relations. It extended its outreach to the informal economy. 1 In 2002 it made this expansion explicit through the International Labour Conference's focus on " decent work and the informal economy " [ILO 2002a]. Achieving decent work for informal workers is a complicated and challenging task in an environment characterised by global economic competition. However it is a necessary task if the majority of the world's workers are to escape conditions of poverty and vulnerability. Paid work, whe...
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Papers by Uma Amara