# Designing Individualized Policy and Technology Interventions to Improve Gig
Work Conditions

Jane Hsieh<EMAIL_ADDRESS>Carnegie Mellon UniversityUSA ,  Oluwatobi
Adisa<EMAIL_ADDRESS>Carnegie Mellon UniversityUSA ,  Sachi Bafna
<EMAIL_ADDRESS>Carnegie Mellon UniversityUSA and  Haiyi Zhu
<EMAIL_ADDRESS>Carnegie Mellon UniversityUSA

(2023)

###### Abstract.

The gig economy is characterized by short-term contract work completed by
independent workers who are paid to perform “gigs”, and who have control over
when, whether and how they conduct work. Gig economy platforms (e.g., Uber,
Lyft, Instacart) offer workers increased job opportunities, lower barriers to
entry, and improved flexibility. However, growing evidence suggests that
worker well-being and gig work conditions have become significant societal
issues. In designing public-facing policies and technologies for improving gig
work conditions, inherent tradeoffs exist between offering individual
flexibility and when attempting to meet all community needs. In platform-based
gig work, contractors pursue the flexibility of short-term tasks, but
policymakers resist segmenting the population when designing policies to
support their work. As platforms offer an ever-increasing variety of services,
we argue that policymakers and platform designers must provide more targeted
and personalized policies, benefits, and protections for platform-based
workers, so that they can lead more successful and sustainable gig work
careers. We present in this paper relevant legal and scholarly evidence from
the United States to support this position, and make recommendations for
future innovations in policy and technology.

††journalyear: 2023††copyright: rightsretained††conference: Annual Symposium
on Human-Computer Interaction for Work 2023; June 13–16, 2023; Oldenburg,
Germany††booktitle: Annual Symposium on Human-Computer Interaction for Work
2023 (CHIWORK 2023), June 13–16, 2023, Oldenburg, Germany††doi:
10.1145/3596671.3598576††isbn: 979-8-4007-0807-7/23/06

##  1\. Introduction

Gig work is often characterized by short-term and digitally mediated tasks or
projects performed by independent contractors, who usually hold control over
where the work is done (Watson et al., 2021). Recent accounts show that gig
workers comprise a sizable and rapidly growing segment of the nonstandard
workforce, revolutionizing the informal workforce by providing a cost-
effective earning opportunity for workers with low skills or education,
enabling small businesses to scale quickly, and offering greater mobility to
disadvantaged citizens (Wood et al., 2018; Branstetter et al., 2020; Blaising
et al., 2021). By 2021, more than one-third of the US working population had
participated in gig work (noa, 2021a), and more than 3% of adults engaged with
it as their primary occupation (Anderson et al., 2021). But alongside the
proliferation of platforms, scholars are expressing concerns about how
algorithmic management affects the well-being of gig workers (You et al.,
2021; Zhang et al., 2022; Lee et al., 2021; Cram et al., 2020, 2022; Wu et
al., 2022; Berger et al., 2019; Parry and Battista, 2019).

Previous studies report the limited social (Yao et al., 2021; Kuhn and
Galloway, 2019; Wood et al., 2019), technological (Li et al., 2022; Jarrahi et
al., 2020), and regulatory (Dubal, 2019; Hardy and McCrystal, 2022; Graham et
al., 2017; Tan et al., 2021; Stewart and Stanford, 2017) support needed to
contend with the adverse conditions of gig work, which include intense
competition (Bates et al., 2021; Kost et al., 2020), low wages (Friedman,
2014; Kalleberg and Dunn, 2016; Wood et al., 2018), job precarity (Ashford et
al., 2018; Sutherland et al., 2020), and physical hazards (Bajwa et al., 2018;
Howard, 2017). These inadequacies arise from several unique characteristics of
workers, such as information asymmetries (Jarrahi and Sutherland, 2019;
Jarrahi et al., 2020; Zhang et al., 2022; Kinder et al., 2019), a
commodification of labor (Stefano and De Stefano, 2015; Wood et al., 2019),
and a lack of benefits and protections (Muntaner, 2018; Luckett, 2021).
Underlying these problems is the ambiguous legal classification of gig
workers-their status as independent contractors provides flexibility in the
time and location of work, but at the expense of typical employee rights to
unionization and collective bargaining or benefits such as health care and
paid time off (Bales and Woo, 2016).

In light of these concerns, many have turned to the redesign of regulatory
policies [39] and platforms (Arnoldi et al., 2021; Jabagi et al., 2019).
However, many existing proposals suggest broader advancements that uniformly
benefit the entire gig workforce without considering individual workers’
unique constraints and priorities (Hsieh et al., 2023). Such general, all-
encompassing solutions overlook the diversity of gigs and the population of
workers who complete them. Many different categories of gig work exist (Duggan
et al., 2020), and along with them unique occupational hazards and worker
needs (Bajwa et al., 2018). While gig workers may bear the same risks as
others doing similar work outside of platforms (e.g. taxi drivers), they do
not share the benefits and protections typically afforded to employees.

In this position paper, we argue that instead of universal benefits and
solutions, policy and platform designers need to consider more targeted and
personalized policies and features to support the unique needs of individual
workers, who undertake a wide variety of tasks types and occupy diverse and
intersectional backgrounds. For example, policymakers of the U.S. can amend
existing codes and introduce new legislation to provide workers with
collective bargaining power, protections against discrimination and
retaliation, as well as specialized bills for addressing particular working
needs of different types of gig workers. On the platforms’ end, engineers and
designers can implement features and services that target and accommodate
individual needs, increase worker agency, and in general improve worker well-
being and welfare. Outside of platform initiatives, technological advancements
such as automation can assist workers with tax filing, financial tracking,
contract writing as well as promoting individual well-being.

##  2\. Background

###  2.1. Diversity of Gig Services and Participants

Gig work is multifaceted and encompasses many service industries, ranging from
physical labor such as construction work to digitally deliverable services
such as logo design or software development. While some primary attributes
(e.g., placement platform or spatial/temporal flexibility) unify and define
all forms of gig work, further classifications can identify multiple variants
and categories. Some studies broadly divide gig work into its physical and
remote counterparts (Fauzi et al., 2022; Hsieh et al., 2022). For example, De
Stefano distinguishes between crowdwork – platforms such as Amazon Mechanical
Turk or CrowdFlower that mediate the remote execution of microtasks – and app
work – intermediaries such as Uber or TaskRabbit that connect workers to tasks
performed locally, including transportation, cleaning, and various other
errands such as food delivery (Stefano and De Stefano, 2015). Duggan also
introduced capital platform work as a third variant, characterizing the work
of online sellers who use digital platforms such as Etsy and Airbnb to share
individually-owned capital with consumers (Duggan et al., 2020; Maffie, 2020).
In addition to task-based classifications, a literature review by Watson et
al. also profiled different groups of gig workers: the Gig Service Provider
(e.g., Uber, AirBnb, TaskRabbit app workers), the gig goods provider (e.g.,
online sellers such as Etsy or RedBubble), the gig data provider (e.g.
crowdworkers like AMT or Google Surveys), the Agency Gig Worker (where
contractors are assigned work through an intermediary agency), and the
Traditional Gig Worker, which includes roles such as substitute teachers,
comedians, babysitters, photographers, and musicians (Watson et al., 2021).

Each of the above gig work variants require a distinct set of protections and
resources. In addition to work-related specializations, workers also diverge
from one another in terms of demographics. Recent surveys show that gig
workers tend to be younger, male, Hispanic/Black, more likely to be educated,
and live in urban areas compared to traditional workers (noa, 2018b; Gelles-
Watnick and Anderson, 2021). In contrast, an older report from BLS in 2005
showcased an older and more white gig workforce (Howard, 2017). Within each
category of gig work, however, there are more subtle differences: independent
contractors tend to be older and whiter, workers on online platforms tend to
be male, and women are more likely to engage in capital platform work
(Davidson, 2022). This diversity of demographic and occupational
characteristics (and the associated intersection between groups) necessitates
the development of targeted policies and platform features that address the
specific work needs of each group. In the following sections we outline the
current state of challenges faced by gig workers as well as existing forms of
regulatory support and budding policy initiatives to address such issues.

###  2.2. Challenges and Inequalities in Gig Work

Currently, gig workers of the United States are exposed to various financial,
safety, and health risks while lacking access to many forms of necessary
social, technical, and legal support. Previous work suggests that platforms
are unwilling to implement programs and features to improve working conditions
due to the high costs involved, and that policymakers tend to favor one-size-
fit-all solutions that apply to all gig workers to ensure inclusion and avoid
segregation (Hsieh et al., 2023). However, not only are such homogeneous
solutions hard to devise, they will not meet the individual needs of gig
workers, and platforms cannot be expected to provide the benefits required by
each individual worker. Below, we outline some key concerns and priorities for
specific subgroups of workers, and subsequently propose ways of expanding
existing U.S. policies and platform support to address such shortcomings.

####  2.2.1. Occupational Hazards of (Physical) App Workers

App workers performing physical work (e.g., ride-sharing, delivery services,
contractual construction work) need safety precautions and safeguards, access
to bathrooms, and flexibility in determining where they work (by setting a
maximum radius of travel etc.). A survey of 4,000 gig workers conducted by
UCLA found that 37% of delivery drivers have suffered an accident while on the
job (noa, 2018a). To make matters worse, drivers are disincentivized from
taking protective measures, such as using dashcams, as passenger discomfort
with surveillance can lead to poor ratings, which are important inputs to
platforms’ rating systems (Almoqbel and Wohn, 2019). According to NIOSH,
delivery drivers face a higher risk for work-related motor vehicle accidents
compared to workers in other occupations (noa, 1998). Many cases of violence
likely go undetected, but the Markup has identified 361 ride-hail and delivery
drivers as victims of carjackings or attempted carjackings over just the last
five years alone (Kerr, 2022). Cleaners, caregivers, and TaskRabbit workers
also face the dangers of entering strangers’ homes to offer their services
(Bajwa et al., 2018). These workplace hazards are exacerbated by the lack of
training and on-site supervision expected in traditional work arrangements.

In addition to physical safety risks, psychological and physical work demands
placed on app workers further expose them to health risks (Keith et al.,
2020). Studies of mortality and psychological morbidity studies have shown
that workers in nonstandard, gig work arrangements are at higher risk of
physical and mental injuries than workers in standard industrial work
environments (Howard, 2017). Empirical studies have also found that job
insecurity (a typical characteristic to contingent workers ) has a negative
impact on health and well-being (De witte et al., 2016).

####  2.2.2. Conditions of Online Gig Work

Unlike location-dependent app workers, online-based workers like freelancers
are more likely to deal with uncertainty in payments and opportunities
(Kitamura et al., 2021; Blaising et al., 2021) and invasive monitoring
(Popiel, 2017). Freelancers experience platformic management when their
performance evaluations are documented in ranking systems (which depend on
client reviews), as well as extensive oversight when their keystrokes and
active time are recorded (Vega et al., 2022). In addition, international
clients subject freelancers to long and unusual work hours (Shevchuk et al.,
2021, 2019), which increases emotional exhaustion, leads to a blended work-
life balance, and undermines life satisfaction. Finally, freelancers are
responsible for their own reputational management, which can entail extensive
time spent on building profiles and maintaining positive relationships with
clients (Kitamura et al., 2021; Hsieh et al., 2022).

Crowdworkers face similar challenges of self-management and long working
hours. However, they must additionally endure the challenges of unfair pay
(Barbosa and Chen, 2019) and wage theft, as their payment relies on the
approval of requesters and a relatively large supply of laborers makes their
services fungible and easily replaceable (Irani and Silberman, 2013). Such
imbalance of labor supply and demand also creates meaningless, menial tasks as
well as low pay and recognition (Kittur et al., 2013; Durward et al., 2020).

Online goods providers are more vulnerable to hikes in transaction fees, or
competition from large corporate companies (West, 2022), although they also
face the challenges of low pay, algorithmic management, and the pressure of
reputation upkeep through rating systems (Benson et al., 2020). For peer-to-
peer sharing platforms such as AirBnb, reviews constitute yet another
performance metric that workers must work to maintain (Lawani et al., 2019).
Finally, due to invisible platform policies, online sellers often have to
negotiate to defend that their products amount to “handmade” commodities and
familiarize themselves with intellectual property laws to defend against
infringement (Razaq et al., 2022).

####  2.2.3. Reinscriptions of Inequality in Gig Work

Gender pay gaps are reported in both crowd work and freelancing (Dunn et al.,
2021; Foong and Gerber, 2021; Dubey et al., 2017; Litman et al., 2020),
requiring women to work more hours on platforms to make up for the differences
in pay (Barzilay and Ben-David, 2016). In addition to unfair remuneration,
occupational gender stereotypes are perpetuated in various gig work sectors
around the world (Galperin, 2021; Wood et al., 2018). However, due to
caregiving and other domestic responsibilities, women are less able to fulfill
the long working hours demanded of freelancers (Adams-Prassl and Berg, 2017).
To top it off, harassing behaviors such as verbal abuse, stalking, or bullying
are more likely to put women at risk (Rosenblat et al., 2017). The lack of
public or platform-enforced anti-harassment policies have led women workers to
resort to “brushing it off” when harassment does occur (Ma et al., 2022), or
to use usernames that don’t reveal their gender (Kasliwal, 2020).

Despite the disproportionate participation of Black and Hispanic populations
in gig work, occupational segregation and racial discrimination remain
prevalent (England, 2021). On AirBnb, profile pictures have resulted in Black
hosts charging 12% less than non-Black hosts (Edelman and Luca, 2014). In an
experimental study of hypothetical hiring decisions, Black candidates were 16%
less likely to be hired (Leung et al., 2020). A 2021 survey found that White
workers were less likely than their white counterparts to earn from multiple
types of gig jobs (48% vs. 30%), to feel unsafe while completing jobs (41% vs.
28%), and to receive unwanted sexual advances (24% vs. 13%) (Gelles-Watnick
and Anderson, 2021). There is also evidence of disparities between goods
providers on Craigslist and eBay, where a White person’s hand in product
photos helped garner higher prices than a Black one (Rosenblat et al., 2017).

Socioeconomic factors may underlie many existing inequalities in the gig
economy (Shaw et al., 2022). Compared to low socioeconomic status (SES) areas
and the suburbs, services such as UberX and TaskRabbit were found to be
significantly more effective in dense high-SES areas (Thebault-Spieker et al.,
2017). AirBnB workers tend to have higher education, higher income, and strong
ties in the labor market, forming a barrier to entry for individuals of lower
socioeconomic status (Ilsøe and Larsen, 2020). These findings are noteworthy
because studies point to the potentially detrimental impacts of SES on late-
life poor health outcomes, such as aging and mortality (Freni-Sterrantino and
Salerno, 2021; Pathak et al., 2022).

A discussion of inequalities would be remiss to not consider the dynamics of
intersectionality. Workers perceived as women on TaskRabbit (especially white
women) received 10% fewer reviews, and Black (men) received significantly
lower ratings; Black men on Fiverr also received 32% fewer reviews (Hannák et
al., 2017). While past studies have substantiated claims of racial, gender and
socioeconomic biases, we lack understanding (and therefore encourage future
investigations) around gig works’ impacts on other vulnerable groups, such as
the disabled and older populations, as well as intersecting inequalities (e.g.
the gendered experiences of workers in low- and middle-income countries)
(Barakat and Redmiles, 2022; Hunt and Samman, 2019).

###  2.3. Existing Initiatives and Preliminary Policies

Many of the work-induced challenges described above have fueled legislative
concern in the US, where the state of California leads the nation’s
disagreement around labor laws. In January of 2020, the Assembly Bill 5 (AB5)
amended the state’s labor laws to expand the definition of an employee so as
to reduce the chances of employers misclassifying regular workers as
independent contractors. The bill was subsequently mandated by courts and
extended labor protections like paid leave to an estimated one million people
(noa, 2021b). However, in the November 2020 state election, a ballot
initiative (which cost platforms more than 200 million in campaign funds
(Stecker, 2020)) was passed to exempt app-based transportation companies from
AB5 (Hussain, 2022). In August 2021, the initiative was declared
unconstitutional and unenforceable by a county court judge (Gedye, 2023; unc,
2021), but proponents of Prop 22 subsequently appealed the ruling in December
2022; they are expected to receive a decision from the California Supreme
Court (Yakal, 2023).

Other states also strive to bring more benefits to gig workers. In March 2022,
Washington state governor Jay Inslee signed the Engrossed Substitute House
Bill 2076 into state law (in effect by January 2023), which guarantees minimum
trip payments, workers’ compensation, paid sick leave (one hour earned for 40
worked hours), as well as a resource center to educate workers on received
benefits (Fletcher, 2022). A pair of proposed ballot initiatives would
guarantee Massachusetts drivers benefits such as minimum wage, per-mile
expense reimbursements, a health care stipend, paid leave, workers’
compensation, protection against discrimination, as well as a right to appeal
terminations. At the federal level, a bipartisan group of legislators from the
US House of Representative introduced a federal bill in July 2022 that would
make it compulsory for platforms to provide a written summary of worker
benefits, allowing workers to reject assignments and conduct multi-platform
work, affording them rights to privacy, safety and leave as described in the
Family and Medical Leave Act, as well as protections against client
discrimination, retaliation and harassment (Shepherd, 2022).

Besides initiatives to guarantee worker benefits, a plethora of classification
tests are getting developed and adopted to assess the appropriate
classification of workers. Since 2019, California and nine other states have
adopted (or are considering) the employee-friendly ABC test to avoid
misclassification of workers as independent contractors (Iacurci, 2022). More
recently, President Biden also proposed a national rule to test whether a gig
worker could be considered an employee based on factors the amount of control
workers have over how they conduct work as well as the opportunities to
increase earnings by offering new services (Scheiber, 2022).

###  2.4. Gaps between Worker Needs and Existing Policies

The existing bills and proposals take many large-scale issues (e.g. workers’
compensation and paid leave) into consideration, but they do not make
provisions for the needs of specialized communities, excepting rideshare
drivers. Many subgroups of workers await targeted policies to assist with
particular dimensions and issues of their work – working mothers need paid
maternal leave while disabled and marginalized workers require public
accommodations for meeting various health and safety needs. For instance, our
past work eliciting the perspectives of multiple stakeholders found platforms
to resist the implementation of worker benefits, advocating instead for
worker-initiated collective actions, and that existing public infrastructure
failed to provide for basic working needs of gig workers (Hsieh et al., 2023).
Platform reluctance to provide benefits stemmed from the fear of being imposed
a legal employment relationship with the worker (as consistent with prior work
(Harris and Krueger, 2015)). On the other hand, these workshops also revealed
how regulators preferred all-inclusive solutions to special accommodations
(e.g. universal healthcare or universal basic income) to minimize the risk of
excluding (potentially vulnerable) segments of the population, and avoided
personalized solutions as they pose potential threats to worker privacy (Hsieh
et al., 2023). However, worker participants of the workshops voiced desires
for customized solutions to meet individual needs, the agency to leverage
multiple platforms or conduct their own financial planning, as well as to
avoid classification as employees (Hsieh et al., 2023). Finally, the
investigation of an “indie” food delivery system by Dalal et. al. uncovered
how platforms that prioritize local contexts over transnational scales offers
unique affordances and possibilities for workers (Dalal et al., 2023).

While an argument might be made for an omnibus bill that includes all benefits
and protections to address needs of all gig workers (Harris and Krueger,
2015), such a tendency toward all-encompassing policies and benefits have the
downside of being very broad, leading to a high cost associated with their
implementation and major labor revisions. Cost is already a major reason for
platforms’ inhibition against implementation of benefits (Hsieh et al., 2023),
and also contributes to the lengthy process of policy implementation (Hudson
et al., 2019). Presenting specialized policies that target specific issues can
reduce the legislative burden in terms of which committees and jurisdictions
to involve, potentially allowing for the earlier and faster presentation of
highly-prioritized benefits.

##  3\. Envisioned Advancements

Prior work has highlighted the need for a third category of workers to lift
legal ambiguity, improve working conditions, and increase market efficiencies
(Harris and Krueger, 2015). Currently, workers can choose among the binary
categories of the formal employee or the independent contractor. But
attempting to force the newer and more informal working arrangements of the
gig economy into such pre-existing categories limits real and potential
economic benefits of short-term, contractual workers, and recent findings show
that multiple involved stakeholder groups advocate for the establishment of a
new legal class of workers (Hsieh et al., 2023). Harris and Krueger terms this
third class the “independent workers”, and argues for their various social and
economic benefits (Harris and Krueger, 2015). In the following, we examine
existing models of relevant (and sometimes specific) policies at the local and
federal level in the US and propose ways in which they can be extended,
improved or adapted to benefit other groups of gig workers as well.

###  3.1. Policy Innovations

####  3.1.1. Power to Collectively Bargain

Currently, gig worker communities are fragmented and blocked from socializing
and forming a collective identity due to a variety of factors including
platformic design, legal constraints as well as fears of platform retaliation.
The main legal impediment for collective bargaining among gig workers is
federal antitrust law, which states that “Every contract, combination …in
restraint of trade or commerce …is declared to be illegal.”, hence “Every
person who shall make any contract or engage in any combination or conspiracy
hereby declared to be illegal” (15 U.S Code § 1). These laws were codified in
an attempt to outlaw monopolistic practices, so as to keep a free competitive
market with low prices and high quality. Since gig workers are largely
classified as independent contractors rather than employees, antitrust laws
prohibit their efforts to collectively organize and bargain – any of their
attempts at collective action can be treated as illegal cartelistic behaviors
by courts. However, legal employees hold a “labor exemption” from antitrust
liabilities since “The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of
commerce”, and so “Nothing contained in the antitrust laws shall be construed
to forbid the existence and operation of labor …organizations” (15 U.S. Code §
17). Employee efforts to collective action and unionizing are further
protected by the National Labor Relations Act, which states that “Employees
shall have the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor
organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own
choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of
collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection” (29 U.S. Code § 157).

We argue that gig workers, much like formal employees, should also be granted
exemption from antitrust laws since many of the necessary benefits and
protections they require for work (outlined in above sections) can be easily
negotiated once workers gain power to collectively bargain. Prior work
revealed that regulators strongly supported workers to collectively bargain
for their needs (Hsieh et al., 2023), and such arrangements would empower
workers to protest unfair working conditions, as well as benefit societal
welfare at large by facilitating more efficient and rapid allocation of market
resources. Furthermore, workers would more rapidly gain access to benefits (as
compared to the time-consuming process of implementing specific legislation),
and different groups of workers can have the flexibility and agency to
prioritize benefits according to specific working needs. For instance,
individuals completing gigs in food delivery and ridesharing are more likely
to bargain for workers’ compensations and bathroom access whereas freelancers
and crowdworkers might negotiate for higher wages. Such benefits negotiated
from worker-initiated action are more flexible and efficient than policy
amendments as they can be more quickly negotiated and updated. The exemption
can be applied to gig workers a few different ways: a new, third federal
category of workers can be created to adapt labor laws to the changing nature
of work, gig workers can be reclassified as employees, or workers can be
directly granted exemption on a case-by-case basis.

####  3.1.2. Specialized Policies for the Food Delivery Industry

In September 2021, the New York City Council took leading steps in improving
the welfare of food delivery workers by passing six bills that provide them
benefits and protections through actions from the service platforms as well as
a city agency (noa, 2021b). In terms of actions from the city, Bill Int No.
2294-2021 requires “the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection to study
the working conditions of third party food delivery workers”, and “based on
the results of the study …no later than January 1, 2023, the department shall
by rule establish a method for determining the minimum payments that must be
made”. Regarding payment, Int. No. 2296 mandates that platforms “shall not
charge or impose any fee on a food delivery worker for the use of any form of
payment” (thereby removing additional fees) and that that worker will be paid
“for work performed no less frequently than once a week”. With respect to
tips, Bill Int. No 1846-2020 prohibits platforms from “solicit[ing] a gratuity
for a food delivery worker …unless such third-party food delivery service
discloses, in plain language and in a conspicuous manner …amount of each
gratuity that is distributed …whether such gratuities are distributed
immediately …and whether such gratuities are distributed in cash”.
Furthermore, the bill states that “For each transaction …[the worker] shall be
notified of how much the customer paid as gratuity”, and overall platforms
must disclose to workers “the aggregate amount of compensation …gratuities
earned”, essentially requiring transparency for tips. To increase worker
agency, Bill Int. No. 2289 states that workers will be provided “the ability
to specify: the maximum distance per trip …“ as well as parameters that allow
workers to “not accept trips that require travel over any bridge or …tunnel”.
Finally, bills 2298 and 2288 and equip workers with physical accommodations:
Int. No. 2298 mandates that “a toilet facility is available for the use of
food delivery workers lawfully” on premises of food service establishments
(i.e. restaurants), provisioning workers with access to necessary bathroom
facilities, and Int. No. 2288 makes “available insulated bags to any delivery
worker who has completed at least six deliveries for the company”.

This exemplary model addresses specific needs of gig workers in New York City
and we believe that it could be applied toward many other locations and
sectors for a similar effect. For instance, grocery deliverers such as
Instacart shoppers complete adjacent work, and can also benefit from the
transparency in tips, set maximum distance per trip, access to bathrooms, as
well as provisions of insulated bags. The requirement to pay workers at least
once a week can be broadly applied to many worker types, including
crowdworkers, online sellers and freelancers. Finally, workers in other
critical industries of the gig economy (e.g. ridesharing or healthcare) can
similarly benefit from a specific and targeted set of public policies (Lobel,
2017).

####  3.1.3. Anti-discrimination Protections

Many suggest that labor platforms provide income opportunities and increased
mobility for disadvantaged workers who are otherwise incapable of engaging in
full-time jobs (e.g. mothers, students, or individuals from marginalized and
undereducated communities), offering them income through low-entry gigs as
well as low-cost services (Choudary, 2018; Branstetter et al., 2020). But as
members of marginalized communities are becoming increasingly involved in
platformic and precarious work (Dillahunt et al., 2021), they are also exposed
to more risks that are inherent to short-term precarious work. Thus, policy
amendments are necessary to adapt to the changing nature of work so that all
gig work individuals have access to equal opportunities and necessary
protections.

As a basis for comparison, workers of the formal economy are well protected
from discriminatory employment practices by federal statutory protections
enforced by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. For instance, Title
VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act forbids employers and employment agencies
from refusing “to hire or to discharge …or …discriminate against any
individual with respect to …compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of
employment, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or
national origin” or “to limit, segregate, or classify …employees or applicants
…in any way …deprive any individual of employment opportunities …because of
such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin”. Beyond
restricting discriminatory hiring and firing practices, sections of Title VII
also cover actions related to promotions, compensation, training decisions,
job shift assignments, merit systems, or disparate impact cases, among others
(noa, 1964).

On the other hand, gig workers are only granted limited protections due to
their current status as independent contractors. In particular, Section 1981
of the 1866 Civil Rights Act states that “All persons …shall have the same
right …to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, give evidence, and
to the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of
persons and property as is enjoyed by white citizens” 111Where “make and
enforce contracts” includes the making, performance, modification, and
termination of contracts, and the enjoyment of all benefits, privileges,
terms, and conditions of the contractual relationship., thereby prohibiting
race-based discrimination when making, performing under, and terminating
contracts. A subsequent amendment by Congress clarified that Section 1981
applies to private (as well as state) instances of racial discrimination “in
all forms of contracting, no matter how minor or personal” (Leong and Belzer,
2016). While important, this section is severely limiting in protecting
marginalized populations of gig workers as it only allows individuals to bring
federal claims if platforms discriminate on the basis of race, but not other
characteristics such as gender, age, disability, religion or ethnicity. In
order for such protections to reach the various marginalized populations, we
propose gig workers should also be protected under federal employment laws
against discrimination, and similar to the right of collective bargaining,
this can be achieved through either worker reclassification, a new class of
workers, or case-by-case applications.

####  3.1.4. Expansion of Anti-retaliation Protections

Wage theft refers to situations where clients fail to pay for work that has
been completed or pay less than the agreed-upon amount. This can have serious
consequences for workers, including financial strain, loss of income, and
reputation damage. For employees, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ensures
rights such as minimum wage and is enforced by the U.S. Department of Labor
(fls, 1964). The FLSA also provides employees anti-retaliation protections, so
that employers cannot take adverse actions (e.g. firing) against employees who
report misconduct or violations of labor laws.

Unfortunately for gig workers, by 2016 nearly two-thirds of platforms included
a forced arbitration agreement, which requires workers to submit disputes or
reports of violations to arbitrators instead of to court, which means that
workers cannot bring their own lawsuits to recover unpaid wages or other
damages (noa, 2021c). Furthermore, almost all of these agreements included a
class action waiver, which bans workers from bringing their claims as a group
in arbitration, even if the claims are borne of the same unlawful workplace
practices. Thus, we suggest the creation of a private right of action for gig
workers, so that individuals can pursue legal remedies if their rights under
the FLSA are violated. Online gig workers (e.g. crowdworkers and freelancers)
are especially vulnerable to wage theft or delayed payments due to the
digitally mediated nature of their work, and thus would benefit from an
expansion of such anti-retaliation efforts to protect their rights to speak up
and report unfair treatments.

###  3.2. Technological Gaps

While implementing public or platform policies can lead to significant
improvements in working conditions, we also recommend some technological
advances tailored toward individual workers that can be developed alongside
policy. These proposed technological improvements can either be integrated
into platforms (as in the case of in-app customizations) or exist as external
resources (financial planners, automated tax-filing). Unlike the quality-of-
life improvements that policy amendments/additions may bring, the technical
innovations, features and extensions might only result in incremental changes.
Nonetheless, personalization is most feasibly achieved at the individual
level, and technological approach centering end-users may constitute the most
suitable and practical way of addressing users’ diverse preferences (Li et
al., 2022).

####  3.2.1. Platform-initiated Features

Many of the above measures are implementable by platforms even if not required
by policy mandates. For instance, increased transparency in gratuity and
frequency in pay disbursements can benefit many workers of the on-demand and
online sectors. In addition to fair practices in remuneration, platforms might
consider systems that tailor toward worker preferences and schedules.
Customizations may be implemented for workers to express their desired
schedules and tasks preferences – the choice of opting out of deliveries that
requires crossing tunnels/bridges constitutes one such personalization. On top
of tailored options, in-app earnings projections can also assist individual
workers in conducting personal financial planning. As gig work is making
earning opportunities available to otherwise unemployable individuals (e.g.
mothers, students, disabled persons), it is of increasing importance to elicit
and subsequently accommodate each workers’ unique needs, priorities,
constraints, and context.

####  3.2.2. Developments Designed for Individual Well-being

After gaining an understanding of workers’ needs and objectives, platforms (or
outside efforts) can incorporate various features to help improve individual
well-being. For example, past work by You et. al. has developed a “social
sensing” probe that shares drivers’ personal health data with their
significant others so as to increase awareness and establish accountability
for maintaining well-being (You et al., 2021). Zhang et. al. has similarly
investigated how data probes (interactive data visuals) can surface individual
workers’ well-being and positionalities, which affect working strategies
(Zhang et al., 2023). Such developments, combined with nudges and reminders,
can help workers collectively resist irregular schedules as well as long
working hours.

While some protective measures against late or non-payment are already in
place (e.g. escrow), dynamic or smart contracts offer another way to protect
worker wages. Smart contracts that self-execute and auto-enforce based on
predefined conditions can help with the lack of transparency and wage theft,
allowing freelancers to automatically receive payments that trigger when the
conditions are met, reducing payment conflicts. Time and effort required to
manage contracts will also decrease, helping mitigate long work hours.
Finally, there is an opportunity gap for automation since independent
contractors are required to file quarterly tax payments per year – AI-powered
assistance with financial tracking and tax codes could help alleviate this
burden, freeing up time and effort.

##  4\. Concluding Discussion

In this position paper we discuss ways that policy and technologies in the
United States can target and improve the well-being of individual workers of
the gig economy. We argue that specialized policies and personalized
technology are efficient ways of addressing worker needs and promoting well-
being. This work contributes to the CHIWORK community by 1.) presenting a
summary of existing literature on diverse gig worker types, needs and
populations 2.) analyzing existing legislative efforts from both legal and
social perspectives and 3.) making recommendations for ways of extending the
current policy and technological developments.

###  4.1. Positionality, Limitations and Future Work

We acknowledge the existence of potential drawbacks to personalized features
or specialized policies that we did not consider or discuss. Although the
authors of this paper vary in educational backgrounds (our training lies
within Human Computer Interaction, Design, Information Systems, Software
Engineering and Computer Science), gender as well as race, we all currently
live within the US and only one author has resided outside the country within
the past five years. As a result, our analysis centers specifically on the
U.S. context, yet many platforms operate in a variety of countries across
multiple continents. This regional bias may have caused us to overlook
existing policy solutions in other regions, or more seriously, we may miss
critical issues that are only present in non-US regions, such as the global
south. We invite future lines of inquiry to evaluate the degree to which
existing policy and technology serves the individualized needs of gig workers
in other regions – the Europe-based investigation on workers’ data access
rights by Stein and Calacci is a good example (STEIN and CALACCI, 2022).
Secondly, we asserted that collective bargaining would more efficiently bring
worker benefits, but this line of argument assumes the existence of union
members who are willing to spearhead collective initiatives –- it’s possible
that workers are still reluctant to damage their relationships with platforms
even after receiving exemption from antitrust laws. The legal classification
of gig workers is another contentious issue that our proposed policy
amendments does not address, but it is in fact a critical issue that merits
further discussion and consideration. We hope that this paper furthers the
community’s understanding of potentials and tensions surrounding gig worker
well-being and helps generate ideas for the key issues raised on working
conditions. Future lines of work and dialogues are welcomed to extend or push
back on this perspective towards individualized ways of promoting gig worker
well-being.

###### Acknowledgements.

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation
(NSF), in part under Award 1952085, and in part by the Graduate Research
Fellowship Program under Grant No. DGE2140739. Any opinions, findings, and
conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the
author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science
Foundation. We are thankful to Professor Lee Branstetter for providing
invaluable advise on how to approach the research related to policy-related
innovations.

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