Good gigs: a fairer future for the UK's gig economy

Abstract

There are now an estimated 1.1 million people in Britain's gig economy, which is nearly as many workers as in the National Health Service (NHS) England. Over the last five years, the trend of using online platforms to source small, sometimes on-demand, jobs has accelerated, and shows little sign of slowing down. In the largest survey undertaken on Britain's gig economy, the RSA found that young people (aged 16-30) are particularly attracted to the idea of gig work - one in four said they would consider some form of it in future. Given this enormous potential for growth of the gig economy, the RSA set out to envision how platforms can become a catalyst for fair, fulfilling work in the modern labour market. How we as a society respond to the impact of gig work on the labour market is an early, and significant, test of how we will manage increasingly radical changes as a result of developments in technology, such as artificial intelligence and automation. The hope is that we can leverage technology for the benefit of workers.