In the wake of the COVID-19 epidemic, many studies and news reports have pointed out that the era of China’s Gig Economy has arrived, but is it really a new driving force for social growth or a cheap tool for social stability? According to analysts, the characteristics of China’s gig economy are very different from those of knowledge-based gig economy in developed countries, and “today’s Europe and America are not necessarily tomorrow’s China”.
The report “The Development Status, Social Impact and Policy Suggestions of Part-time Economy in the Internet Era” released last month by the Institute of Economics, School of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing and Beijing Byte Jump Public Policy Research Institute defines part-time economy in the Internet era as an emerging economic model based on online platform, with independent and specific ability workers as the main body, fragmented tasks as the work content, flexible working time, location and mode, and maximum matching of supply and demand.
Entrepreneurs: Odd jobs economy will become increasingly prevalent
In an interview with Voice of America, Cheng Zhiyao, director of the Institute of Labor Studies at National Chengchi University in Taiwan, said that according to the literature or information he read, the trend of the development of the fragmented work economy was seen before COVID-19 appeared, and in the labor market after the epidemic, many CEOs of enterprises responded that the fragmented work economy will become more and more prevalent.
Workers wear masks as they work on an auto assembly line in Wuhan, Hubei province. (April 8, 2020)
Perhaps the consideration is to avoid contact with people, and perhaps a lot of work is delegated out, perhaps also considering that if many employees are gathered in a factory or workplace, it will not cause frequent contact, or even more viral infections in this regard, so a lot of work may still be outsourced to these individuals, regardless of whether they are The work may be outsourced to these workers, whether they are individuals or workers in the odd job economy to deliver these goods. If this information shows that this is indeed the case, then I believe that the future labor market will still see a large number of workers and will continue to develop, and even the scope of application will continue to expand.”
In an interview with Voice of America, Chen Yun, a professor at Fudan University’s School of International Relations and Public Affairs, argued that the casual labor economy is only a supplement to formal employment, and that the situation is more complicated in China. She said that the casual labor economy used to be called “migrant workers” in China, and they mainly worked in the manufacturing industry of the real economy, while the casual labor economy is based on the existing foundation and adds many intellectual youths, with different carriers, and now relies more on the virtual economy, engaging in life services and entertainment for the platform economy.
Solving the employment problem of college students
Chen Yun said, “The background of China is different from that of developed countries. One of the characteristics of China’s odd jobs economy is that the intellectual youths rely on the network platform for such odd jobs to survive or expand their employment. Like this year 2020 college graduates are 8.74 million, which is a record high every year since a decade, while China’s GDP (growth rate) dropped to 6.6% in 2018, and now under the epidemic, we don’t know exactly what it is. Although such an increase of three point a few was reported in the first quarter, but for the whole year, some people said it was two point a few, which is still unknown, so now the employment situation is even more severe.”
A graduate recruitment event at a university in Shenyang, Liaoning Province. (March 21, 2019)
Chen Yun said that whether China’s odd-job economy can develop to solve the problem of economic downturn depends mainly on the market demand side and the main body of employees engaged in odd-job economy, whether they themselves have unique knowledge-based skills. In fact, she said, in order to solve the employment of intellectual youth, China proposed the policy of “mass entrepreneurship and innovation” in 2017, which seems to face all the public, but the overall problem of employment difficulties of intellectual youth is still targeted.
Chen Yun said that this policy is not successful in practice, because there are many fields in the market that are monopolized by state-owned enterprises and some private enterprises, so there is little room for real entrepreneurship and innovation.
Market demand and the main body of youth
Chen Yun said: “The second one is the lack of awareness of innovation skills of these college students, the main body of knowledge youth. In fact, Chinese college students are basically the products of exam-oriented education, so from childhood to adulthood there is no accumulation of awareness and skills in this area of innovation, so the slogan after 2017 does not really solve this problem. Coupled with the U.S.-China trade friction that started last year with the new crown (Chinese Communist Party virus), many people are interested in whether the odd job economy can solve China’s economic problems.”
Although some reports point out that due to the economic growth slowdown, market saturation, and tightening government regulation, China’s online odd jobs economy is afraid that it can no longer absorb a large number of unemployed factory workers; with platforms such as DDT and Meituan Dianping laying off workers one after another, it is feared that the Chinese labor market will once again pull the alarm. Some media also pointed out that the failure to recruit workers in China’s traditional industries is also related to the fact that young people are turning to the odd jobs economy. However, a report co-authored by the Institute of Economics, School of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University and Beijing Byte Jump Public Policy Research Institute concluded that the casual labor economy is playing an increasingly prominent role in driving employment and boosting the development of new industries, and has become a new driving force for social wealth creation.
Developed countries are different from developing countries
Chen Yun, professor of School of International Relations and Public Affairs of Fudan University, does not shy away from saying that under COVID-19, more people do put into the odd-labor economy, like some supermarket employees moving to Hema Fresh Express, but she still thinks the development of odd-labor economy has its limits, and believes that the Internet odd-labor economy in developed countries is very different from that in developing countries: China has the highest proportion in the life service industry, while developed countries have knowledge-based freelancers who have higher knowledge-based skills and are in demand in the market. This is a different situation from China’s economic downturn, where people are struggling to find employment and go into the platform economy.
Chen Yun said: “You have to know that the consumption of this kind of takeaway on the Internet must first have income. If the double blow of trade friction between China and the United States and the epidemic causes the whole economy to shrink very seriously, you have no income, these takeaway services themselves will also be seriously shrunk, and demand will also shrink. Secondly, with constant price pressure, the income of takeaway employees may also plummet. The concept of shared staff sounds wonderful, but in reality it can only exist in very replaceable work time, that is, all very low-skilled, low-threshold work, who can do it, but only a temporary reallocation of human resources. Of course (under the epidemic) there is better than no, but there is no need to exaggerate the shared staff as if it will become a trend in the future.”
Hu Yuan, who works as a delivery boy in Guangzhou, graduated from college but chose a low-threshold delivery job in order to quickly find a job to support himself, thus entering the job market as soon as possible.
A delivery boy is delivering food in Wuhan, Hubei province. (Feb. 26, 2020)
Hu Yuan shared with VOA why he became a delivery boy: “Personally, I don’t like working in a factory where I work 12 hours a day; secondly, if I deliver faster, I earn more tips than others. If I work fast in the factory, the leader will not necessarily raise my salary, and he will not necessarily know who I am. So if I just run the delivery myself, and deliver the meal to the customer within the time limit, he can offer me more tips if I provide good service.”
Chen Yun, a professor at Fudan University’s School of International Relations and Public Affairs, said this shows that the attractiveness of traditional jobs is decreasing, and that the high suicide rate of thirteen consecutive jumps in the traditional manufacturing industry, previously represented by Foxconn, shows that the institutional factory management model is incompatible with the lifestyle pursued by young people now. But at the same time, this kind of labor-intensive work in the platform economy, such as takeaway, is not really the place for young people, especially intellectual youth, either in terms of income security or their own development.
Is today’s developed world China’s tomorrow?
Chen Yun said the report is generally positive about China’s casual labor economy, defining China’s future as a knowledge-based and skilled workforce from a holistic perspective, and somewhat wishfully thinking that “today in developed countries is tomorrow in China.
Chen Yun said, “It needs to improve the human resources of those people who work part-time, and they need to have skills to become really skilled and creative, so that you can find your job in the market that needs flexible employees. Otherwise, it’s not that your status is free and you’re bound to find a job. Now many young people themselves in this area of skills and creativity is very scarce, test-based education may have to take a big responsibility, is to teach people to brush out the brush, the pursuit of standard answers type of learning.”
Chen Yun said her real concern is that China’s economic growth is now declining and affected by the trade war between China and the U.S. Every year, college graduates knowledgeable young people are growing, in this situation should be how to solve the problem of their stable life and welfare. After all, the casual labor economy is low-income and low-security at the individual level, with poor stability and sustainability, and non-employment relationship, so the variables are very big, which is also a big problem for the individual security and welfare of young intellectuals.
Experts: limited positive spillover effect
Chen Yun said: “The second is to say that this type of economy will have a positive spillover effect on the whole society, in fact, I personally think that the challenge here is greater. To a large extent, there is no original technology, but the application, the innovation of externalities and industrial structure to drive the overall improvement, can not say that there is no effect at all, like Baidu enthusiastic development of autonomous driving, but not yet very mature, to say that there has been a positive spillover effect is still too early to say.”
However, at a time when Chinese college graduates are eager to find a job to make ends meet, the rights and interests of labor security do not seem to be their primary concern in choosing a job. Hu Yuan, a delivery boy, said, “In my own case, of course I would like to have more protection, which is certainly better for me. But now there are many people working in the delivery industry, and the competition between us is very strong, and the physical requirements are very high, and I certainly do not want to be injured at work. Just now you mentioned the protection, I never thought about it, but now you mentioned it, and then I started to worry a little. I will ask my foreman if I have a better employee protection if I continue to do it.”
Cheng Zhiyao, director of the Institute of Labor Studies at National Chengchi University in Taiwan, said that regardless of the differences in the levels of work content, odd jobs economy labor in exchange for high pay, working hours will be relatively long; and delivery personnel in order to grab a single, fast, occupational safety and health aspects that may lead to traffic accidents are also at risk; most importantly, they generally lack the support of the social security system, whether it is for unemployment or retirement life protection will also be relatively inadequate.
Three major risks for odd jobs economy workers
Cheng Zhiyao said: “For those who are engaged in casual labor economy, if they are not under an employment relationship, they have the risk of long working hours and even overwork, as well as the risk of occupational safety and health, and also the social security system we talk about, which is relatively speaking not thorough and complete enough for these people. Nowadays, the workers in the platform economy, especially the individual workers, if they are not employed, even if they join the industrial or professional unions, the industrial or professional unions basically have no way to fight for better labor conditions or protection of rights and interests with the platform workers on their behalf.”
Cheng Zhiyao advocates breaking this regulatory restriction that unions must be in an employment relationship to negotiate and negotiate on behalf of labor. He said that some European and American countries have positioned their group negotiation systems in such a way that unions can negotiate on behalf of their members as long as there are interests and stakes, even if they are not in an employment relationship. According to Cheng, this is the part where the design of the group negotiation system may have to break through.
For developing China, the casual labor economy creates more jobs for college graduates and perhaps fulfills China’s most important function of maintaining social stability. However, the problem of inadequate labor security extended by this business model is still at a stage where countries around the world are paying attention or paying attention to it, and it may take some time before it is really over-deployed.
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