The emergence of digital platforms has been viewed in scholarly narratives as a “technological fix” of global capital, to use Beverly Silver's classic term. That is, capital continues to devise innovative strategies to restructure the labour process and avoid employer legal liabilities. This study reveals an important but somewhat overlooked “financial fix” aspect of the platform economy. Through a case study of a Chinese food delivery platform, the author shows that global speculative capital and its cash-burning games have generated a form of market-value fetishism in this sector. In response, platform companies have devised innovative labour acquisition strategies to expand their market share that have profoundly shaped the work and employment dynamics within the sector. In particular, the platform companies engaged in a subsidy rivalry with their competitors in order to attract crowdsourcing/gig workers for their regular services and at the same time established a highly structured subcontracting system to secure a more reliable and committed workforce to target the relatively high-end consumer market. The author argues that the interaction between global financialization and local capital's strategic choices accounts for the peculiar structure and employment dynamics in the Chinese platform economy.

This article considers, summarises, and analyses the merits of various arguments regarding options for regulating (or not regulating) ‘gig work’, concluding with observations about currently proposed legislation. There is a strong argument for regulating gig work. Many workers are vulnerable, and many of the arguments against any form or regulation – in terms of innovation, productivity, employment, or the inevitability of this trend – lack merit. Current definitions of employment, indeed current labour law, are not adequate and many, but not all, gig workers are like employees in terms of the control exercised over them. However, treating gig workers as employees would encounter several problems. The outcomes would be uncertain. Not all would be covered. Many gig workers would be opposed (despite wanting protection). The gig firms could render such legislation ineffective, or alternatively succeed in mobilising opposition, almost ensuring such legislation would be revoked at the next change of government. Regulating gig work as a form of contracting is a viable alternative. It has the potential to attract support from gig workers themselves, undermining opposition by the gig firms, and attract support from some parts of capital. The New South Wales experience shows us that regulation of gig work as contracting is feasible and politically sustainable. Despite limitations, the ‘Closing the Loopholes’ Bill provides a sustainable model for regulating and protecting many ‘gig economy’ workers. It is time to envisage labour law as something that extends not just to employees but to many contractors as well.

Protests differ and so do protest outcomes. This is also the case in food delivery gig work, which is characterised by frequent labour unrest. Various cross-country analyses have pointed to the importance of the national context for the strategies and outcomes of courier protests. However, as the article shows, the protests already differ at the level of different cities. To analyse this, the study argues that the heterogeneity of protests in platform-mediated courier work is due to the spatially distinct logic of the respective cities. The research is based on two case studies of food delivery platforms in Germany, which were investigated with a mixed methods research design consisting of interviews, multi-sited ethnography and a survey. The findings show that the intrinsic logic of the two centres of courier protests studied (Cologne and Berlin) played a central role in the composition of the protesting groups, their strategies and subsequently the outcomes. However, it turns out that intrinsic logics are not homogeneous and in fact may exist in various forms, which can be complementary or in conflict with each other and are supported and realised by different social groups. In addition, the size of the cities also proves to be decisive for the dynamics of the protests.

Digital platform businesses primarily utilise on-call contingent workers, using their own tools and equipment, to perform the productive work associated with the supplied service. The expansion of this business model has led some to proclaim that traditional ‘jobs’ will come to an end. Some welcome this development, others fear its consequences for the stability and quality of work – but most see it as driven primarily by technology, and therefore largely ‘inevitable’. This article provides historical and theoretical perspective on the expansion of digitally mediated work, to better understand the range of forces (technological, economic and socio-political) at work. It shows that the major features of platform work were all visible in earlier periods of capitalism, but they became less prominent with the rise of the ‘standard employment relationship’ in the 20th century. The rise and fall of the standard employment relationship is described with reference to the changing context for the labour extraction effort of private employers. A better understanding of the complete range of forces driving changes in work organisation, and a rejection of the assumption that they are technologically determined and hence inevitable, can inform regulatory and political responses to the rise of platform work.

The COVID-19 pandemic has created economic crises and considerable loss of employment throughout the world. In the Australian context, social distancing restrictions and business closures contributed to a dramatic increase in unemployment, with 780,000 people losing work within weeks of the first COVID-19 outbreaks. Job losses were concentrated in casualised industries such as retail, recreation, arts and culture, hospitality, and accommodation. We examine policy discourses framing independent work, entrepreneurial workers and flexible work relations as essential for ‘economic recovery’, where this means business flexibility, productivity and future economic prosperity. We draw on these framings to show how the equation of flexible work relations and productivity underpins the Australian Government’s response to unemployment caused by the pandemic, as reflected in policy announcements and proposed changes to industrial relations law. In these proposals, constructions of ‘job creation’ and ‘economic recovery’ rationalise industrial relations changes that further empower business, through conflating public and business interest. At the same time, ensuing labour market deregulation and the changing profile of business renders the very idea of ‘jobs’ tendentious.