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I’ve Got to Make Money! I Don’t Really Care Anymore: Age-based Differences in Gig Economy Work

Mon, August 13, 2:30 to 4:10pm, Pennsylvania Convention Center, Floor: Level 100, 113A

Abstract

Due to the emphasis on technology and low-wages, sharing economy involvement is often identified as a young person's phenomenon. Yet, Farrell and Greig (2016: 22) found a surprising number of workers were outside of the typical 18-34 range: roughly a quarter of workers in labor or capital platforms (such as Airbnb hosting or Ebay sales) were between the ages of 35 and 44. Nearly a third of labor workers and an additional 36% of capital platform workers were 45 years old or older. What drives older workers to the gig economy? How do their experiences and reasons for participation differ from younger sharing economy workers? And how does such episodic work affect their mental and physical health?
In this paper, I draw my data from 78 in-depth qualitative interviews with 23 Airbnb hosts, 22 TaskRabbit workers, 19 Kitchensurfing chefs and 14 Uber drivers/messengers. Worker ages ranged from 20 to 60, with 40% of participants identifying as 35 or older. In this paper, I reexamine worker experiences through the prism of age, dividing workers into the Hopefuls and Give-Ups. I find that younger workers are more likely to be utilizing gig economy work as a supplement to their salaries or a way to fill their free time with productive work. By comparison, 'older' gig workers (defined here as 35 and beyond) are more likely to be turning to the sharing economy as a source of needed income after a job loss. While some younger workers feel gig work is stigmatizing and seek to hide such identification from friends and family, older workers encounter the stigma of gig economy work differently. Having turned to gig work after a job loss or major financial set-back, older workers profess to prefer any job over no job.

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