How gig workers are changing the labour market

Once upon a time, labour was hired as needed – what used to be called day labour. Today, with digital platforms, this old principle has been given a new face: gig workers. Workers chase short-term “gigs” through platforms, ranging from food delivery to translation and design.

The gig economy is a form of labour market in which jobs are carried out as short, temporary engagements via digital platforms. Workers enjoy flexibility in choosing when and what kind of work to do, while employers hire as needed, without offering permanent contracts. Language teachers for foreigners, graphic designers or music producers – anyone can offer their skills and earn by the hour.

In Serbia, the gig economy has developed as a relatively amorphous field that involves work through digital platforms, and today it includes both online and physical jobs. Yet, the key idea of flexibility, for both employer and worker, remains.

“Gig economy and gig workers are two similar concepts: the first refers to the services produced, and the second to the people themselves,” explains Professor Mihail Arandarenko from the Faculty of Economics for NIN.

Historically, the gig economy was linked to digital platforms. Freelancers connected with companies worldwide. Workers delivered services from their homes – from editing and design to translation and administrative tasks. Later, platforms offering more traditional types of work, such as physical services, appeared, but flexibility and informality of employment remained. Arandarenko explains that gig work today can mean anything from a one-off job for an unknown employer to twelve hours a day of constant deliveries as the sole source of income. In European systems, where hiring and firing employees is difficult, the gig economy offers a completely different model – you choose what, when, and how long you work, but without the security that comes with permanent employment.

Gig and freelancing

The boundaries between gig workers and freelancers are very blurred: the gig economy often overlaps with self-employment, especially in jobs such as food delivery or dog walking.

“Until 2020 they were considered the same. Today, the term gig worker is linked to physical jobs such as taxi driving, while freelancer is used exclusively for digital projects,” Arandarenko explains.

Gig work also includes the hiring of foreign workers. For instance, Russian companies that relocated to Serbia due to sanctions employ their workers as self-employed. They are also gig workers, although they are more often called digital nomads. This makes the situation even more complex.

This form of work is spreading across the world, but how is it perceived here? According to Tanja Jakobi, Executive Director of the Centre for Public Policy Research, the presence of gig workers in Serbia is significant. For more than a decade, Serbia has ranked among the top ten countries in the world in the number of these workers per capita.

“Serbia’s share in the global gig workforce is estimated at 1.5 to 2 per cent – much more than the country’s population size would suggest,” Jakobi explains for NIN. Nevertheless, given the large number of global digital platforms, it is impossible to accurately estimate the number of workers.

Despite this, the economic effects in Serbia are manifold. Platforms not only allow workers to improve their skills and gain work experience, but also provide them with an opportunity to earn income in situations when domestic employers cannot offer adequate jobs.

“Global work platforms have enabled highly trained workers from various sectors – from writing and language teaching to administrative services – to find an additional source of income,” Jakobi points out. In her view, these platforms have played a major role in retaining the workforce in the country, while also bringing other benefits.

“Domestic employers have indirectly benefited from such platforms because the workforce has acquired additional skills that can now be used in the local labour market,” she says.

Two sides of the same coin

Like any job, this type of work has its advantages but also its drawbacks. The positive aspects include organising working hours as needed, as well as diverse jobs and experience on projects far larger than those offered by a single employer. However, the work also comes with numerous risks. Research shows that it takes gig workers around six months before they find well-paid opportunities.

Jakobi stresses that workers often spend days doing unpaid or poorly paid tasks to build up their reputation, and sometimes employers fail to pay them, even though platforms provide some level of protection.

There is no law that directly defines gig work and gig workers. The law recognises people who are not employed in the traditional sense, and they may receive payment into a private account and be taxed under a special regime, or they may register as self-employed and be subject to the rules for that category. A specific law for gig workers does not exist, which means that solutions for some important issues, such as maternity leave, are lacking.

“Since work is currently under way on amendments and additions, or possibly on drafting a new labour law that should be aligned with the European Directive on platform work, there is a possibility that the status of these workers will be better regulated. However, this is a complex issue and in many countries it has not been resolved adequately,” says Jakobi.

The question of working hours further complicates the situation. Gig work offers freedom – the freedom to work 60 hours a week.

“That is not specific only to gig workers – other self-employed people also often have such a rhythm, working 50 or 60 hours a week. You can work less when you have a stable job and are just supplementing your budget, but you can also work much more when you find yourself in financial difficulty,” explains Arandarenko.

It is also important to note that this kind of work is usually short-term, which means that workers are constantly searching for new opportunities. If those opportunities are lacking, so is the income.

According to Jakobi, with the improvement of conditions in the domestic labour market over the past year, there has been a decline in the number of Serbian workers on some digital platforms, but further research is needed to determine the causes of these changes.

“How interested Serbian workers will be and how able they will be to take up these jobs depends on global labour market trends and on whether our workers have the necessary skills,” says Jakobi.

She adds that employers’ interest in hiring labour for short-term jobs, or for tasks that can be done outside the traditional workplace, is increasing, so this form of employment can be expected to continue developing. Arandarenko agrees, noting that in the coming years the gig economy will likely grow, but it is unlikely to fully replace the standard model of employment.

As Arandarenko points out, this type of employment suits the needs of modern society and certain kinds of work, but it has limitations. Historically, the labour market itself began as a “gig market” – people gathered and offered their labour for a daily wage, for instance, among the so-called Vukovci, workers who looked for jobs near the Vuk monument. However, where permanence, stability and guaranteed quality are required, the gig economy cannot be sustainable. The question remains how far digital “gigs” will be able to provide livelihood and security, and how far they will remain temporary work – a modern version of day labour in the digital age.

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