Highlights from an ILO survey of crowdworkers Janine Berg, ILO - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Highlights from an ILO survey of crowdworkers

Janine Berg, ILO COST meeting - Brussels 18 February, 2016

ILO surveyof crowdworkers

Platform All Crowdflower AMT U.S. India Survey 1 1,167 353 686 128 Survey 2 677

• 573

104

Survey sample by platform and country (no. of respondents)

Beyond basic demographic information, we know little about crowdworkers Who are they? How many crowdwork for a living? What other jobs do they do and what did they do before? How is the financial security of their household? Source: ILO Survey of Crowdworkers.

Where are the workers?

Gender balance among US- AMT; more men elsewhere

73.1 52.1 68.8 26.9 47.9 31.3 0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 60.0 70.0 80.0 CF AMT-US AMT-India Male Female

Average age is 35 years

5 10 15 Percent 20 40 60 80 Years

Poor health is a problem for some crowdworkers

34.6 51.8 10.2 2.8 0.6 24.5 52.8 18.1 3.9 0.7 28.9 57.0 11.7 2.3 0.0 0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 60.0 Very good Good Fair Poor Very poor CF AMT-US AMT-India

“[Crowdwork] has been a lifesaver for me, I have a disability but cannot get benefits so this is one

• f the few things I

can do without having to stand or walk.” – AMT worker

Education levels are high

14.1 3.9 28.4 36.7 16.9 18.7 4.0 20.7 36.5 20.1 14.3 3.4 37.3 34.1 11.1 0.8 6.3 2.3 51.6 39.1 0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 60.0 HS diploma or less Technical certificate Some college College degree Post-graduate degree All CF AMT-US AMT-India

Tenure of Survey Respondents

3.0 23.1 19.7 28.6 18.3 7.3 3.1 27.3 22.7 32.1 12.5 2.3 3.4 24.2 21.1 28.8 15.7 6.8 0.8 6.3 3.9 18.0 47.7 23.4 0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 60.0 <1 month 1-6 mos. 7-12 mos. 1-2 yrs 3-4 yrs 5+ yrs All CF AMT-US AMT-India

Is crowdwork your primary means of income (i.e. main job)?

36.96 30.75 37.96 48.8 63.04 69.25 62.04 51.2 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 All CF AMT-US AMT-India Yes No

Whichis the most important reasonwhy you do crowdwork?

5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 Could not find other employment I can only work from home I prefer to work from home Pay is better than other available jobs To complement pay from other jobs To earn money while going to school As a form of leisure I enjoy it Other All CF AMT-US AMT-India

60% of AMT workers who hold another

• job. Their employment status:

53.2 28.4 11.9 3.97 2.7 19.6 64.7 3.9 11.8 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 Hourly wage employee Salaried employee Freelancer Owner or partner in business Other AMT-USA AMT-India

Doing crowdwork while on the

• ther job
• 40% perform crowdwork during the working hours
• f the other job
• yet only 5% do so exclusively
• 55% report that their employer would be accepting
• f them performing crowdwork while at their other

job.

“The pay is low, but since I do it while I do my other job it is like getting paid a little extra at my other job.”

Main activity prior to beginning crowdwork

46 26 4 33 18 26 49 49 17 26 36 33 10 20 30 40 50 60 working the same job or running the same business working a different job running a business that no longer exists unemployed in education or training caring for children, a disabled person or an elderly adult USA India

Survey 2. AMT workers only.

4 main areas of concern

• 1. Pay of the tasks
• 2. Availability of work
• 3. Unfair treatment by requesters
• 4. Lack of responsiveness of the platforms

to the workers’ concerns.

Hourly pay by platform and country

Crowdflower AMT - USA AMT - India Median hourly pay $0.94 $4.65 $1.65 Mean hourly pay $1.77 $5.55 $3.17 Standard deviation $2.61 $3.97 $4.24 Observations 315 667 111

Note: Trimmed at 99% and $0 responses removed. Results are from Survey 1. Source: ILO Survey of Crowdworkers.

Insufficentwork: 90% would like to do more

crowdworkthan they are currently doing now

Why are you not currently doing more crowdwork?

5 60 14 14 7 9 38 33 18 4 20 36 24 18 2 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 I am not qualified for the work There isn't enough work The pay is not good enough I do not have time to do more work Other CF AMT-US AMT-India

Continuous search for tasks…

For every one hour of paid work, crowdworkers average 20 minutes of unpaid work 21% regularly work six days and 39% regularly work seven days per week

“The toughest part of turking for a living is actually finding the jobs, for every hour I spend working I most likely spend 2 hours monitoring the various scripts I have running to see what jobs show up.” –AMT worker “I would very much like if the tasks would open one after another for specific jobs, other than to wait great amount of time for them.” – Crowdflower worker (Serbia) “I would want to know when tasks are up so I can plan my day.” – AMT worker

94% have had work rejected/ were refused payment

"When you work at a real job, you are given time to learn and make mistakes and are given feedback, but in crowdwork, the first time you make a mistake (usually for a task that has vague instructions) you are rejected and maybe even blocked" - AMT worker

5.0 17.5 24.6 34.4 18.6 0.0 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 30.0 35.0 40.0 They all were Most were Some were A few were They were not

Social security contributions among US-AMT workers

Do any of your jobs take out social security from your paycheck,

• r do you make voluntary contributions to social security?

51.5 9.4 77.0 48.5 90.6 23.0 0.0 10.0 20.0 30.0 40.0 50.0 60.0 70.0 80.0 90.0 100.0 All Main job Not main job Yes No

ILO’s work on on-demand economy

• Part of larger work on Non-standard forms of employment.

Held tripartite meeting of experts on NSFE in February 2015 and received strong mandate from constituents to continue work on topic.

⇒See on-demand economy as broader trend of casualization of work. ⇒ Policy work on disguised and dependent self-employment.

• Legal analysis of on-demand economy. Working paper on on-

demand economy and fundamental principles and rights of work by Valerio De Stefano

• Analyses of income security of crowdworkers. Can we devise

social protection schemes that give sufficient coverage to casual workers? Do we need to reorganize work and recognize the employment relationship?

Thank you

For further information, please contact: Janine Berg berg@ilo.org Please contact me before citing from this presentation.