Forget automation. The workplace is already cracking up in profound ways, and Washington is sorely behind on dealing with it.
This Tumblr has been paused for a good half year or so, as I’ve caught my breath after grad school, worked on securing marks for the prototype and other IP, and otherwise busying myself between contract work and other employment searches. That said, Design for Work is very much a thing, and I will attempt to post here as often as possible (along with Twitter).
And so, this new piece via Politico. I don’t find any particular revelations here other than more of what we already know: specifically, that our new modes of work do not align with current government policy and systemic architecture.
In the mid-20th century, the federal government developed a litany of workplace protections—minimum wage, overtime, collective bargaining, workplace safety, tax withholding, unemployment insurance, worker’s compensation—that apply to people only classified as employees. Even more importantly for many people, benefits like employer-sponsored health insurance and retirement saving plans are also administered by employers, and are less accessible for independent contractors. As new benefits arise, they’re built on the same model. For instance, Republicans included a new credit in their 2017 tax bill that encourages companies to provide paid leave to their workers—a break that would apply to only employees, not independent contractors.
It’s worth a read regardless of familiarity, and it closes by posing this increasingly considered question: “If the workplace is changing so much, would it be possible to invent a new kind of worker? One solution that has begun to arise among labor experts is to create a third, hybrid worker classification—something between an employee and a contractor, offering protections to people, like Uber drivers, who might not be “employees” but work chiefly for one company.”