> If the US had full employment and decent unemployment benefits (like it used to) jobs like these wouldnt exist. We don't, though, and that has much deeper ca

> If the US had full employment and decent unemployment benefits (like it used to) jobs like these wouldnt exist. We don't, though, and that has much deeper causes than the existence of gig companies. A large swath of the American voting public supports political candidates who oppose providing an adequate backstop for people balancing on a knife edge. I think there's a legitimate market for people who want to earn cash in their spare time on their own schedule and gig companies seem like a good fit for those people, such as people who already have stable employment or cannot work regular hours for one reason or other. Very few industries/companies offer that level of flexibility to their workers. The issue is that gig companies are also gutting already-existing labor markets by burning investor cash to undercut established competitors, so people who have stable employment find themselves forced into precarity and turn to gig work due to the lack of full time employment in the industry combined with the lack of adequate support in the American social safety net.