The Gig Economy Is Fledging

THE COVID-19 epidemic has led to the emerging of many new forms of employment that are based on the digital economy. According to data from the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and other central agencies, the scale of flexible employment hasreached about 200 million people. This means the country has entered the gig economy era.

- CHEN JUN

Freedom and Flexibility

The gig economy involves three players – gig workers, platforms, and service receipients. The strong development of Internet technologies and mobile terminal platforms has led to higher humanresource allocative efficiency in flexible employment, and hence boosted the gig economy.

During the pandemic, many consumer activities, especially those in the fields of healthcare, education, and catering, moved online, creating new job opportunities. Flexible employment plays a positive role in keeping more people in employment during a time of economic hardship. An example of this is the staff sharing partnership that online grocery stores like freshhema.com and maicai. meituan.com have established with some restaurants. During the pandemic, the former saw their orders skyrocket and consequently experienced a dire shortage of hands, while restaurants were shut down for the most part, and their workers put on extended leave. The partnership alleviated the payroll pressure on restaurants and provided a source of income for their staff.

In the time of the digital economy, more people have opted for, or forced into, flexible employment.

At 8:30 p.m., 35-year-old Li Liang, a designated driver waited at Wanfeng Road in Fengtai District, southern Beijing, ready to take orders via mobile phone from an online platform for driving services. He and his wife formerly ran a small restaurant near a used car trading center in that district, but after the business was closed during the pandemic, he chose to be a designated driver.