Documents Maselli, Ilaria 14 results

"The digitalisation of work is creating new ways of intermediating work, with for example platforms intermediating work between individuals online. These so-called online collaborative platforms have the potential to fundamentally change the labour market, but for the moment, with an estimated 100,000 active workers or 0.05% of total employees in the EU, they do not seem to have a large impact on the offline/traditional labour market or the create/destroy impetus.



This paper analyses the direct and indirect impact of the collaborative economy on the labour market. The findings, based on a collection of empirical studies, suggest that most workers do not earn their main income through online platforms and they obtain earnings from different types of platforms. Earnings from physical/local services are, in general, substantially higher than virtual services that can potentially be delivered globally. The paper also assesses the conditions, number of hours worked and employment status, compared to the offline labour market, and finds shows large differences across types of workers, platforms, and countries.



The emergence of online collaborative platforms poses some challenges and opportunities for policy-makers. On the one hand, they may be challenged to ensure minimum remuneration, fair evaluation, tax declaration and social protection, and reduction of the administrative burden. On the other hand, the new technologies may provide opportunities to (partially) liberate some professional services and activate specific groups at a distance away from the labour market.



This paper was commissioned by the European Commission as input into its European Agenda for the Collaborative Economy. This Agenda will take account of the direct and indirect impact of the collaborative economy on the labour market."

"In this extensive report, we assess how a European unemployment benefit scheme (EUBS) could be designed. To this end, we examine 18 EUBS variants, 4 equivalent and 14 genuine schemes, and their key features. Some of these features can also be found in national unemployment benefit schemes, while others are more related to the EUBS context. We analyse the design of a common EUBS in previous literature and combine these insights with results for the legal and operational options as well as constraints and the economic value added obtained as part of our study on the “Feasibility and Added Value of a European Unemployment Benefit Scheme”. All this information is integrated into a summary fiche for each of the 18 EUBS variants studied. In addition, the report deals with a range of policy issues including convergence, minimum requirements and accession criteria."

"This case study provides a snapshot of the dynamics in the digital market for locally provided personal services. Based on a case study for a Belgium platform with 14,113 identified workers and 9,459 posted tasks, the findings suggest that the current intermediation is inefficient. Only a limited share of the tasks posted on the platform are being completed, whereas the characteristics of the not-completed tasks are fairly limited. Moreover, just a small share of the workers participating in the platform is actually performing the completed tasks. Their average earnings per hour are in most cases above the minimum wage and even above the median wage in the offline market. At the present time, however, the limited earnings for individual workers prevent this mode of working from becoming an alternative to a conventional job. In addition to the standard determinants of workers' earnings (e.g. gender, age, occupation, etc.), the characteristics and evaluation mechanism of the platform have a large influence on the distribution of tasks and earnings."

"The last few years have witnessed the exponential growth of platforms like Uber and Airbnb and the creation of countless other less well-known examples. The expansion of the on-demand economy puts huge pressure on regulators to adapt it to the existing frameworks for labour and taxation. The rapid growth of the sector also divides experts: it is seen by many as threat for working conditions, and by others as an incredible opportunity.

The purpose of this essay is to take a balanced perspective on what we know about the on-demand economy and what needs further investigation. More research is needed on the individual cases before one can draw conclusions on how this new sector works. The political economy of the sector is made even more interesting by the fact that the technology is developing faster than the regulation. Yet, our plea to policy-makers is to refrain from legislating too early and to take the time to understand how the supply and the demand of these services behave and their equilibrium.

This CEPS Essay presents groundbreaking work on the on-demand economy, drawing on the most salient findings debated during the CEPS Winter School “From Uber to Amazon Mechanical Turk: Non-traditional labour markets driven by technological and organisational change”, 23-25 November 2015, financed by the InGRID FP7 project. For more information and to download the presentations, please visit: www.ceps.eu/content/2015-winter-school.
https://www.ceps.eu/system/files/CEPS%20Essay%20No%2021%20On%20Demand%20Economy.pdf"

"Recent organisational and technological changes have generated a digital class of workers and contractors – in effect a new labour-market fringe. In this paper the authors take the case of an Italian crowdsourcing platform for interior design, called CoContest, to examine whether this medium is profitable and why professionals would choose to supply their work via such a platform.

The authors' analysis shows that despite the low returns on crowdsourced design work, a straightforward pattern of northern employer/southern contractor is not represented here because designers supply their work even if they live in Italy, which is a high-income country. For these designers CoContest can make sense if they are new to the labour market and face high entry barriers, although crowdsourcing does not offer them profitable full-time employment. The case of Serbia, however, which is the second-largest supplier of designers on the platform, is interesting in this regard. As a result of differences in purchasing power, experienced Serbian designers can make a living from crowdsourced contracts, assuming that the market continues to grow."

"This paper aims to frame the debate on a European Unemployment Benefits Scheme (EUBS), as a shock absorber for EU economies, around its origins on the one hand, and its most controversial aspects, on the other. The paper focuses on several key aspects of the EUBS, the first being the options for financing the scheme. This can be divided into those requiring the imposition of an ad-hoc tax in member countries and those relying on general contributions from these countries, which can in turn be financed in various ways. Second, it focuses on the extent to which harmonisation of current national unemployment benefit schemes would be needed. Harmonisation implies changing national legislation and practices, which creates political and administrative difficulties. Third, the study examines the problem of schemes generating regular monetary transfers from certain countries to others, and the associated problem of moral hazard. There are two broad ways to solve this problem: ex-ante or ex-post balancing. Fourth, it discusses which countries should join the EUBS. There are arguments for limiting membership to euro-area members, or for extending it to the entire European Union, but participation should in any case be mandatory. Finally, it reviews the costs of the various forms of EUBSs proposed in the literature, concluding that they tend to stay below 1% of the member countries' aggregate GDP."

"This study is a contribution to the debate around the creation of an unemployment insurance scheme for the EU/euro area by proposing an alternative mechanism to the Europeanisation of national insurance schemes. The authors make the case for a reinsurance mechanism and show that such a system delivers, for a small average contribution, large shock-absorption capacities. At the same time, due to a threshold issue, it is not suitable for EU-level absorption of small national shocks. It is rather meant to deliver a large punch once activated, which should occur only in case of MAJOR events for the labour market. Had such a scheme been in place in the EU during the period 2000-2012, it would have been triggered 40 times."

"This study offers an in-depth economic analysis of the two main proposals for the creation of a European unemployment insurance scheme. One proposes the creation of a harmonised European unemployment benefit scheme that would apply automatically to every eligible unemployed person. The alternative, termed ‘reinsurance' here, would transfer funds to national unemployment insurance schemes to finance benefits from the centre to the periphery when unemployment is measurably higher than normal.

The rationale behind these proposals is to set up an EU-level shock absorber to overcome coordination failures and the crisis-budget constraints of individual countries. The authors consider the possible trade-offs and challenges of, for example, the definition of the trigger, the fiscal rule and the harmonisation of national benefits. They conclude that while both options are viable, ‘reinsurance' offers a stronger stabilisation effect for the same amount of European distribution."

"Work is both an essential part of our daily lives and one of the major policy concerns across Europe. In this second volume of The Future of Labour in Europe, the authors explain in accessible language the findings of the NEUJOBS project on the job prospects of key industries and groups of people. They use three colours – green, pink and silver – to pinpoint areas with the largest challenges as well as the greatest potential. The conclusions are addressed to policy-makers, the business world, journalists, fellow academics and to anyone interested in the shape, size and character of the labour markets of tomorrow."

"Work is not only an essential part of our daily lives, but also one of the top policy concerns across Europe. Unfortunately, the public debate of labour issues is all too often driven by political rhetoric and short-term concerns. In the context of the NEUJOBS FP7 project, scholars from seven European countries bring together in an edited volume what the research findings from various social sciences mean for the future of labour in Europe. Their findings, written down in an easily accessible language, are addressed not only to policymakers, business persons, fellow academics and journalists, but to anyone interested in the shape, size and character of the labour markets of tomorrow and beyond."