The Uber-economy f**ks us all: How “permalancers” and “sharer” gigs gut the middle class

The "sharing" economy sounds groovy: politically neutral, anti-consumerist. Wait until it comes for your job
by STEVEN HILL

"A significant factor in the decline of the quality of jobs in the United States has been employers’ increasing reliance on “non-regular” employees — a growing army of freelancers, temps, contractors, part-timers, day laborers, micro-entrepreneurs, gig-preneurs, solo-preneurs, contingent labor, perma-lancers and perma-temps. It’s practically a new taxonomy for a workforce that has become segmented into a dizzying assortment of labor categories. Even many full-time, professional jobs and occupations are experiencing this precarious shift.

This practice has given rise to the term “1099 economy,” since these employees don’t file W-2 income tax forms like any regular, permanent employee; instead, they file the 1099-MISC form for an IRS classification known as “independent contractor.” The advantage for a business of using 1099 workers over W-2 wage-earners is obvious: an employer usually can lower its labor costs dramatically, often by 30 percent or more, since it is not responsible for a 1099 worker’s health benefits, retirement, unemployment or injured workers compensation, lunch breaks, overtime, disability, paid sick, holiday or vacation leave and more. In addition, contract workers are paid only for the specific number of hours they spend providing labor, which increasingly is being reduced to shorter and shorter “micro-gigs.”

In a sense, employers and employees used to be married to each other, and there was a sense of commitment and a joined destiny. Now, employers just want a bunch of one-night stands with their employees, a promiscuousness that promises to be not only fleeting but destabilizing to the broader macroeconomy. Set to replace the crumbling New Deal society is a darker world in which wealthy and powerful economic elite are collaborating with their political cronies to erect the policy edifice that allows them to mold their proprietary workforce into one composed of a disjointed collection of 1099 employees. Employers have called off the marriage with their employees, preferring a series of on-again, off-again affairs.

This is a direct threat to the nation’s future, as well as to what has been lionized around the world as the “American Dream.” "

http://www.salon.com/2015/10/31/the_uber_economy_fks_us_all_how_permalancers_and_sharer_gigs_guts_the_middle_class/