Work in the platform economy

arguments for an employment relationship

Beltrán de Heredia Ruiz, Ignasi

In light of the growing tendency towards precariousness and atypicality in the European Community employment market – and increasingly so since the financial crisis – this essay addresses the impact of the platform economy on the quality of employment and on the morphology of employment and self-employment contracts.
This analysis suggests that a ‘false debate regarding dependence or subordination’ is taking place, in particular because work through platforms (offline and online) does not entail an intrinsic (and inevitable) reduction of this trait (threatening its knowability). Thus, without denying the challenges that this new reality poses, which affect multiple labour-legal institutions, this essay defends the non-obsolescence of the characterizing features of salaried employment in this environment.