Gig Economies: Past, Present, and Future

Harvard FAS

This course explores how and why “gig work” — featuring flexible, short-term agreements and few of the benefits or protections associated with formal employment — has become so pervasive, with harmful consequences for workers and societies alike. We will examine how unions and federal labor law sought to redress precarity in the early twentieth century; the emergence of early gig-like arrangements like direct selling, multi-level marketing, and franchising; the role of digital technologies in…