The ongoing digital revolution has consistently been debated among actors involved in the labour market and industrial relations systems. This revolution consists of broad technological changes in the world of work that need constant adjustments to new devices that allow people to access network programmes that bring about connectivity.
In some cases, this digitlisation has been the cause of large-scale disruptions in workplaces that required a new legal framework. Indeed, new players have appeared on the regulated market that pose a serious threat to the existence of the old established model.
An apt example of such a turbulence brought about by new entrants in the labour market can be found in the taxi service sector which has lately been overwhelmed by the presence of globalised firms.
Globalised agencies such as UBER, BOLT and eCabs, often defined as platform enterprises, have become established and effective players in this labour market niche. In this process these firms have posed a serious threat to the traditional service providers who work on a self-employed basis.
To make the public aware of their plight these self-employed taxi drivers recently organised a protest where they claimed that their livelihood is being seriously threatened by the predatory pricing models being adopted by the digitalised global firms which are setting unrealistically low prices to push the traditional taxi drivers out of business.
Another service sector operating in the realm of this platform economy is the delivery of food at home. The workers engaged in this service have been suffering from lack of a legal framework governing their job.
In this service industry the status of the deliverer was not clear as there were no clear distinctions between employee and self-employed. To address this the government published a Digital Platform Delivery Wages Council Regulation Order which declared that digital platform delivery personnel are employees by default.
This initiative taken by the government may be defined as an attempt to steer the course of this digitalisation process along channels it would not follow if left to operate on its own. While digitalisation may have opened vast opportunities in the world of work it has by the same token been the cause of making certain jobs obsolete.
Public policymakers should be thinking about job guarantee schemes- Saviour Rizzo
A case in point is the self-checkout machine at modern supermarkets which is designed to reduce labour cost by employing less workers to perform that task. Automation is moving from factory to the counter service as employment gets transformed and decentralised.
Paradoxically, however, while jobs requiring physical effort are declining, tasks that require dexterity remain an important part of some shop floor jobs notably in the context of operating machines. In such cases workers’ skills tend to complement machines rather than directly compete with them.
The fear animated by robotisation that automation and smart computers will eventually eliminate many jobs has not completely come true. Overall, workers, maybe due to their higher level of education and possession of skills, tend to be more highly insulated against redundancies.
This however does not rule out the need for workers to update their skills in order to cope adequately with the constant changes being made in the international globalised market.
Due to these paradoxes inherent in the labour market we still do not have a clear idea of the level of risks to their jobs which workers facing the same plight of these taxi drivers and food deliverers must contend with.
Perhaps worldwide events that are transforming the jobs of taxi drivers and the serious threat to their livelihood which they are forced to face are symptomatic of the high level of risks which workers might have to face in this digital world of work.
These workers feel that they are sinking not because they can’t swim but because of the overwhelming forces of the globalised economy that are pushing them down.
The debate about how to respond to the nuances of this digital age is likely to be with us for quite some time. Public policymakers should be thinking about job guarantee schemes that complement the normal labour market.
What is however needed is not a safety net measure which is often associated with the provisions of social services but a strong and flexible springboard that provides added impetus.
Saviour Rizzo is a former director of the Centre for Labour Studies at the University of Malta.