Gig Work and the Pandemic: Were Bad Jobs Good During the COVID-19 Crisis?

During the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of people lost their jobs. At the same time, online microtask platforms – web-based labor platforms that allow businesses and individuals to outsource tasks to a workforce who can complete tasks virtually – seemed to thrive and the number of workers engaged in microtasks for online platforms like Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) is growing. However, few researchers have focused on this type of gig work. Sociologist Jeremy Reynolds will analyze data from a panel survey of 1,111 MTurk workers to determine whether microtask gig work helped people avoid financial hardship during the pandemic. He will investigate the following questions: 1) How did workers registered on MTurk prior to the pandemic alter their hours in response to the pandemic? 2) To what extent did microtask work help workers reduce financial hardship? 3) How do these processes differ by gender and education?