Platform work is a form of employment that uses an online platform to match the supply of and demand for paid labour. In Europe, platform work is still small in scale but is rapidly developing. The types of work offered through platforms are ever-increasing, as are the challenges for existing regulatory frameworks. This report explores the working and employment conditions of three of the most common types of platform work in Europe. For each of these types, Eurofound assesses the physical and social environment, autonomy, employment status and access to social protection, and earnings and taxation based on interviews with platform workers. A comparative analysis of the regulatory frameworks applying to platform work in 18 EU Member States accompanies this review. This looks into workers’ employment status, the formal relationships between clients, workers and platforms, and the organisation and representation of workers and platforms.
Funded and commissioned by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, the paper is also available for download here. The CEPS team worked on the project from September 2017 with many partners, notably EFTHEIA, Valerio De Stefano of KU Leuven, Antonio Aloisi of Bocconi University and Irene Mandl from Eurofound.
