Access to social security for digital platform workers in Germany and in Russia: a comparative study

A common feature of platform work in Germany and Russia is that in both countries the new forms of employment can usually only be classified as self-employed work in the form of ‘solo self-employment’, despite the fact that platforms use direct and indirect control mechanisms indicating a personal or at least an economic dependency of the digital workers on the platforms. The difference is that, in Germany, as the main rule, self-employed persons are not obligatorily insured in the state pesion insurance scheme, whereas in Russia, unlike Germany, the state pension insurance scheme is mandatory for all self-employed persons.Considering the different legal frameworks in Germany and in Russia, the article analyses various reform proposals aiming at tackling the above-mentioned challenges for the social security systems, and looks for adequate responses to ensure access to social security for digital platform workers. In particular, the following questions are investigated: Is it sufficient to subsume digital work under the existing employment categories? Could it be an appropriate solution for the access of digital workers to social security to introduce a new employment category only in social law?Keywords: digital platform worker, social security, self-employed person

Undeclared work and legal instruments for combating it in Spain

This article analyses the measures adopted in Spain to combat undeclared work, although only with respect to activities included in the scope of the Spanish Workers’ Statute (workers under employment agreements). For the purposes of this analysis, the measures have been broken down into three main groups: control measures; measures to combat illegal employment and, finally, measures to promote legal employment. The paper concludes with some reflections on the effectiveness of these measures.Keywords: Undeclared work. Control instruments. Promotion of declared work. Sanctions against undeclared work. Spain.

Contingent work is not contingent. Which models of regulation for the new forms of work?

Contingent work represents a sort of paradigmatic epiphenomenon of a new expression of the Labour Law need to reconsider itself, its identity and its same scope in a future perspective. The employment contract looses its capacity to select the situations that need protection. By the way, workers’ professionalism always requires to be safeguarded, also through innovative legal instrument. In this sense, soft law and corporate social responsibility in particular, seem to represent privileged regulative tools, to be considered and explored in order to achieve the essential protective objectives of the subject, called to be protagonist in a deeply changed world.Keywords: Contingent work. Technological revolution. Corporate Social Responsibility

The contract-of-employment test renewed. A Scandinavian approach to platform work

Platform work blurs the scope of labour law and challenges the contract-of-employment test, threatening effective labour law protection. This article analyses this challenge from a Scandinavian perspective, where the contract-of-employment tests share common features and where a core common challenge is the ambiguous nature of worker freedom: When does the freedom to choose tasks and hours indicate autonomy and when does it indicate (extreme) precarity?As the criteria guiding the test leave this issue unresolved, the article argues that a renewal is required and suggests how it can be achieved. The purposive approach rooted in Scandinavian jurisprudence allows for both an individual and a market perspective, and provides a basis for a careful renewal of the test. The article concludes by suggesting new –or updated– criteria guiding the contract-of-employment test when dealing with platform work.Keywords: platform work, crowdwork, contract of employment, concept of employee.

Collective transnational bargaining: practical implementation experiences from European Works Councils in Spain

Council Directives 94/45/EC and 2009/38/EC impose transnational collective bargaining in Community-scale undertakings so as to create procedures for informing and consulting employees in said undertakings. More than twenty years after the first Directive was passed, this article examines the agreements reached by European-scale companies with headquarters in Spain and tries to construct a typical model for European Works Councils among companies in Spain.Keywords: European Works Council; EWC; Collective transnational bargaining

Employees, workers and the ‘sharing economy’ Changing practices and changing concepts in The United Kingdom

Recent years have seen a radical shift in the practice and profile of the labour economy in the United Kingdom consisting in the considerable growth of the so-called ‘Sharing Economy’ or ‘Gig Economy’, better identified as the ‘On-demand Economy’. From that starting point, it is argued that a corresponding change seems to have occurred in the set of concepts which the labour/ employment law of the United Kingdom uses to analyse and to characterize the work relations and work contracts which are created, made, and operated within this rapidly growing sector of the labour market. Two recent high-profile Employment Tribunal decisions in the Uber and Citysprint cases, and a decision of the Court of Appeal in this same area in the Pimlico Plumbers case have served to confirm the legislative creation of a third intermediate category of ‘workers’ who benefit from a set of employment rights which is more limited than that enjoyed by employees but which is nevertheless very important. This crystallization of labour law’s newly tripartite taxonomy of work relations has occurred very largely in the context of the on-demand economy, and is beneficial to those located in that sector. This is, however, a rather fragile conceptual structure.Keywords: employees, workers, ‘sharing economy’, ‘on-demand economy’, recent cases in UK.

The Status of Uber Drivers: A Purposive Approach

The status of Uber drivers – the question of whether they are independent contractors (as argued by Uber) or employees – has been the subject of a heated debate recently. The goal of this paper is to address this question at the normative level: what should the law be in this regard? It begins, in part II, by briefly discussing some preliminary issues about how to address the problem: does it make sense to retain the employee/independent contractor distinction at all? Is it justified to maintain an “all or nothing” dichotomy? Should we leave the determination of “who is an employee” to courts? And finally, how should we interpret the term “employee” that appears in legislation? As will become clear, my approach is purposive, and Part III outlines – based on my previous writings – what this means in the context of identifying an employment relationship that justifies the application of labour laws. I will briefly consider several goals of labour law, and suggest that the most useful level of abstraction for current purposes is to focus on the unique vulnerabilities of employment, which I identify as democratic deficits (subordination, broadly conceived) and dependency (economic as well as for social/psychological needs). Finally, part IV applies these general principles to the specific context of Uber drivers, concluding eventually that Uber drivers should be considered employees.Keywords: employee, independent contractor, Uber, gig economy, on demand.

The sharing economy: the emerging debate in Spain

Focusing attention on work-on-demand via apps, this article deals with the consequences of the slow emergence of the so-called sharing economy in Spain. As far as the labour field is concerned, it examines the advantages and risks that this new type of service provision (work?) entails and how Spanish law treats it as a previous step to reflect on the ability of the (labour) current regulation to secure ‘collaborators’ decent working conditions. By extension, it also analyzes the impact that thesedeveloping activities could have on the Social Security system, in terms of protection (or lack of it) and financial condition.Keywords: sharing economy, employee, employmen contract, social security.