Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Global cities
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter
  • Membership

One Person, One Car? The Digital Revolution’s Platform Economy

Philippe Pochet 25th November 2015

Philippe Pochet

Philippe Pochet

Before the ‘digital revolution’ things were relatively simple. A taxi equalled a car plus a driver. This driver could be self-employed or employed by a taxi company – or, possibly, a member of a cooperative. He or she paid taxes and social security contributions. Taxi-driving was an occupation, usually both full-time and long-term (except in those cases where it was a second job). The only – relatively marginal – alternative was hitchhiking.

The digital revolution – to be more precise, the emergence of digital platforms – has fundamentally altered this simple equation. Today ‘person + car’ can be the sum of at least four different combinations, the first of which is still the one described above, albeit enhanced by some technological improvements (mobile appliances, GPS, etc.).

The second combination is that of a part-time job carried out for a few hours per day or per week, generally in conjunction with some other status or activity (student, unemployment, employment or self-employment, retirement – or even taxi-driving). This applies to Uber and other similar agents about whom we hear less, like the new Flex service launched by Amazon which makes each one of us into a potential ‘delivery boy’ paid on a piece-work basis. What is the status of these workers? Unclear – as is shown in particular by the recent efforts of Uber workers to obtain employee status.

The third possibility is to reduce your own transportation costs – generally for long journeys – by offering to share your vehicle with one or more other people. This is the kind of ‘car-pooling’ arrangement organised by the Blablacar platform: a paying service for a sharing economy. Yet the nature of the transaction is hardly clear here either: is it some sort of cost-sharing contract?

The fourth combination, finally, is to rent out your own car – for a week or weekend when you are not using it – to other users. This combination too – a way of providing some extra income that contributes to the cost of running a car – has been made easier by digital platforms. Would it be called a rental service contract?


Become part of our Community of Thought Leaders


Get fresh perspectives delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for our newsletter to receive thought-provoking opinion articles and expert analysis on the most pressing political, economic and social issues of our time. Join our community of engaged readers and be a part of the conversation.

Sign up here

It becomes perfectly possible to earn your living principally as a taxi-driver, to do a bit extra on the side for Uber, to carry passengers on a private ride-sharing basis, and to rent out your car as a service.

Yet none of this is straightforward. What are the tax and social security implications and consequences of all these ‘new’ types of transaction? The case of Uber, whose social security, taxation and profit-making aspects are far from clear, has captured media attention. Yet the same questions arise in relation to Blablacar, a survey having shown that without it passengers would either have driven their own car or taken the train. Indirectly, this raises the question of public investment in collective transport; if the cost of using a car is reduced, relative price issues are affected.

Similarly, the car owner who rents out his vehicle pays neither social security contributions nor taxes on the time required to clean the car and get it ready, to sign the contract, and so forth, whereas in a private car rental firm the workers paid to carry out these tasks pay taxes and social security contributions on their earnings.

The digital revolution brings us up against unprecedented situations applicable to categories of persons and workers about whom we know rather little. Who are the Uber drivers? Who are the people who rent out their cars or offer rides to paying passengers?

This diversification of the ‘one person-one car’ binome (duo) reflects a development that is also emerging in other areas where what used to be a matter of the part-time private use of an expensive item (car, apartment, tools, …) has become for the owner an asset lending itself to a range of income-generating uses and activities.

A host of questions thus arise as a result of these changes: questions about the ‘person/worker’, to which we have alluded, but also about the ‘platform/employer’, about the localisation of profits (and taxes), about monopoly and competition, about the financing of ‘local’ social models, about regional development, about individual and collective responsibilities, etc. These changes thus call for urgent overall reflection at the European level.

This contribution is part of our project on the future of work and the digital revolution.

Philippe Pochet
Philippe Pochet

Philippe Pochet is general director of the European Trade Union Institute. He is author of À la recherche de l'Europe sociale (ETUI, 2019).


Support Progressive Ideas: Become a Social Europe Member!


Support independent publishing and progressive ideas by becoming a Social Europe member for less than 5 Euro per month. You can help us create more high-quality articles, podcasts and videos that challenge conventional thinking and foster a more informed and democratic society. Join us in our mission - your support makes all the difference!

Become a Social Europe Member

You are here: Home / Politics / One Person, One Car? The Digital Revolution’s Platform Economy

Most Popular Posts

Russia,information war Russia is winning the information warAiste Merfeldaite
Nanterre,police Nanterre and the suburbs: the lid comes offJoseph Downing
Russia,nuclear Russia’s dangerous nuclear consensusAna Palacio
Belarus,Lithuania A tale of two countries: Belarus and LithuaniaThorvaldur Gylfason and Eduard Hochreiter
retirement,Finland,ageing,pension,reform Late retirement: possible for many, not for allKati Kuitto

Most Recent Posts

OECD,inflation,monetary The OECD and the Great Monetary RestrictionRonald Janssen
prostitution,Europe,abolition Prostitution is not a free choice for womenLina Gálvez Muñoz
Abuse,work,workplace,violence Abuse at work: who bears the brunt?Agnès Parent-Thirion and Viginta Ivaskaite-Tamosiune
Ukraine,fatigue Ukraine’s cause: momentum is diminishingStefan Wolff and Tetyana Malyarenko
Vienna,social housing Vienna social-housing model: celebrated but misusedGabu Heindl

Other Social Europe Publications

strategic autonomy Strategic autonomy
Bildschirmfoto 2023 05 08 um 21.36.25 scaled 1 RE No. 13: Failed Market Approaches to Long-Term Care
front cover Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship

ETUI advertisement

The future of remote work

The 12 chapters collected in this volume provide a multidisciplinary perspective on the impact and the future trajectories of remote work, from the nexus between the location from where work is performed and how it is performed to how remote locations may affect the way work is managed and organised, as well as the applicability of existing legislation. Additional questions concern remote work’s environmental and social impact and the rapidly changing nature of the relationship between work and life.


AVAILABLE HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound Talks: does Europe have the skills it needs for a changing economy?

In this episode of the Eurofound Talks podcast, Mary McCaughey speaks with Eurofound’s research manager, Tina Weber, its senior research manager, Gijs van Houten, and Giovanni Russo, senior expert at CEDEFOP (The European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training), about Europe’s skills challenges and what can be done to help workers and businesses adapt to future skills demands.

Listen where you get your podcasts, or for free, by clicking on the link below


LISTEN HERE

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

The summer issue of the Progressive Post magazine by FEPS is out!

The Special Coverage of this new edition is dedicated to the importance of biodiversity, not only as a good in itself but also for the very existence of humankind. We need a paradigm change in the mostly utilitarian relation humans have with nature.

In this issue, we also look at the hazards of unregulated artificial intelligence, explore the shortcomings of the EU's approach to migration and asylum management, and analyse the social downside of the EU's current ethnically-focused Roma policy.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

WSI European Collective Bargaining Report 2022 / 2023

With real wages falling by 4 per cent in 2022, workers in the European Union suffered an unprecedented loss in purchasing power. The reason for this was the rapid increase in consumer prices, behind which nominal wage growth fell significantly. Meanwhile, inflation is no longer driven by energy import prices, but by domestic factors. The increased profit margins of companies are a major reason for persistent inflation. In this difficult environment, trade unions are faced with the challenge of securing real wages—and companies have the responsibility of making their contribution to returning to the path of political stability by reducing excess profits.


DOWNLOAD HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube