Summary
Ghost work’s introduction and first chapter cover a birds-eye look at the new gig economy of crowd intelligence tasks. They cover several anecdotes of people working on these tasks in various situations, mostly in the United States and India. The introduction also wants to get across that these types of tasks are for problems that AI can’t solve or needs training to be able to solve. The text also tries to impart that there is nothing to fear from AI – automation has always happened through new technologies and that there will always be more work generated by the blind spots of the newer technologies. The first chapter then goes through several different scenarios for these workers, starting with the worst working conditions and then working up to the “best.” Lastly, it pointed out that there are possible moral issues with the whole setup, using a lawsuit of workers for a specific company arguing that they were essentially being paid minimum wage working full time with no benefits.
Personal Reflection
I thought it was interesting to better understand how these gig workers came into being and why they’re needed. However, I couldn’t stop thinking about the human element. Yes, the text seems to drive you towards that direction, but it’s not until the last 2-3 pages of the book that it ever actually asks the question “Is this right?” The first few specific anecdotes in the first chapter were chilling – these were people with not just undergraduate degrees but post-graduate degrees who were working for a paycheck that put them below the poverty line. Arguably only the last 2 companies mentioned, Upwork and Amara, were even close to acceptable living conditions. LeadGenius was close, as there were tiers and “promotions” that could be earned through working, but they still seemed to pay very little for quality work. MTurk being the worst really outshone the others. A talented worker as the example was, she was only earning $16,000 a year working (according to the intro) 10 hours a day, and she was happy it was better than the $4,400 she earned the first year. The text even (insultingly) points out $4400 is more than earning $0. Futhermore, working as an mTurk required additional work to figure out what good HITs would open and what requesters to avoid as well as learn the tips and tricks of the trade. At least in a Starbucks you get paid the full amount during your training. This text and the whole ghost work gig-economy industry feels like share-cropping, where the workers are cheated out of their proper valuation.
Questions
- How could the ghost-work/gig-economy be regulated? Is self-regulation as shown by the mechanical turk forums and reddits enough?
- Now knowing what life is like for these workers, could you ethically use this service? Are the rosy-stories of “I can fill in gaps on my resume” or “I can’t work standard hours so the flexibility is nice” or “I have another source of income so this is just free money” enough to counteract the underpayment of these workers?
- Which of the businesses that setup gig-workers seems like the best tradeoff for requesters and workers? Why?
- What do you think about the idea of having to screen “employers” on Mechanical Turk? How can this impact the pay rate?
