Rising self-employment rates in U.S. tax data that are absent in survey data have led to speculation that tax records capture a rise in new "gig" work that surveys miss. Drawing on the universe of IRS tax returns, we show that trends in firm-reported payments to "gig" and other contract workers...

Designing benefits for the growing platform workforce in the U.S. poses significant challenges. While platform workers need protection against unforeseen shocks, work that is often part time and spread across multiple platforms makes the traditional benefits model untenable. This paper reports...

Alternative work arrangements, defined both by working conditions and by workers' relationship to their employers, are heterogeneous and common in the U.S. This article reviews the literature on workers' preferences over these arrangements, inputs to firms' decision to offer them, and the impact...

Alternative work arrangements, including temporary and contract work, have become more widespread. There is interest in understanding the effects of these types of arrangements on employment and earnings risk for workers and the potential for existing social insurance programs to address this...

Working consistently through one's fifties and early sixties is key to attaining retirement security. However, workers also need access to retirement plans - so they can continue to accumulate resources - and health insurance - so they can avoid withdrawing assets in the event of a health shock....

Moonlighting is increasingly popular in OECD countries, with 5 to 10% of workers holding two or more jobs. However, little is known about the responsiveness of moonlighting to financial incentives due to the lack of identifying variation. This paper studies a unique reform in Germany that...

During the last two decades, there has been a significant growth in the share of faculty members at American colleges and universities that are employed in part-time or in full-time non tenure-track positions. Our study is the first to address whether the increased usage of such faculty...

It is often argued that 'new economy' jobs are less likely to use traditional employment relationships, and more likely to rely on 'alternative' or 'contingent' work. When we look at new economy jobs classified on the basis of employment in high-tech industries, we do not find greater use of...

This paper presents an incentive-based dual labor market model. Three implications of the model are emphasized. First, in equilibrium, there is an excess supply of workers to primary jobs. Second, when demand is uncertain, firms may choose a mix of primary and contingent workers to perform the...

This paper reports new evidence from a survey of over 408 U.S. employers concerning their use of temporary and on-call workers. More than 90 percent of responding organizations reported reliance on these flexible staffing arrangements. They accounted for an average of 1.5 percent of total labor...