Seminar Series

The Robot Revolution: Managerial and Employment Consequences for Firms 

Who Benefits from Online Gig Economy Platforms?

Using data from a global online labor market, this paper estimates the magnitude and distribution of surplus from online trade in tasks. We find that providers capture forty percent of the surplus from filled positions.  Buyer surplus varies with experience using the market, and past hiring experience accelerates future hiring. Counterfactuals that increase the price of online hiring reduce the total surplus for both buyers and providers on individual job postings and dynamically through a reduction in job postings. Event studies of minimum wage changes suggest that buyers' online activity  does not respond to changes in the local price of offline hiring, making it unlikely that increases in the price of online hiring would increase offline employment.

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