What do you believe that contract work like what one sees at Uber is the wave of the future, or do you thing that eventually it will be difficult to find people willing to take such jobs?

When they discuss their business model, representatives for Uber always focus on the software application that links would be riders with would-be drivers, and hence, quickly and seamlessly connects a specific demand for labor with a specific supply of labor. The success of this business model is undeniable in the sense that, even though it has been in existence for only five years, the company has expanded to more than 300 cities and is now valued at over $50 billion. The number of people who drive for Uber all over the world is difficult to estimate, but the company states that it has 26,000 drivers in New York City, 15,000 in London, 10,000 in Paris, and 20,000 in Chengdu, China, alone. Beyond the software application, though, a big part of Uber's success can be attributed to the fact that all of the labor employed in this case is low paid, has no job security, and is provided no benefits. In the United States, for example, many Uber Page 223 drivers enjoy the flexibility that this work provides, but the fact is that they are paid far less than the minimum wage, especially when expenses and vehicle depreciation are taken into account. The company can get away with this because the drivers are classified as "independent contractors" rather than traditional employees." This classification has been challenged in several instances, however, and in June 2015, the California Labor Commissioner's Office ruled that Uber drivers should be classified as traditional employees. This finding has huge implications because Uber is just one of many "on-demand" companies that rely on this ever-increasing business model for managing workers. This is the same model that is employed by Uber's number-one rival, Lyft, as well as companies such as Instacart, which delivers groceries, Handy, which provides cleaning services; Task Rabbit, which does odd jobs; and Mechanical Turk, which provides a broad range of services. Some observers have even suggested that this freelance model of employment is the next wave of the future. As one labor economist noted, The S40-an-hour-manufacturing job is not going to come back, but the $25 local services job represents a viable alternative." Few of these jobs actually pay at this rate, however, and the generally high level of worker discontent has made some of these companies reconsider their business model. For example, Instacart announcedthe week after the California rulingthat it was reclassifying its workers as employees. Instacart ran a trial experiment with this reclassification in Boston the year before and concluded that this change improved the quality and efficiency of order picking and made for a better customer experience." Apparently, the customer services advantages of a more traditional supply of labor outweighed the cost savings associated with the on-demand labor supply