Platform work – empowering or exploiting the labourers? - A Case Study of Taxify: An analysis of the relationship between the company and its labourers

The people’s need and dependence for community has led to a sharing economy in which underused resources or leisure time are monetised. This new type of economy has brought on the growth of the digital labour platforms that offer sharing solutions in various fields. For instance, it has created a ridesharing and providing trend. Apps like Uber offer seemingly easy options to earn money yet have regulations that make the labour conditions very precarious for the workers who are providing gigs for the companies. Many scholars have conducted studies about sharing economy and digital labour phenomena yet the current research on transportation sector lacks information from the labourers’ side. This empirical study dives into the transportation platform work and tries to uncover what is the relationship between Taxify, a ridesharing app, and its drivers. To what extent are the labourers exploited by the company and why? In order to answer the research question and sub-questions a qualitative research design was chosen. A case study method was chosen to analyse the relationships between the company and the employees, as well as, to understand the role of a digital labourer by looking into how the structuring of Taxify works. A thematic analysis was conducted based on the 100 latest posts from four different Facebook groups, in addition to two focus groups in which Taxify and the drivers were interviewed separately. The study revealed quite a lot of new information in regards of how the workers perceive the gig labour and their work conditions. Contrarily to the previous literature on the matter, this research showed that the drivers have a neoliberal view of the job and believe themselves to be responsible for their success. The relationship that Taxify has with its drivers can mainly be explained as transparent and supportive. The analysis showed no existence of exploitation and revealed that the drivers perceive Taxify’s treatment as fair. The main reason for the misconception surrounding the treatment of drivers might be caused by the fact that the regulations seem to leave all the responsibility on the drivers while the company actually has many positive activities that are not written down and announced to the larger public.