Seventy percent of post-00 part-time takeaway riders are college students

　　The legal gap behind flexible employment

　　After the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia, the Didi travel platform added more than 1.5 million online ride-hailing drivers in eight months; on the Ele.me food delivery platform, 12,000 post-00 college students began to deliver food delivery part-time.

With these new changes, a new employment concept that is still blank in our country's law-"flexible employment" has received more attention.

　　Zeng Xiangquan, a professor at the School of Labor and Human Resources of Renmin University of China and the director of the China Employment Research Institute, believes that flexible employment is due to long working hours, unstable income, and most of them are not included in social insurance, which leads to prominent employment problems and should be taken seriously.

　　"Part-time jobs" in the traditional sense are just one type of flexible employment.

According to Zeng Xiangquan, flexible employment usually refers to the sum of enterprise employment forms that are different from traditional formal or standard employment methods in terms of working hours, labor remuneration, and workplace.

For example, self-employment, part-time employment, temporary employment, part-time employment, remote employment, independent employment, contracted employment, etc.

Internet digital technology platforms have created a large number of work forms that are different from traditional employment, such as pan-entertainment live broadcasts, game live broadcasts, e-commerce live broadcasts, online literature platforms, etc. Platform-based employment is the biggest feature of this type of employment.

　　Lai Youwei, Vice President of Meituan, introduced that in Meituan, the top ten areas for the distribution of new business formats in the life service industry are paid study rooms, indoor cute pet interaction, Hanfu experience hall, hair transplant, formaldehyde detection, trampoline, light medical beauty, and homestay , Secret rooms, fresh retail.

The new format has given birth to a wide variety of new professions, such as pet baker, secret room designer, Hanfu stylist, hair transplant doctor, milk tea tester, takeaway operator, receptionist, maker instructor, etc.

　　Hu Cheng, vice president of Didi Travel, said that from February 1 to September 30, 2020, Didi has newly registered more than 1.5 million drivers, which is equivalent to 5,000 small businesses with 300 employees.

Research shows that about 23% of new drivers after the epidemic have been affected by the epidemic.

According to statistics, 63.7% of online ride-hailing drivers use Didi platform revenue as their main source of income.

Their average age is 37, more than 40% are from the traditional service industry, more than half are the main employees in the family, more than 70% are in debt, and more than 80% need to support minor children and support the elderly.

　　In contrast, the riders on the food delivery platform Ele.me are younger.

According to Zhang Cheng, a senior expert at Alibaba's Local Life New Service Research Center, the average age of Ele.me riders is 31 years old. Among them, the post-90s riders account for 47%, and the post-95 riders have the fastest growth.

More than 20% of service industry practitioners on the Ele.me platform have their household income derived from the work of riders.

　　"College students using their free time to take orders and deliver food is becoming a way of life for them." Zhang Cheng said that since the outbreak, an important new feature is that riders are becoming younger.

Since 2020, post-00 riders have tripled year-on-year, and 70% of post-00 part-time riders are college students.

"Similar to the research conducted by Meituan and Didi, we also found that the main reason why young people like this job is flexible working hours."

　　At the two sessions in 2020, Gao Xiaomei, member of the Standing Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and vice chairman of the National Revolutionary Committee of the People's Republic of China, suggested speeding up the process of flexible employment legislation.

She believes that although the concept of flexible employment has appeared in government documents for about 20 years, it has not been fully incorporated into the scope of supervision by labor administrative departments, labor regulations and labor security cannot be followed, and it has become a high incidence of labor disputes.

Under the requirement of guaranteeing employment, the demand of flexible employment practitioners to enjoy social security has become more prominent. It is necessary to speed up action, advance legislation and establish guarantees.

　　Zeng Xiangquan said that so far, employment statistics and employment-related laws and regulations have not included employment on digital platforms.

For example, the Labor Contract Law only sets certain provisions for the special flexible employment method of labor dispatch, and the Employment Promotion Law does not even mention the concept of flexible employment.

　　In July 2020, the "Opinions on Supporting Multi-channel Flexible Employment" of the General Office of the State Council pointed out that flexible and diverse employment methods are an important way for workers to increase their employment income and play an important role in expanding new employment channels and cultivating new drivers of development.

　　From the perspective of development trends, Zeng Xiangquan believes that in the future, a considerable number of professionals, such as consultants, designers, teachers, doctors, etc., may choose flexible employment, because in this mode, the degree of freedom, income level, satisfaction and happiness The sense may be higher.

　　Zhang Jianguo, the founder and CEO of Renrui Talent, whose main business is to serve job-seekers with flexible employment and flexible employment in enterprises, said that the concept of flexible employment is still confusing. Especially in the actual operation process, many things are in a fuzzy area. Mode, development is inevitable, and it directly involves the interests of many parties, including the interests of the country, enterprises and workers, so future standardization is also inevitable."

　　Zeng Xiangquan suggested that flexible employment should be included in the legislative content or plan, at least in the Employment Promotion Law to add provisions on flexible employment, local governments may also consider introducing some flexible employment management regulations.

From a long-term perspective, the healthy development of flexible employment needs to be discussed in terms of national economic accounting, statistical measurement, laws and regulations, including how to integrate with international employment standards.

He also said that in the future, it is necessary to explore new measures on how the platform economy can improve flexible employment, including income sharing between platform companies and employees, and solutions for social insurance such as pension and medical care. All parties should work together.

　　China Youth Daily and China Youth Daily reporter Geng Xueqing Source: China Youth Daily