When Grace started working as a grocery delivery courier in Edinburgh in 2016, she was one of only two women in the city. She appreciated being able to choose her hours for Deliveroo and adapt them to studying for her master’s degree. “I liked the independence and the idea of not having anyone micromanaging me or looking over my shoulder at work,” says Grace. “When I started, I realized those things were there, but in a more subtle way.” Fees got lower and rides longer. Like many of her friends who work in the gig economy, Grace switched to other platforms including UberEats, Just Eat and Citysprint to deliver full-time after putting her MA on hold. Since she often worked a 60-hour week, she made just enough to live on.
But more courier work meant more harassment and unwanted attention, more everyday sexism and more fear for her safety as she cycled the streets of Edinburgh. “If I was waiting for an order with other male drivers, we would sit in the restaurant with our phones and wait – but the waiters would come up to me and ask all the questions – how long have you been doing this? how strong are you Do you live alone?” says Grace, who, like the other gig staff WIRED interviewed for this story, asked not to be identified to protect her privacy. “Several times, restaurant staff have taken my phone number off the app to contact me privately on my phone.”
Like many women working in the global gig economy, Grace adapts her behavior to cope and just keeps going. She doesn’t dare complain to the restaurants or platforms for fear of losing revenue. Recent estimates from the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford suggest that over 163 million people worldwide earn an income from paid work through digital work platforms, and it has increased fivefold over the past decade. And while they’re still in the minority, the percentage of women getting involved in the digital economy has increased in recent years, whether it’s cleaning homes on the fly, delivering groceries in under 15 minutes, or handing out the Tax return for someone else.
However, women working in the gig economy are more likely than men to face discrimination and sexual harassment in the workplace. Their vulnerability at work means they often have to avoid taking the most lucrative jobs, and when they face abuse or harassment, there are rarely opportunities for them to get help. Most of the time, platforms that claim to be “gender neutral” are built on the assumption that men’s experiences are the norm, blinding them to women’s realities.
“Women often devise their own mechanisms to deal with this,” says Savita Bailur, a professor in Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs and research director at Caribou Digital, a research consultancy dedicated to building ethical digital economies. “But with gender-sensitive design, they really shouldn’t have to.”
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