Perspective
In May, the Human Rights Watch nonprofit released a damning investigation that should alarm policymakers worldwide.
The group argued that the seven largest gig platforms in the United States — Amazon Flex, DoorDash, Favor, Instacart, Lyft, Shipt and Uber — are using algorithmic systems not simply to manage workers but to systematically extract labor while evading fundamental legal obligations. The report, “The Gig Trap: Algorithmic, Wage and Labor Exploitation in Platform Work in the US,” exposes what amounts to a crisis of AI governance algorithms that have become the primary instrument through which corporations deprive workers of minimum wage protection, disable collective bargaining, and execute instant termination without due process.
Yet despite this, the response in Washington and state legislatures has been fragmented, timid and ultimately inadequate.
The problem is not that algorithms manage workers — it is that they have become employers without accountability, and our legal system has not caught up.
The platforms frame algorithmic management as a neutral, efficient technology. They claim their algorithms optimize matching, reduce transaction costs and enable the flexibility workers desire. The HRW report reveals this framing to be false. Consider dynamic wage-setting. A DoorDash or Uber driver does not know why their pay for the same delivery route fluctuates week to week. The platforms justify this...
A Fleming Island eye-care business will pay $2.1 million to settle accusations of improper Medicare or Medicaid claims. The business was one of five ophthalmology practices in Florida that collect...