New report by the University of California, Irvine, King’s College London and Oxford University reveals best and worst practices in the platform economy in the US.
There are now more than 40 million people who find work via platforms in the US, and they experience algorithmic management and automated technologies are used all too commonly. A new report by Fairwork finds that AI-powered tools for hiring, scheduling, paying, managing and surveilling work and workers are at the heart of the on-demand service industry.
Eleven of the most popular digital labour platforms in the US have been rated according to how they treat workers according to the Fairwork Principles. ShiftMed and Papa received 2/10 and 1/10, while the Fairwork US team was not able to evidence that the other platforms met any of the principle thresholds. This is the second Fairwork study in the US, scoring companies on labour standards such as pay, conditions, contracts, management and representation.
Katie Wells, Director of Research and Senior Fellow at Groundwork Collaborative, and the Principal Investigator of the Fairwork US project said: “Platform economy in the US looks more like a black box than a clear process or a fair set of rules. The opaque systems and uncertainties combine to create frustrating and precarious conditions for the workers who rely on the platforms”
Report’s co-author Dr. Funda Ustek Spilda said: “This Fairwork 2025 US Report documents how platform companies and AI-powered technologies have gained a foothold in previously unthinkable sectors, such as healthcare, and now we are witnessing platformisation of everything. This has serious implications for how we imagine the future of work, but also future of care.”
The report, “Fairwork United States Ratings 2025: When AI Eats the Manager” ranks platforms against five principles of Fairwork, giving each company a score out of ten. The report finds that the majority of the 11 platforms cannot evidence they meet the basic standards of fairness when benchmarked against the Fairwork principles.
This year, Fairwork rated CareRev, Clipboard Health, DoorDash, Grubhub, Instacart, Lyft, Papa, ShiftKey, ShiftMed, Uber and Uber Eats.
Key findings:
Publishing this study, researchers from the University of Oxford, Groundwork Collaborative, University of California, Irvine and King’s College London are calling for stronger protections and more robust labour standards in the US platform economy.
Aisha (name changed to protect worker identity), Nursing Assistant and works part time for ShiftKey, said – You really have no one to talk to if…you’re needing help… It’s really no communication with anybody other than yourself… There’s no one for you to complain to if there’s any mistreatment…or abuse [of patients] there. You really don’t know the chain of command.”
As part of Fairwork’s commitment to holding platforms accountable for their labour practices, the project has launched the Fairwork Pledge. The pledge aims to encourage other organisations, such as universities, companies and investors, to announce their public support for decent working conditions in the platform economy, guided by the five principles of Fairwork.
Professor Mark Graham, Professor of Internet Geography at Oxford Internet Institute and Director of Fairwork, said:
“These findings expose a systemic failure. Too many digital platforms are neglecting basic fairness, leaving millions of gig workers exposed. We must act now—by strengthening regulatory oversight and uniting around the Fairwork Pledge, we can turn the tide towards a more just future of work.”
Fairwork evaluates and ranks the working conditions of digital platforms. The ratings are based on five principles that digital labour platforms should ensure in order to be considered to be offering basic minimum standards of fairness. The project evaluates platforms annually against these principles to show not only what the platform economy is today, but also what it can be. The Fairwork ratings provide an independent perspective on labour conditions of platform work for policymakers, platform companies, workers, and consumers. The Fairwork project is coordinated from the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, and the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. Fairwork researchers to-date have rated platforms in 40 countries across five continents.
For more information, please contact info@fair.work
Notes for editors:
About the research
In the US, 79 workers were interviewed across 27 states and the District of Columbia (Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin). The findings are based on desk research and interviews with platform workers and managers, between January 2024 and August 2024. Download the full report.
Research Associate
Dr Funda Ustek-Spilda was a postdoctoral researcher and project manager on the Fairwork project at the Oxford Internet Institute.
Professor of Internet Geography
Mark Graham is an economic geographer. His research focuses on digital labour, the gig economy, and digital inequalities. He is the author, most recently, of The Gig Economy: A Critical Introduction.
Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Groundwork Collaborative.
Katie J. Wells is the Director of Research and a Senior Fellow at Groundwork Collaborative. A tech and labor policy expert, she writes about how tech affects the way we live in cities.
The Fairwork Foundation will certify online labour platforms, using leverage from workers, consumers, and platforms to improve the welfare and job quality of digital workers.
