, Columnist
The Gig Economy Is Powered by Old People
Online platforms don't play such a big role, either.
What a gig.
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Much ink and many pixels have been spilled over the past few years about the rise of the gig economy, sharing economy, on-demand economy, 1099 economy, freelancer economy or whatever you prefer to call it. Some of the claims about its growth have been overstated, and I’ve written several columns trying to debunk them, or at least put them in context.
But this data, from economists Lawrence F. Katz and Alan B. Krueger’s new paper on “The Rise and Nature of Alternative Work Arrangements in the United States, 1995-2015,” is for real: