According to the author, vouchers should be used to put more pressure on politicians.
(Photo: dpa)
The internet and smartphone apps have drastically reduced transaction costs for arranging home services. The operators of such platforms have euphonious names like “Helpling” or “Book a tiger”.
The applications promise easy access to cleaners or a caregiver – and legally. However, they are all based on the business model of self-employment, so the service providers have to pay for their social security largely independently.
According to a sample calculation by the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB), a self-employed worker with an hourly wage of 12.90 euros remains after deduction of 20 percent portal commission and health insurance contributions 7.10 euros. This does not include the costs for retirement provision or commuting to work. The pay is well below the minimum wage.
It is only because of this minimum wage circumvention that household-related services can be offered more cheaply on the digital marketplace than by companies that hire their employees regularly.
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A change in the status of employees would significantly reduce profitability, which investors expect. Although on-demand companies claim to pay attention to qualifications and reliability, in practice there are massive quality problems and high turnover among the workforce.
Coupons for relief
In addition, the digitized work orders are usually carried out under high time pressure, comparable to piecework. Here, a business idea that is obviously extremely attractive for stakeholders in the age of digitization fits seamlessly into a historically long chain of precarious and atypical employment relationships in the service sector. There is already talk of a “digital precariat”.
Until 2018, Uta Meier-Gräwe held the chair for private household economics and family science at the Justus Liebig University in Giessen and was an advisor to the federal government.
(Photo: Freiburg Equal Opportunities Office)
In the current coalition agreement, this trend is to be countered by state subsidies for household-related services. Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) wants to hand out subsidized vouchers to families with children, single parents and people with relatives in need of care.
>> Read more: Not every situation in life has to be regulated with state vouchers. A comment.
However, these can only be redeemed at service companies that are certified according to certain labor law quality standards and offer employees the right to social benefits, i.e. short-time work benefits, sick pay and unemployment benefits, but also opportunities for further training. This should be a reason for many platform employees to turn away from on-demand companies and switch to a certified service company.
This should be used to build up further pressure so that the working conditions for the employees placed via platforms improve or this exploitative business model disappears.
More: Employ domestic help legally and save taxes – which is already possible today.