Gig Economy: Are Swiggy And Zomato Really Boosting Workers' Income?
The study also found that long-shift workers are increasingly unable to meet household expenditure.
Food delivery platforms, such as Zomato and Swiggy, emerged as an important source of employment after the pandemic. But, did it really improve the lives of gig workers?
While these jobs acted as a shock absorber, real income earned by India's platform workers has gone down over time, according to a study by the National Council of Applied Economic Research released on Aug. 28.
"When you adjust for inflation, real income has gone down over time," Dr. Bornali Bhandari, the project lead for the study, told BQ Prime.
"Higher fuel prices are one reason. Incomes were also impacted because they faced increased competition from a larger number of people entering the food delivery sector. Remember, the survey was done in April 2022, we're just coming out of the pandemic ... Traffic was also increasing, so a combination of these factors caused constraint for workers," she said.
The study is a result of a survey of 924 food delivery platform workers, spread across 28 tier-1 to tier-3 cities. This was carried out in April and May 2022 and was sponsored by Prosus, an investor in Swiggy.
The study also found that long-shift workers are increasingly unable to meet household expenditure. "Long-shift workers were breaking even in 2019 and 2020, but not in 2021 and 2022. As fuel costs and overall inflation started to rise, workers found it increasingly difficult...," the study said.
For context, India had about 77 lakh gig workers in 2020-21, according to NITI Aayog. That number is set to expand to 2.35 crore workers by 2029-30, on promises of additional income and flexibility. But the lack of paid leaves, pension and social security leaves many in a lurch.
However, Bhandari said that these platforms do move the needle on formalisation.
"The formalisation question is very interesting. There are two favourable factors. Everyone has a written contract and 100% of the workers also had accident insurance. But the problem is they don't get any paid leaves or pension, which some of them used to get at their previous jobs. So, net-net it does move the needle on formalisation of employment for these workers."
There's still much more to be done before we can call them formal workers, Bhandari said. "So, is it better off or not? It depends. But I think it's an option for workers, instead of sitting at home and not doing anything. I think it's a better way to be employed because at least it gives them a job, even if you're not the primary wage worker."
