Hyman is the author of a new book called “Temp: How American Work, American Business, and the American Dream Became Temporary.” He told Recode’s Kara Swisher and Rani Molla that the number of people who have to rely on temporary, freelance or other “alternative work arrangements” has been growing since the 1970s, when the era of bloated corporations gave way to businesses that optimized for short-term profits and began treating workers as disposable.

“The alternative to driving for Uber is not a good job in a factory with a union wage or working in a stable office job, it’s slinging coffee at a Starbucks where you may or may not get the hours you need,” he said. “That is what people are shoring up. They’re shoring up getting enough hours, trying to make ends meet. Oftentimes, people talk about the gig economy as ‘supplementary income’ ... It’s not supplemental if you need it to pay for your kids’ braces, or food, or rent.”

Hyman argued that this phenomenon could be traced back to the legions of undocumented migrant laborers who built early computers, before those manufacturing jobs moved overseas.

Check at

https://www.recode.net/2018/8/29/17793766/louis-hyman-temp-book-cornell-gig-economy-jobs-kara-swisher-rani-molla-uber-labor-ubi-podcast