This study combines market-level data about changes in jobs offered via online labor platforms and interviews with online freelance workers to highlight how freelancers are responding to the novel coronavirus’s presence. We pursue this work recognizing that as the scope and breadth of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to grow, the implications to workers and labor markets are profound. Our focus on online labor markets and workers reflects our enduring interest in knowledge work, with a particular attention to precarious work. Market data show the dramatic shifts in work availability (supply) and the changes in worker availability (demand) as the United States’ economy struggles with the initial burst of effects of a pandemic. Interview data reveal that freelance workers are aware of these shifts. These changes to already- precarious and market-driven work arrangements are magnified by the realities of balancing family members’ changes in job status, working around children who are home from school, and re-organizing work and lives to account for the rapid onset and confusion of stay-at-home requirements and the uncertainty that is the core of the pandemic. Findings suggest work flexibility, which seems central to freelancer’s motivation to pursue such work, is diminishing and instead freelancers are being driven by desperation rooted in the acknowledged precarity of their situation, magnified by the constellation of events reshaping their working arrangements. We further observe that these effects vary by occupation and are more keenly experienced by women freelancers, both of which warrant additional attention.

We report findings from an ongoing panel study of 68 U.S.-based online freelancers, focusing here on their experiences both pre- and in-pandemic. We see online freelancing as providing a window into one future of work: collaborative knowledge work that is paid by the project and mediated by a digital labor platform. The study’s purposive sampling provides for both empirical and conceptual insights into the occupational differences and career plans of freelance workers. The timing of the 2020 data collection provides insight into household changes as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Findings make clear these workers are facing diminished work flexibility and increased earning uncertainty. And, data show women are more likely than men to reduce working hours to help absorb the increased share of caregiving and other domestic responsibilities. This raises questions of online freelancing as a viable career path or sustainable source of work.

No abstract

Background Patient agency in contraceptive decision-making is an essential component of reproductive autonomy. Objective We aimed to develop a psychometrically robust measure of patient contraceptive agency in the clinic visit, as a measure does not yet exist. Design For scale development, we generated and field tested 54 questionnaire items, grounded in qualitative research. We used item response theory–based methods to select and evaluate scale items for psychometric performance. We iteratively examined model fit, dimensionality, internal consistency, internal structure validity, and differential item functioning to arrive at a final scale. Participants A racially/ethnically diverse sample of 338 individuals, aged 15–34 years, receiving contraceptive care across nine California clinics in 2019–2020. Main Measures Contraceptive Agency Scale (CAS) of patient agency in preventive care. Key Results Participants were 20.5 mean years, with 36% identifying as Latinx, 26% White, 20% Black, 10% Asian/Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander. Scale items covered the domains of freedom from coercion, non-judgmental care, and active decision-making, and loaded on to a single factor, with a Cronbach’s α of 0.80. Item responses fit a unidimensional partial credit item response model (weighted mean square statistic within 0.75-1.33 for each item), met criteria for internal structure validity, and showed no meaningful differential item functioning. Most participants expressed high agency in their contraceptive visit (mean score 9.6 out of 14). One-fifth, however, experienced low agency or coercion, with the provider wanting them to use a specific method or to make decisions for them. Agency scores were lowest among Asian/Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander participants (adjusted coefficient: -1.5 [-2.9, -0.1] vs. White) and among those whose mothers had less than a high school education (adjusted coefficient; -2.1 [-3.3, -0.8] vs. college degree or more). Conclusions The Contraceptive Agency Scale can be used in research and clinical care to reinforce non-coercive service provision as a standard of care.