A Feminist Future of Work in the Post-Pandemic Moment

Summary

A new social contract as if women matter.

To bring feminist perspectives into this equation, we need to look closely at what is valued and how value is created. As things stand today, the platform economy – dominated as it is by a few firms – is extractivist, exploitative, and expedient. It is based on an unsustainable model with scant regard for natural resources; built on the back of a global division of labor that bears the marks of race, class, gender, and geography. And it propels itself on a free market arrogance that knows no boundaries, geographic and otherwise, operating as it does with impunity – tax evasion, price manipulation, wage theft, political arm-twisting, and more. Key to the value proposition of platform firms is the intangible asset of data, data that is stolen and hoarded from people and nations.