IEM TSU Experts Are Studying New Forms of Employment in the Era of Digitalization
The project's research supervisor, Evgenia Nekhoda, Director of IEM TSU, and one of the key contributors, Olga Nedospasova, Head of the Department of Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management at IEM, discuss the challenges faced by the researchers and the solutions they propose.
— What is the main contradiction your team encountered while analyzing the modern labor market?
Evgenia Nekhoda: We identified a fundamental imbalance, which we called an "institutional gap." On one hand, we see a revolutionary growth of new types of employment—platform-based, gig work, freelancing (the pluralism of terminology in the field of "new" workers also creates certain difficulties in research). The digitalization of labor is developing at an exponential rate (the average annual growth rate in different countries is 15-20%), while the adaptation of institutions follows with a lag of 5-7 years—evolutionarily. This gap is what generates the main problems.
Olga Nedospasova: The most striking example of such a gap is the conflict between judicial practice and tax regulation. We are documenting cases wh ere courts reclassify civil-law relationships for platform workers as employment relationships, recognizing workers' rights to sick leave and vacation. At the same time, tax authorities may interpret the same relationships differently, as may businesses. This creates a legal vacuum and makes "new" workers, especially in low-skilled segments (couriers, drivers), extremely vulnerable. They remain unprotected during a period when institutions are just beginning to adapt to the new reality.
A vivid confirmation of the above came from the results of scientific expert seminars conducted by our team in May 2025. We assembled two focus groups with representatives of the professional HR community, as well as students and recent graduates with personal experience working in new forms of employment, totaling 48 people. The goal of the seminars was to provide an expert assessment of the level of institutionalization of new forms of employment, identify key barriers, and develop proposals for improving regulation.
Respondents unanimously pointed to the insufficient entrenchment of new forms in the system of social and labor relations and in legislation. At the same time, significant differences in focus of perception were discovered. Professionals emphasize macroeconomic and regulatory indicators (share of GDP, volume of government investment, legislative coverage), while young people focus on practical aspects that directly affect their situation—such as the availability of benefits, judicial protection of rights, and the technological equipment of companies.
Interestingly, in the assessments of the seminar participants, the state acts simultaneously as a source of potential solutions and as a factor preserving existing systemic barriers. The identified obstacles (legal vacuum, distrust of new forms of employment, technological lag, socio-economic risks), in the opinion of our experts, are interconnected, which requires a comprehensive approach to overcoming them. In short, our respondents confirmed that the time has come to move from stating the problem to developing effective mechanisms for the institutionalization of new forms of employment, taking into account the interests of all stakeholders.
— How can this growing army of "new" workers be made more secure without destroying the advantages of flexibility that are so important to them?
Evgenia Nekhoda: This is the key question of our research. We have come to the conclusion that there can be no universal solutions. The group of "new" workers is extremely heterogeneous. For a highly qualified freelancer who is a programmer or web designer, autonomy, digital reputation, and access to global orders are important. But for a courier or taxi driver, minimal social guarantees are critically important: accident insurance, protection against the arbitrariness of platform algorithms that can change rates or block access to orders at any moment.
International experience shows that countries that have introduced intermediate statuses (for example, "employee-like worker" in Germany or Australia) have been able to reduce "institutional inequality" and provide basic protection for platform workers. In Russia, however, a federal law on platform employment has still not been adopted, allowing some aggregators to use the self-employment regime (NPD) as a "loophole," turning essentially hired workers performing labor functions into "pseudo-self-employed."
Olga Nedospasova: We propose a systematic approach to the issue. In one of our articles, which is devoted to decent work for "new" workers, we developed a framework flexible system of indicators that includes six key blocks: economic, technological, professional, psychological, social, and legal.
Evgenia Nekhoda: This system can become the basis for a new social contract and dialogue. For example, we are talking about the need to create "portable" social insurance accounts that will be tied to the worker's income rather than to a specific employer. It is important to develop industry standards for platform work and introduce elements of algorithmic transparency. And, of course, it is necessary to legally establish a status, especially for those for whom platform work is their main source of income. This would remove that very "power of platforms" that today often substitutes for traditional labor guarantees.
— What are the prospects for this research? What will be the focus of attention in the coming year?
Evgenia Nekhoda: The most interesting part is ahead. We plan to delve deeper into the impact of artificial intelligence on the labor market. How will AI change the structure of employment? Can it become not a threat but a tool for a fairer distribution of risks? Perhaps the future lies with AI regulators—smart contracts, algorithmic dispute arbitration, and automated contribution systems on the blockchain. But the fundamental question we pose is not technology for technology's sake, but human choice: how to ensure that the digital transformation of the economy works for the benefit of people. We will continue to seek answers to this question.
Also on the research team's agenda is an analysis of the Russian freelance market, specifically, platforms, fields of activity, financial indicators, client expectations, as well as the socio-demographic characteristics of Russian freelancers. It should be noted that freelancers also constitute a heterogeneous group and differ significantly: by forms of employment (full-time, part-time, temporary, working on web platforms or geolocation-based platforms); by types of labor relations (permanent or temporary contracts, self-employed); by working conditions and modes (fully online, fully offline, hybrid schedule, full-time or part-time); by legal status (alternative workers, contract workers – independent contractors, consultants). Moreover, the same online work can be complex, unique, and require high qualifications (creative, technical work), or, conversely, simple, not requiring special professional training (virtual assistant, data entry). The same applies to offline work.
The paradox also lies in the fact that the main differentiating factor for "new" workers is not so much the type of contract or relationship, the presence or absence of social guarantees and labor rights, but rather the level of uniqueness of competencies, personal productivity, and digital image. This is becoming a new ethical norm, undermining the institutional privileges of industrial wage labor.
Background: The research is supported by the Russian Science Foundation (project No. 25-28-00799). The authors include: E.V. Nekhoda, Doctor of Economic Sciences, Professor; O.P. Nedospasova, Doctor of Economic Sciences, Associate Professor; O.I. Gevorgyan and D.K. Demidova, Junior Research Fellows. The results of the first stage of the work have been published in leading scientific journals (Tomsk State University Journal, Journal of Institutional Studies, Tomsk State University Journal of Economics), and were presented at conferences in Yekaterinburg (UrFU), Moscow (Institute of Economics of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Lomonosov Moscow State University), St. Petersburg (Faculty of Economics of St. Petersburg State University), and Vologda (Vologda Research Center).