Our week 8 module on Web 2.0 and the gig economy discussed this in more depth, and Barron alludes to this dynamic elsewhere in the article when describing both the typical user of an app like seamless and the typical profile of the gig economy worker who actually delivers their food - I appreciate the critiques of app design and user infantilization he is making here, but the article could have also discussed in more depth how these design choices help these companies to obfuscate and divert attention from the way they impact people besides the consumer. There is a whole class people whose primary interaction with these apps is on the back end- as struggling small business owners dependent on positive yelp reviews, delivery people, and rideshare drivers - maybe that is outside the purview of this article, but it would have been nice to see this angle explored a bit more.

IZA – Institute of Labor Economics. ‘COVID-19 and the Labor Market’. Accessed 6 October 2020. https://covid-19.iza.org/publications/dp13650/.

Von Gaudecker. H. M., Holler. R., Janys. L., Siflinger. B., Zimpelmann. C. (2020). Labour Supply in the Early Stages of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Empirical Evidence on Hours, Home Office, and Expectations. Institute of labor economics. Retrieved from: https://covid-19.iza.org/publications/dp13158/