Top comments are about how gig work can help make ends meet for people who are struggling. By some estimates 9% of adults are currently doing tech-enabled gig-work, or have done it in the past. That is too many people trying to make ends meet. That number is so high that the conclusion that /I/ draw is that about 5% of the jobs being offered on the market are gig work, and the people who are in a position to take them aren't paid well enough to make a decent living.

All of this is related to hustle culture. Where instead of believing in the myth that corporations buy your labor from you, we have a new myth that we are all to some extent self-employed. That our greatest assets are our ability to push ourselves for economic gain. That our attention is for sale. That the solution to financial ruin is a side-hustle. We used to rely on the community of people around us to make ends meet and provide enrichment in our lives, but the new mythos doesn't make room for that. Friendships are monetizable. Attention is transactional. Hobbies are for improving oneself.

I don't fully know where this rant is going. I don't think everyone thinks these things. But there is something about individuality and money being more important than camaraderie and material wealth that I think motivates the prevailing viewpoint that gig work is anything other than an erosion of protections our great grandparents fought very hard for.