Fighting Back against the algorithms — Community and the redemption of Taylorism?

As algorithms have come to dominate the lives of gig workers, treating many like poorly performing robots, community structures are emerging that allow workers to spontaneously organize — and create a potentially powerful counterforce.

Piecework and the labor/management divide

Frederick Winslow Taylor was the very first management guru, indeed the first management consultant. His ideas, which were radical at the time, posited that for any physical task, there was one best way to get it done. To get to the heart of the one best way, he did time-and-motion studies, compared how different workers stacked up and experimented with different techniques. Once the best way had been found, it would be codified in manuals, used to train workers and ultimately to deliver higher productivity across the board. Indeed, at one of his early employers, Midvale Steel Company, he managed to double productivity.

This did not come without tension between the bosses and their labor force. Workers, paid on a piecework system, received a specific amount of compensation for each “piece” produced or action performed. The disadvantage is that both sides of the production equation are incented to game the system. Employers want prices as low as possible…