All About Status? The Politics of Regulating Platform Work

Platform firms have disrupted markets and challenged regulatory frameworks, but a new phase is emerging in which governments increasingly regulate these firms and firms engage with regulation strategically. This article examines how interactions between governments and firms shape the employment classification of platform workers. Drawing on case studies of California (United States), Spain, and Denmark, I show that welfare regime characteristics structure the regulatory environment that firms confront, whereas their competitive calculations shape their strategic responses. The analysis identifies three distinct configurations: successful firm override of government initiatives to classify workers as employees, resulting in a hybrid worker category (California); mixed firm responses to government initiatives aimed at employee classification, ultimately leading to universal employee status (Spain); and voluntary employee classification in the absence of specific government mandates (Denmark). These findings challenge assumptions that platform firms uniformly resist regulation and demonstrate how welfare state institutions and firms’ competitive strategies jointly shape worker classification outcomes.