A Ghost Workers' Bill of Rights: How to Establish a Fair and Safe Gig Work Platform

Many of us assume that all the free editing and sorting of online content we ordinarily rely on is carried out by AI algorithms — not human persons. Yet in fact, that is often not the case. This is because human workers remain cheaper, quicker, and more reliable than AI for performing myriad tasks where the right answer turns on ineffable contextual criteria too subtle for algorithms to yet decode. The output of this work is then used for machine learning purposes to generate algorithms constructed from large data sets containing thousands of correctly coded observations. The fact that ghost workers are treated as consumers distorts the basic logic of the employment relationship, effectively placing the worker-as-consumer in the worst of both worlds, in which they hold the legal rights of neither group. This puts them in a regulatory limbo position in which they have little or no protection, control, or guarantee of return on investment. This is because the platforms that facilitate ghost work have orchestrated a three-way virtual relationship that absolves all parties of responsibility, while placing nearly all the risks and opportunity costs squarely on the shoulders of the workers. As a result, we believe such a work arrangement as it stands, does not uphold basic standards of Rawlsian justice as fairness

The Role of Organizational Justice in Pay and Employee Benefit Satisfaction, and Its Effects on Work Attitudes

The objective of our study is to provide a complementary approach with regard to organizational justice in the domain of compensation. It presents research undertaken on a sample of six hundred employees in three different Canadian organizations. The results reveal that employees distinguish clearly between pay satisfaction and benefit satisfaction, and that distributive justice perceptions are better predictors of pay satisfaction than procedural justice perceptions. This result is reversed for employee benefit satisfaction: procedural justice perceptions are better predictors than distributive justice perceptions. Lastly, the results show that distributive justice perceptions with regard to pay play a more important role than procedural justice in job satisfaction and satisfaction with the organization. Cet article a pour but d'apporter un éclairage complémentaire en ce qui concerne la justice organisationnelle dans le domaine de la rémunération. On y fait état de recherches réalisées auprès de six cents salariés appartenant à trois organisations canadiennes différentes. Les résultats révèlent que les salariés dissocient bien la satisfaction à l'égard du salaire, de la satisfaction à l'égard des avantages sociaux. Ils montrent également que les perceptions de justice distributives permettent de mieux prédire la satisfaction à l'égard du salaire que les perceptions de justice procédurales. Le résultat est inverse en ce qui concerne la satisfaction à l'égard des avantages sociaux : les perceptions de justice procédurales sont de meilleurs prédicteurs que les perceptions de justice distributives. Ils montrent enfin que la perception de justice distributive concernant les salaires joue un rôle plus important que la justice procédurale dans la satisfaction à l'égard du travail et à l'égard de l'entreprise.Organizational justice, pay and benefit satisfaction, work attitudes, Justice organisationnelle, satisfaction du salaire, satisfaction des avantages sociaux, attitudes au travail

Explaining Sales Pay Strategy Using Agency, Transaction Cost and Resource Dependence Theories

The purpose of this study was to investigate, using data gathered from 325 French-Canadian organizations, the influence of key constructs related to agency, transaction cost and resource dependence theories on the proportion of salary in sales compensation. Level of task programmability, capacity to observe behavior, career opportunities and financial resources offered were associated with an increased use of salary pay. In contrast, difficulty of measuring result outcomes, availability of product/service-related resources and high marginal sales force productivity were associated with decreased use of the salary component. Results supported the argument that integration of multiple theoretical perspectives offered a better explanation of pay policy. However, the results have not supported the ability of market and selling uncertainty to predict the proportion of salary L'objectif de cette étude était d'examiner, auprès d'un échantillon de 325 organisations, l'influence des construits clés relatifs à la théorie de l'agence, la théorie des coûts de transaction et la théorie de la dépendence des ressource sur la proportion du salaire dans l'enveloppe de la rémunération directe du personnel de vente. Le niveau de programmation des tâches, la capacité à observer les comportements, les opportunités de carrière et les ressources financières offertes étaient associés à une augmentation du recours de la composante salariale. En revanche, le degré de difficulté à mesurer les résultats, la disponibilité de ressources reliés aux produits/services et un grand différentiel de performance étaient associés à une diminution de la composante salaire. Les résultats supportent l'argument de l'intégration d'une multitude de perspecttives théoriques pour expliquer le choix des stratégies salariales.Sales, compensation, agency theory, cost analysis theory, resource dependence theory, Représentants aux ventes, rémunération, théorie de l'agence, théorie des coûts de transaction, théorie de la dépendance des ressources

Gainsharing and Mutual Monitoring: A Combined Agency-Procedural Justice Interpretation

This study examines the behavioral consequences of gainsharing using a combined theoretical framework that includes elements of agency and procedural justice theory. The hypothesis tested is that gainsharing as a collective form of incentive alignment results in increased mutual monitoring among agents (employees) when the plan is perceived to be procedurally fair. The hypothesis was supported in two separate firms using a quasi-experimental field study. The implications of the study for future extensions of agency theory to examine intraorganizational phenomena are discussed

Explaining Sales Pay Strategy Using Agency, Transaction Cost and Resource Dependence Theories

L'objectif de cette étude était d'examiner, auprès d'un échantillon de 325 organisations, l'influence des construits clés relatifs à la théorie de l'agence, la théorie des coûts de transaction et la théorie de la dépendence des ressource sur la proportion du salaire dans l'enveloppe de la rémunération directe du personnel de vente. Le niveau de programmation des tâches, la capacité à observer les comportements, les opportunités de carrière et les ressources financières offertes étaient associés à une augmentation du recours de la composante salariale. En revanche, le degré de difficulté à mesurer les résultats, la disponibilité de ressources reliés aux produits/services et un grand différentiel de performance étaient associés à une diminution de la composante salaire. Les résultats supportent l'argument de l'intégration d'une multitude de perspecttives théoriques pour expliquer le choix des stratégies salariales.The purpose of this study was to investigate, using data gathered from 325 French-Canadian organizations, the influence of key constructs related to agency, transaction cost and resource dependence theories on the proportion of salary in sales compensation. Level of task programmability, capacity to observe behavior, career opportunities and financial resources offered were associated with an increased use of salary pay. In contrast, difficulty of measuring result outcomes, availability of product/service-related resources and high marginal sales force productivity were associated with decreased use of the salary component. Results supported the argument that integration of multiple theoretical perspectives offered a better explanation of pay policy. However, the results have not supported the ability of market and selling uncertainty to predict the proportion of salar

The Role of Organizational Justice in Pay and Employee Benefit Satisfaction, and Its Effects on Work Attitudes

Cet article a pour but d'apporter un éclairage complémentaire en ce qui concerne la justice organisationnelle dans le domaine de la rémunération. On y fait état de recherches réalisées auprès de six cents salariés appartenant à trois organisations canadiennes différentes. Les résultats révèlent que les salariés dissocient bien la satisfaction à l'égard du salaire, de la satisfaction à l'égard des avantages sociaux. Ils montrent également que les perceptions de justice distributives permettent de mieux prédire la satisfaction à l'égard du salaire que les perceptions de justice procédurales. Le résultat est inverse en ce qui concerne la satisfaction à l'égard des avantages sociaux : les perceptions de justice procédurales sont de meilleurs prédicteurs que les perceptions de justice distributives. Ils montrent enfin que la perception de justice distributive concernant les salaires joue un rôle plus important que la justice procédurale dans la satisfaction à l'égard du travail et à l'égard de l'entreprise.The objective of our study is to provide a complementary approach with regard to organizational justice in the domain of compensation. It presents research undertaken on a sample of six hundred employees in three different Canadian organizations. The results reveal that employees distinguish clearly between pay satisfaction and benefit satisfaction, and that distributive justice perceptions are better predictors of pay satisfaction than procedural justice perceptions. This result is reversed for employee benefit satisfaction: procedural justice perceptions are better predictors than distributive justice perceptions. Lastly, the results show that distributive justice perceptions with regard to pay play a more important role than procedural justice in job satisfaction and satisfaction with the organization

The Hazards of Putting Ethics on Autopilot

The generative AI boom is unleashing its minions. Enterprise software vendors have rolled out legions of automated assistants that use large language model (LLM) technology, such as ChatGPT, to offer users helpful suggestions or to execute simple tasks. These so-called copilots and chatbots can increase productivity and automate tedious manual work. In this article, we explain how that leads to the risk that users' ethical competence may degrade over time — and what to do about it

Beyond the Brave New Nudge: Activating Ethical Reflection Over Behavioral Reaction

Behavioral intervention techniques leveraging reactive responses have gained popularity as tools for promoting ethical behavior. Choice architects, for example, design and present default opt-out options to nudge individuals into accepting preselected choices deemed beneficial to both the decision-maker and society. Such interventions can also employ mild financial incentives or affective triggers including joy, fear, empathy, social pressure, and reputational rewards. We argue, however, that ethical competence is achieved via reflection, and that heavy reliance on reactive behavioral interventions can undermine the development of ethical competence over the long term. Specifically, drawbacks may occur through motivational displacement, dependency, moral crowding out, loss of personal autonomy, and reactance. We introduce complementary cognitive boosting techniques designed to stimulate reflective cognition, as a more promising long-term strategy for instilling ethical behavior. One such approach is the Moral Self-Awareness (MSA) motivational construct, which incrementally leads agents to increasing levels of ethical reflection. We explain why ethical boosting approaches present more edifying and durable alternatives to reactive behavioral interventions and offer suggestions for social and organizational policy

An Open Letter to Congressman Gingrich

We urge you to reconsider your proposal to amend the House Rules to require a three-fifths vote for enactment of laws that increase income taxes. This proposal violates the explicit intentions of the Framers. It is inconsistent with the Constitution\u27s language and structure. It departs sharply from traditional congressional practice. It may generate constitutional litigation that will encourage Supreme Court intervention in an area best left to responsible congressional decision. Unless the proposal is withdrawn now, it will serve as an unfortunate precedent for the proliferation of supermajority rules on a host of different subjects in the future. Over time, we will see the continuing erosion of our central constitutional commitments to majority rule and deliberative democracy