CRIS Scientific Seminar 2022-2023

Friday, February 17th 2023, 11:30 am
Sciences Po (1, place Saint-Thomas-d'Aquin) - Room K008

The Big Apple’s Inner Workings:
Structural Stress, Individual Strain, and Relational Footholds in a Labor Market

Philipp Brandt

Assistant Professor, Sciences Po - CSO

Workers quickly disappear behind larger processes in labor markets. They can get qualifications or referrals for better jobs, do the ones they have well or slack, and organize for better conditions. But labor market changes come from political reforms, technological innovation, and the rise of international trading partners.

This talk turns to a less vivid but equally important side of labor markets, their continuity, where workers’ activities play a significant role. It shows how so in the prominent case of New York City’s original yellow cab industry.

Whereas previous studies took externally defined perspectives, this analysis reconstructs drivers’ work lives from a large database of a year’s work activities: 170 million trips. It identifies two main segments of drivers, one in familiar transactional work arrangements and another in previously unrecognized relational work arrangements. Transactions offer flexibility and relations stability but require commitment. Drivers embark on “relational hustling” quests where they take spare shifts in existing relational arrangements to find stable relations and, with them, higher average revenues.

This small segment of hustlers ensures continuity for all in New York City’s yellow cab industry and informs our understanding of labor markets.

Registration is mandatory. Thank you.

To find out more: https://www.philippbrandt.xyz/home