What Works EP 467: Organizing Indie Labor with Chiarra Lohr
The labor market has undergone a sea change in the last 20 years. A full third of US workers are part of the independent workforce, including gig workers, contract workers, freelancers, and sole proprietors. And yet, key provisions in our labor regulations do not cover independent workers.
What's more, platform companies have further changed our idea of work. If you sell your labor on a platform, you're not an employee of the platform—you're an entrepreneur.
Well, those entrepreneurs are starting to ask questions. I am, too.
Today's episode examines one organization's attempt to organize the indie workforce. The Indie Sellers Guild formed in the wake of a strike action in April 2022 by 30,000 Etsy sellers. I spoke with executive director Chiarra Lohr about what they've been up to, the challenges they face, and the victories they've already celebrated.
Plus, you'll learn a bit about the history of working women's organizing in the US—starting back in the 1830s!
Footnotes:
- Learn more about the Indie Sellers Guild
- What Works Ep 385: "Who do you work for?"
- The Lowell Offering by Benita Eisler
- The Voice of Industry digital archive
- "History & Culture" — Lowell National Historical Park
- Platform Capitalism by Nick Srincek
- Monopsony 101 via Investopedia
- National Labor Relations Act of 1935
- Check out the Indie Sellers Guild Convention
- (00:00) - April 2022 Etsy Strike
- (00:59) - Introduction
- (01:45) - More on the 2022 strike
- (03:18) - The Lowell mill girls and early labor organizing
- (07:38) - The push for a 10-hour workday
- (10:13) - Chiarra's origin story
- (11:25) - Etsy is a platform, which complicate organizing
- (13:26) - Platform policies impact who is on the platform, what is successful, and how businesses are structure
- (15:05) - Example: shipping policies
- (16:08) - Example: production partners
- (17:01) - Example: the Star Seller program
- (19:20) - A labor monopsony?
- (22:09) - Etsy passes off platform problems as individual problems
- (24:06) - Internal competition makes it harder to see common struggles
- (24:53) - How the ISG is doing things differently
- (26:13) - Why independent workers don't have the same rights as other workers under the NLRA (or the NLSA)
- (28:26) - Working in solidarity with other organizations
- (30:13) - Success: Fighting the reserve payments policy
- (32:48) - Success-in-the-making: the COOL Online Act
- (33:22) - Success-in-the-making: the Marketplace Accreditation Program
- (33:47) - The ISG is also focused on education & member enrichment
- (35:22) - Conclusion: we have an opportunity
- (36:59) - Credits