Social risks, platform economy, and welfare regime: evidence from platform workers’ views in Hong Kong

Informed by the new social risk perspective, this qualitative study aimed to examine workers’ experiences under and state responses to the platform economy. The findings drawn from the in-depth interviews with 23 participants indicate that platform workers perceived the occurrence of work-related risks as their responsibility, developing individualised coping strategies, and excluded from the social and labour protection system. They perceive this exclusion as a trade-off between security and their aspiration for freedom. Policy implications are drawn. This study conceptually linked platform work to the new social risk thesis and empirically unveiled East-Asian evidence from a Market Productivist Welfare Regime.