Original title: The odd job economy is gradually growing, and the problem of rights and interests protection is to be solved (introduction)

How can odd jobs and enterprises better realize two-way rush? Subject

Worker's Daily - reporter Li Guo from China Industrial Network

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In recent years, the economy of odd jobs has developed rapidly. By the end of 2023, China's flexible employment population has reached 200 million. Behind the gradual growth of the odd jobs economy, some problems are also emerging. Experts suggest that we should promote the digitalization of the odd job market and introduce the accident insurance mechanism for odd job injuries, so as to protect the two-way rights and interests of employers and odd workers.

"I have a driver position here, do you have a certificate?", The reporter met a small factory owner and a job seeker in a recruitment dialogue.

At the moment, it is the peak of recruitment, and similar dialogues frequently take place in the odd jobs markets in all districts and counties of Chongqing. In July 2022, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and other five departments issued the Opinions on Strengthening the Construction of the Part time Job Market and Improving Job Recruitment Services, which proposed to better support multi-channel flexible employment and promote the employment of part-time workers. Up to now, there are more than 50 odd job markets or odd job posts in Chongqing.

According to the 2022 Research Report on China's Petty Industry, the proportion of flexible employment in China's first tier cities will reach 25.6%, and the demand for odd jobs will continue to release, reaching 400 million people by 2036. In the face of the rapid development of the odd jobs economy, "who is looking for odd jobs and who is recruiting odd jobs?" "How to escort the healthy development of the odd jobs market" and other issues have aroused concern.

New economy, new business type and new occupation are in demand

In recent years, with the emergence of various odd jobs platforms, today's odd jobs market is quite different from that of the "road market" in terms of work scope, work content, etc., and even many new economies, new formats, and new occupations have shown strong demand for odd jobs.

Recently, in the back street odd jobs market of Shipingqiao Street, Jiulongpo District, Chongqing, many staff of fast food restaurants, milk tea shops, takeaway platforms and labor service companies have issued recruitment announcements for "casual workers", and most of their wages are paid in the form of daily and weekly payments.

"In the past, we recruited such temporary and seasonal employees mostly through cooperation with third-party labor agencies. Now, after the establishment of odd jobs markets in various districts and counties, we can recruit ourselves." Wang Huan, the recruitment director of a milk tea brand in Chongqing, told reporters that during the peak period of milk tea sales, some stores were short of staff and needed new personnel urgently.

Similarly, in the odd jobs markets in Wanzhou District, Hechuan District and other districts and counties in Chongqing, construction sites, decoration companies, takeaway platforms, online car hailing companies and other enterprises are also recruiting a large number of odd jobs. In addition to filling vacancies temporarily, there are also "indispensable" but "non permanent" jobs for engineers, registered consultants and other enterprises.

Mao Tie, a model worker in Chongqing, said that from the perspective of enterprise demand, it was mainly because of seasonal, temporary and sporadic orders, which led to a shortage of employees. It was also because of the particularity of these orders that enterprises were often only willing to hire people in a short period of time, which naturally led to the emergence of odd jobs.

In addition, many small enterprises also have obvious "demand orientation" in finance, consultant and other posts, that is, when the enterprise puts forward a demand, these personnel can solve it. Therefore, enterprises are more willing to provide part-time jobs in the form of "daily settlement".

Some people are interested, some people act as "springboards", and some people generate income

Statistics show that by the end of 2023, China's flexible employment population has reached 200 million, accounting for 14.3% of the national employment population. The demand for flexible recruitment keeps increasing at the rate of 8% every year, which means that the size of part-time workers is growing.

So, who is willing to do odd jobs? In recent days, the reporter interviewed several job seekers of different ages in several odd job markets in the main urban area of Chongqing.

"I like baking myself. After leaving my job, I tried to sell cakes made by myself in the community. At the beginning, the response was good, but later my business was poor. I came to the odd job market to see if there were any cake shops to recruit temporary workers." Xia Xi, 28, said that she had worked as an accountant in a real estate intermediary company for five years. After leaving her job, she wanted to work in the cake shop for several months, While earning money to subsidize household use, they also accumulated experience.

Wang Youquan, 46, told reporters that he was from Guang'an, Sichuan. He and his wife had been working on the construction site in Chongqing before. After the construction site was completed, he and his wife went to the odd job market to earn more money. After some weighing, Wang Youquan went to a decoration company to work as a plasterer, with an average daily salary of about 350 yuan; His wife went to a hotpot restaurant, earning 110 yuan a day.

In addition, young people under the age of 30 are also among job seekers in the part-time job market. In their eyes, "day workers", "hourly workers" and "interns" are effective ways to obtain their own workplace experience, and they can also use this as a "springboard", on the one hand, to strive for the opportunity to become a regular worker, on the other hand, they can also contact the society more to find better job opportunities.

In this regard, the recruitment directors of many enterprises frankly said that enterprises usually do not set up thresholds and positions with high technical content in the part-time job market, and generally have low requirements for the comprehensive quality of applicants. However, for job seekers who have done well in part-time jobs, they will conduct further interview and assessment according to the development needs of the company.

The "two-way rush" of odd jobs and enterprises needs the escort of the rule of law

Although the odd job market is in the ascendant, some problems are exposed behind the gradual growth of the odd job economy. For example, many migrant workers who work part-time in the construction industry frequently encounter "salary" problems; The risk of occupational injury of part-time workers in some industries is high, and once an accident occurs, it is difficult to protect labor rights and interests.

How to better enable job seekers and employers to achieve "two-way rush" has become an urgent problem to be solved.

Zhang Houhui, secretary of the Party branch of the project of Mingyue Lake Yunshang Mountain Foothill Science and Technology Innovation Base of China Railway Construction Engineering Group Co., Ltd., told reporters that in the field of engineering construction, the odd jobs used by labor teams are mostly miscellaneous workers, mainly engaged in material stacking, cleaning, etc. "Because such tools are temporary and the recruiter is a labor team, the odd jobs are not registered and recorded in the contractor, which also leads to the fact that the wages of odd jobs are easily delayed when they leave."

Zhang Houhui said that in order to solve the worries of odd jobs in the project, the project implemented dynamic management for workers, improved the entry filing procedures for odd jobs, prompted whether the wages reported to the project before the odd jobs left the site were settled, and posted the contact information of the heads of each unit in a prominent position.

Similarly, Zhang Chao, Deputy Manager of the Project Management Department of the Southwest Company of the Third Company of China Construction Fifth Engineering Bureau, also said that the company has specially established a "pair assistance" mechanism, that is, the project management personnel claim several odd jobs each, responsible for their entrance education, job disclosure, salary implementation and other issues, to ensure that the legitimate rights and interests of odd jobs are not infringed.

In this regard, Mo Yuanming, a researcher at the Chengdu Chongqing Economic Circle Collaborative Development Center of Chongqing Technology and Business University, believes that in the future, efforts should be made to promote the digital and standardized construction of the odd jobs market, effectively improve the accuracy of the basic database, and provide more intelligent employment matching needs for odd jobs and employers.

Tang Shiyong, an expert at the think tank of Chongqing Jiulongpo District People's Congress, believes that professional intermediaries should be supervised according to law, black intermediaries should be severely punished, and illegal acts of publishing false recruitment information or seeking illegitimate interests in the name of recruitment should be severely punished. He also suggested that the relevant provisions of the labor law should be improved, the new employment relationship applicable to the odd job economy should be clearly defined, and the odd job accident insurance mechanism should be introduced through the platform to protect the two-way rights and interests of employers and odd workers.