Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
零工经济对犯罪的影响：以外卖平台为例
Impact of the gig economy on crime: a case study of food delivery platforms
摘要
The gig economy has profoundly reshaped the labour market landscape, fostering new employment forms, expanding overall employment capacity, and enhancing income stability and economic resilience for a broad workforce, which mitigates gig workers’ vulnerability to economic shocks. This study empirically examines the gig economy’s impact on crime rates using a quasi-natural experiment of food delivery platforms’ staggered entry into 209 Chinese cities and criminal conviction data from judicial adjudicative documents. The findings demonstrate that the entry of food delivery platforms into cities – a typical gig economy representative – significantly reduces crime incidence, with robbery, snatch, and theft cases and offenders falling by 8.29% and 10.30%, respectively. This effect is more pronounced in cities with a higher floating population share and lower labour-force participation rates, and for individuals with prior criminal records. Mechanism analysis reveals the gig economy’s crime-reduction effect primarily operates through longer working hours, higher income, and alleviated emotional distress. This emphasizes the direct influence of gig work on improving workers’ economic conditions, and its profound contribution to enhancing quality of life and generating positive social benefits, which are hard to quantify using traditional economic indicators.
中文摘要
零工经济深刻重塑了劳动力市场格局，催生了新的就业形态，扩大了整体就业容量，并增强了广泛劳动者群体的收入稳定性与经济韧性，从而缓解了零工劳动者对经济冲击的脆弱性。本研究利用外卖平台分批进入中国209个城市的准自然实验，并结合司法裁判文书中的刑事定罪数据，实证检验了零工经济对犯罪率的影响。研究发现，作为零工经济典型代表的外卖平台进入城市显著降低了犯罪发生率，抢劫、抢夺和盗窃案件及犯罪人数分别下降8.29%和10.30%。这一效应在流动人口占比较高和劳动力参与率较低的城市，以及有犯罪前科的个体中更为明显。机制分析表明，零工经济的减罪效应主要通过更长的工作时间、更高的收入和缓解情绪困扰发挥作用。这凸显了零工工作对改善劳动者经济状况的直接影响，以及其对提升生活质量和产生积极社会效益的深刻贡献，而这些效益难以用传统经济指标量化。