The Enshittification of Work: Platform Decay and Labour Conditions in the Gig Economy

This study investigates the mechanisms by which gig platforms degrade labour conditions over time, building on the concept of platform decay, or ‘enshittification’, initially developed in the context of social media platforms. In this article, we draw on 30 interviews with long‐term gig workers in the ride‐hail and grocery delivery sectors, offering insights into how these companies shift from offering attractive working conditions to exploiting labour as these services develop market power via network effects. We identify three mechanisms through which gig companies claw back value from workers over time: burden shifting (transferring operational costs to workers), feature addition and alteration (increasing the demands on workers), and market manipulation (reducing worker bargaining power). We then explore how workers respond to platform decay, finding that workers adopt three responses: effort recalibration, multi‐homing and navigating the changing conditions through what we term toxic resilience. This study contributes to the gig work literature by developing a framework to explain how working conditions in the gig economy improve or degrade over time. In doing so, this article provides a framework for organizing the growing constellation of labour research on gig workers.