Solo self-employment––Key policy challenges

Abstract

This study reviews key policy challenges relating to solo self-employed workers––the segment with increasing shares in the workforce in most developed countries in recent decades. We document that this segment attracts the attention of policymakers within four policy domains: addressing decent work deficits, entrepreneurship and small business policies, activating marginalized groups through self-employment, and improving the well-being of the solo self-employed. We offer an integrative framework enabling the analysis of synergies and contradictions of the various policy initiatives targeting the solo self-employed. The study argues that workers who persistently employ only themselves should be understood as a (third) segment of the labor market qualitatively distinct from the traditionally defined categories of “employee” or “employer.” A policy-oriented segmentation of the contemporary workforce using this “blurred trinary divide” is proposed with size estimates of its key segments and subsegments. Finally, the study discusses the prospects of the solo self-employed in the emerging post-pandemic economy and offers recommendations regarding future research and data collection.