In an article titled “‘Uber for nurses’: gig-work apps lobby to deregulate healthcare,” the Guardian writes that “billion-dollar tech platforms are aggressively pushing for deregulation of the ‘Uber for nursing’ industry in an effort to expand gig work in the healthcare sector.”
The story focuses on a report from the AI Now Institute, which produces diagnosis and policy research on artificial intelligence (AI). The report, “Uber for Nursing Part II: How Gig Nursing Companies Are Lobbying States to Deregulate Healthcare,” examines the use of AI to staff healthcare facilities.
“The report warns that growing use of the technology comes at the expense of workers’ rights, protections and pay,” writes the Guardian.
It says the model uses AI to set pay rates for work shifts and surveil performance metrics, using that data to “determine a worker’s future access to gigs and pay rates. The industry also allows nurses to bid on work shifts, with the lowest pay rate winning the shift.”
The AI Now Institute report says that three nurse gig platforms have reached a $1 billion valuation, fueled by investments from private equity firms and government contracts, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers.
Nurse gig-worker platforms are also lobbying state legislatures. The Guardian states that “since 2022, lawmakers in at least 17 states have introduced bills designed to make gig nursing platforms exempt from the regulations applied to other healthcare staffing agencies.” The push to deregulate the “gig nursing” model is similar in intent to how rideshare platforms have largely avoided the regulatory scrutiny and requirements that the taxi industry has operated under for many decades.
Read the Guardian’s story here, and read the full AI Now Institute report here.
