However, Mr. Trump’s new labor secretary could create those marketplaces, as well as encourage companies to train people on the job.
“That’s not a partisan issue.”
This White House could also expand the concept of employment to benefit the millions of Americans
who are freelancers, independent contractors or otherwise part of the “gig economy.”
“If you make it easier to hire more people, that’s both pro-business
and pro-worker,” said Oren Cass, the domestic policy director of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign.
But in recent decades, as courts and regulators tussled over what, exactly, constitutes an employee, “we’ve made it harder to hire, even as it’s gotten easier to become Uber, a company
that succeeds with hardly any formal employees,” Mr. Cass said.
But so much depends on what the government is willing to encourage.”
In particular, say both corporate chieftains and organized labor advocates, there is an opportunity for agencies like the
Labor Department to become innovation catalysts, using technology to rethink how workers are trained and find jobs.
“What if Uber could say to a driver, ‘We’re willing to contribute to your health care costs, but we don’t want to be on the hook for everything.’”
Creating a new category of employment could be risky for workers.
So over the past few weeks, I asked more than two dozen labor thinkers — from both the right
and left; former officials and government skeptics; union leaders and strident capitalists — what kinds of federal innovations could remake American working life.
