Fiona Macdonald - Individualising Risk: Paid Care Work in the New Gig Economy

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I acknowledge, with thanks, the support received from RMIT University through the award of a Vice-Chancellors Senior Research Fellowship and the support from the Australian Research Council. This book was made possible by the contributions of many people. My deep thanks go to Eleanor Bentham whose insights, assistance and company throughout the research process were invaluable. Many thanks are also due to Jenny Malone, Danielle Miller, Mutsumi Karasaki, Karen Douglas, Andrew Nette and Ben Debney and the books reviewers. All helped make this a better book better through their contributions. I appreciate greatly the assistance and patience of the publishing team. My colleagues in the Work of Social Care group, the Centre for People, Organisation and Work and the School of Management at RMIT University have been supportive and encouraging. I am particularly grateful to Sara Charlesworth for her guidance and support. I am immensely grateful to everyone who participated in the research and especially to all the care and support workers who readily offered their time and their personal experiences. My final thanks go to Kevin Brown, who I thank for everything.

The research on which this book is based was funded by Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Grant DE160100543.

In 2020 the global coronavirus pandemic turned a spotlight on social care workers providing long-term care as, along with healthcare workers, they faced new risks at the frontline of caring for vulnerable members of the community. A largely unnoticed and undervalued workforce, social care workers became the recipients of public expressions of gratitude arising in communities all over the world.

But real recognition of the s ocial care workforce requires more than this. The highly feminised workforce who provide support and care to the aged and people with disability are often low-paid workers in highly precarious employment . Social care workers above all else require fair treatment at work.

This book is about social care workers and how changing social care policies are shaping their work and employment , in interaction with ineffective labour regulation . Its focus is on those policies that personalise or individualise care and what they mean for the well-being, livelihoods and opportunities of the hundreds of thousands of mainly women who perform essential social care work . The book is motivated by my interest in prospects for decent work for paid care workers and my concern that, in individualised social care arrangements, the goal of decent work is becoming harder to reach.