George Augustus Bachmann is a recent graduate from the School of International Service at American University in Washington DC.

Every time an Uber driver swipes to accept another ride, or a freelancer at Fiverr pulls to refresh the page, hoping for another gig, they are playing a game designed to keep them hooked. But unlike video games, this one hides the pause button.

The gig economy promises independence and flexibility to anyone willing to hustle. Companies like Uber, Lyft, and Fiverr attract workers with the allure of easy money without the constraints of a traditional job. In its early years, this model appeared revolutionary. A 2016 survey, conducted during the early heyday of gig work, found that 70% of those who freelance by choice were happier than those in traditional jobs. For many, it served as a quick way to make a buck or to regain stability after job loss, because it's among the easiest work to start immediately.

Over time, however, cracks began to show. It became increasingly evident that the distinction between “employee” and “independent contractor” sat at the core of these companies’ profit models. Traditional employees are entitled to benefits, such as minimum wage and retirement plans. Gig work employers are exempt from these responsibilities. Instead, they promote an opportunity for a better work-life balance, free of set schedules. Ironically, in 2020, Uber’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said he would consider giving workers health benefits contingent on how many hours they worked, with full-time workers receiving greater benefits. But of course, that proposal would undercut the supposed flexibility of the gig work.

More recent investigations show that this model is still expanding, despite precarious conditions for workers. A report released by Human Rights Watch in 2025 found that gig workers are governed by algorithms that are “frequently opaque, making it difficult to understand how they are monitored, paid, evaluated, and fired.” In her study of ride-hail drivers, Veena Dubal describes how workers expected a predictable hourly wage, but instead found themselves subject to “algorithmic wage discrimination,” with pay that fluctuates minute by minute under rules hidden entirely from workers.

Amazon Flex, a program that allows individuals to use their own car to deliver packages, relies on similar tactics. A policy brief published by the National Employment Law Project reports how Flex drivers are subject to digital surveillance and algorithmic management, despite being classified as independent contractors.

For gig companies, many of their design choices are mechanisms that encourage full-time effort without the benefits of full-time employment. As Sarah Mason, then a driver for Lyft and DoorDash, reported in a 2018 article in The Guardian, they were losing money trying to flatter customers, in hopes of receiving a high rating. Gig work exploits workers’ instinct to please — even when it drains their time and money.

When things go wrong, many gig workers also lack an alternative recourse, leaving them locked into a system that promises freedom but delivers insecurity. According to the 2025 HRW report, many gig workers make an average of $5.12 after work expenses. This leaves workers unable to pay basic living expenses or even access unemployment benefits because of their work classification as an independent contractor.

The rise of gamified work systems

That raises a question: How can companies convince freelancers that gig work provides them more control and flexibility than a traditional job while getting them to work more and more? The answer: gamification.

Gamification refers to interactive design features that incorporate aspects from games, most notably: the use of rewards to drive action. These can include points, badges, or payments. They can also include status indicators like levels, leaderboards, and progress bars to track achievements. As a 2012 Pew Research Center report noted, “neuroscientists are discovering more and more about the ways in which humans react to such interactive design elements. They say such elements can cause feel-good chemical reactions, alter human responses to stimuli—increasing reaction times, for instance—and in certain situations can improve learning, participation, and motivation.”

Uber and Lyft have employed a range of gaming strategies to keep drivers behind the wheel. Uber has experimented with using psychological inducers in the app interface to influence when, where and how long drivers work. Design elements, including video game features and graphics, and noncash rewards of little value, nudge drivers to work longer, even in less lucrative locations.

These strategies exploit drivers' tendency to set earnings goals, reminding them that if they keep driving just a bit more, they will meet their target. Similar to how experts argue that Netflix’s autoplay function encourages binge-watching among users, Uber has used an algorithmic feature to send a future fare opportunity before their current ride is even over, pushing drivers to keep working.

Weekly challenges can further reinforce this behavior. Drivers can be offered bonuses for completing more rides and reengaging with the platform. For example, in the aforementioned Guardian article by Sarah Mason, they reported that Lyft would offer “an uncharacteristically lucrative bonus, north of $100” if they had not logged on to the app in a while. The algorithm behind these kinds of offers is not disclosed by the companies, but typically, the higher the demand in a given area, the higher the rewards.

The unpredictability of these challenges mimics the mechanisms used by casinos to promote addictive behavior. The “pull to refresh” feature common in gig platforms imitates the lever of a slot machine: each pull offers the chance at a reward but no guarantee. The uncertainty is what sustains engagement. Like gambling, gig work relies on strategies like variable reinforcement schedules and unpredictable intervals of reward to keep workers hooked, always chasing the next payout.

This playbook appears elsewhere. Amazon, whose labor practices have sparked nationwide protests, has also employed gamification inside its warehouses, where 10-hour overnight megashifts are not uncommon. In 2021, the Information reported that the company expanded its FC Games program, deploying features like achievements and leaderboards to make shifts more bearable. While the company claimed participation was optional, the report noted, “the company is widely known to monitor and manage performance rates for warehouse workers, and will reprimand or fire employees who don’t meet expectations.”

The broader consequences for workers

This is the slippery slope of gig work that uses gamification to manipulate workers. On the surface, these companies’ terms and conditions seem flexible and carefree, but once workers rely on the convenience, subtle mechanisms attempt to convert them into addicts, pushing them to chase every goal, every bonus, slowly committing more time and energy to the role the companies want them to fill.

Gamification does not exist in a vacuum; rather, it exaggerates an already unstable employment model. The broader gig economy is characterized by algorithmic unpredictability, low bargaining power, a lack of social protections, and a complete neglect of traditional employee rights. The appearance of freedom and flexibility remains the selling point of these jobs, but they mask a system where workers are exploited for their time by opaque algorithms, exposing them to risks without any formal safety nets.

Given these realities, can workers be expected to walk away from a game engineered to extract as much labor as possible? Gig companies understand what drives addictive behavior, attempting to disguise hard work as play and dependency as freedom. They have engineered their designs so effectively that the more sinister aspects of gamification may go relatively unnoticed by everyday gig workers. Behind every cheerful interface is an invisible hand guiding choices. This is the hand that keeps gig workers clocked in, despite “flexibility” being the main appeal. Until we recognize that the ‘games’ of the gig economy are just another form of control, workers will keep playing – and losing – in a system where the only real winner is the platform itself.