Kenny Dichter

Is the Sharing Economy the New Normal?

Josh Barro, Stacy Brown-Philpot, Kenny Dichter, Belinda Johnson, Alan Krueger, Artie Minson

Alan Kruger and industry leaders from Uber, Airbnb, TaskRabbit, Wheels Up, and WeWork analyze how platform economies are rapidly scaling to unlock idle assets and labor flexibility, currently serving under 1% of the U.S. workforce. While companies like Airbnb and WeWork drive immediate efficiency through community-based models and high utilization rates, experts warn that true macroeconomic productivity gains will only materialize once platform work expands to 5–10% of the total economy. Despite these growth projections, the sector faces critical regulatory hurdles regarding worker classification, prompting proposals for a new "independent worker" category to balance flexibility with essential social protections.