New and emerging work relationships arising in the “online gig economy” do not fit easily into the existing legal definitions of “employee” and “independent contractor” status. The distinction is important because employees qualify for a range of legally mandated benefits and protections that are not available to independent contractors, such as the right to organize...

Analysts and policymakers have long complained of the dearth of internationally comparable statistics on the creative industries because it has made it impossible to benchmark the performance of different countries. In January 2014, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) adopted the Dynamic Mapping methodology for classifying some industries as ‘creative’ and others not...

Summary Work life balance is more of an aspiration than a reality for many Australians. Unpaid overtime is commonplace in many Australian workplaces with more than half of all workers stating they worked unpaid overtime in the week leading up to the survey. Australians now donate $128 billion in unpaid overtime annually to their employers...

Estimates show that 6.5 million Australians with family or friends overseas rely on money transfer services. From 2013 to 2015 the major Australian banks closed their remittance accounts with a devastating effect on Victorian communities with overseas families dependent on remittances. That decision continues to threaten the livelihood of small ethnic-based Money Transfer Operators (MTO)...

There has been little research conducted on the experiences of migrant sex workers both internationally and within Australia. This is despite widespread media and other reports highlighting the perception of migrant sex workers as particularly vulnerable to exploitation and human trafficking. This report focuses on consolidating current knowledge of migrants in the Australian sex industry...