Hatim Rahman on Algorithms’ “Invisible Cage”

KPFA - CounterSpin

This week on CounterSpin:

The power of the algorithm is ever clearer in our lives, even if we don’t understand it. Algorithms don’t just guess at what you might like to buy: sometimes they’re determining whether you get a job, or keep it. Some 40 million people in the U.S. use online platforms to find work. The algorithms these platforms use create an environment where organizations enact rules for workers’ behavior, reward and sanction them based on that, but never allow workers to see these accountancies that make their lives unpredictable, much less work with them to develop measurements that would be meaningful.

Hatim Rahman has been working on this question. He’s assistant professor of management and organizations at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, and he’s author of a new book about it: Inside the Invisible Cage: How Algorithms Control Workers, forthcoming in August from University of California Press.

Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look back at recent press coverage of climate disruption.

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