Productivity outcomes in online labor markets and within-task complexity and difficultly.

A new GLO Discussion Paper finds that the productivity measures used of workers are negatively related to the difficulty and complexity of a specific sub-task.

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Nicholas Giannakopoulos

GLO Discussion Paper No. 739, 2020

Productivity outcomes in online labor markets and within-task complexity and difficultly Download PDF
by
Mourelatos, Evaggelos & Giannakopoulos, Nicholas & Tzagarakis, Manolis

GLO Fellow Nicholas Giannakopoulos

Author Abstract: We analyze the impact of within-task difficulty and complexity on workers’ productivity in online labor markets. Using a randomized control quasi-experiment in AMT we are able to define the difficulty and complexity embodied in requested sub-tasks within a problem-solved task. We find that our productivity measures are negatively related to the difficulty and complexity of a specific sub-task. This finding is robust to several sources of workers’ heterogeneity and to different pay schemes.

GLO Discussion Papers are research and policy papers of the GLO Network which are widely circulated to encourage discussion. Provided in cooperation with EconStor, a service of the ZBW – Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, GLO Discussion Papers are among others listed in RePEc (see IDEAS,  EconPapers)Complete list of all GLO DPs – downloadable for free.

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