The digital wave is sweeping the world of work and changing it dramatically. Work, workers and workplaces aren’t the same any more. Employer-employee relationship is mutating. Full-time workers are fast getting out of fashion. The rise of gigs economy or sharing economy means work can be split, parcelled and accomplished by army of workers spread across the world.Workers have competition not just from the low-cost labour pool in emerging markets like India but also increasingly so from chatbots and robots. Big data and artificial intelligence promise to make machines more efficient than humans. Coworking hubs are the new rage. Real estate consultants CBRE and JLL forecast these hubs to grow from 1.5 million sq ft today to 10-16 million sq ft by 2020 in India.Into this shifting landscape, add two conflicting trends — de-globalisation through a rise in barriers for talent mobility in the midst of globalisation, where technology is bringing the world closer.Structurally, digital revolution — or the fourth industrial revolution — works differently. You don’t need workers any more to create vast wealth. Facebook with market capitalisation nudging $500 billion has just 20,000 employees. The digital era is also polarising workers at the two ends of the spectrum: the highly paid workers at the top and poorly paid workers toiling at the bottom.All this has profound political, social and economic implications. The rise of protectionist right-wing governments across the world is just the start. Creating enough jobs, skilling and keeping workers employed are a global worry even as technology, structural shifts and automation threaten millions of jobs. Rising inequality has the tech world worried — a reason why capitalists like Sam Altman are flirting with socialism in the garb of universal basic income The path ahead is a bit hazy. Governments, corporate honchos, NGOs, multilateral bodies like ILO, researchers and policy experts are all toying with new ideas and experiments to find some answers. Here’s a sample of a few ongoing policy experiments that are in the works to tackle the new workspace.Raising minimum wages is a good way to support low-income workers. But many experts are betting on offering wage subsidies or tax credits.Globally, governments face a policy dilemma regarding minimum wages — low wages keep employers happy but workers suffer. Keeping it high cheers workers but makes recruitment expensive for employers. Employers then choose automation and off-book hiring, slashing job creation.Is there a better policy tool kit to deal with this wage dilemma? How does one improve wages or support lowincome workers and flatten the income distribution?Some experts are voting for tax subsidy that helps low-wage workers while also boosting job creation. At times referred to as NIT or negative income tax, this allows workers below a certain income threshold to get tax credits or/and payout from the government. Many experts see this as a good way to help low-wage workers without reducing the incentive to work. A wage subsidy supports workers on a sliding scale — the highest subsidy going to the lowest wage earner, and the wage subsidy falls off with increasing salary.A version of this exists in the United Stated called EITC or Earned Income Tax Credit which was first enacted in 1975. The initiative, which has been gaining traction over the decades, targets family earnings below a certain threshold. EITC gives them tax refund besides an additional payout.In 2016, US senator Marco Rubio introduced a refundable tax credit bill called the Economic Mobility for Productive Livelihoods and Expanding Opportunity (EMPLEO) which would support low-wage workers in Puerto Rico, reduce employer costs and bring underground economy overground.Last year, JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon talked about NIT as a good solution to tackle rising inequality and low-wage problem in the techled era. Now, US President Donald Trump is talking about beefing EITC to help low-income parents better take care of childcare expenses.This seemingly win-win programme’s chief drawback is that it is publicly funded and burdens taxpayers.Among the criticisms of NREGA have been that it made labour scarce in critical sectors, and distorted wage structure by pushing up wages beyond productivity levels for many employers. Would wage subsidy from the government help?Amid automation, layoffs are rising. Workers need to train and upskill to remain relevant. Singapore’s SkillsFuture programme offers S$500 training credit to all its workersAutomation and technology onslaught are roiling industries, companies and workers. Singapore is working on a three-pronged strategy — create new jobs, redeploy displaced workers and constantly upskill workers — to keep its citizens employed in the digital era. Last summer, Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong outlined the challenges to Singapore’s economy: it “comes down to three things - jobs, jobs, jobs".In 2015, Singapore rolled out a programme called SkillsFuture where every Singaporean aged 25 and above will get S$500 to pay for a variety of courses — from cooking to photography. When not used, the amount can be accumulated and used for more expensive courses in future.It has approved many courses on a range of platforms, including MOOCs ventures like Coursera. Among more than 10,000 courses are “befriending skills and practice” and “startup CEO”. The Singapore government is investing $1 billion annually until 2020 on a slew of initiatives like student counselling, internships and midcareer learning. The objective is to help individual workers take ownership of upskilling and reskilling throughout their life to adapt to and remain relevant in the job market.To align industry and workers better to the shifting market demand, Singapore has also rolled out S$4-5 billion Industry Transform Programme.Under this, industry transformation maps (ITM) will be developed for 23 industries after examining the landscape and future trends to help these industries remain relevant and competitive in future.Populous India faces two big problems — how to skill and employ unskilled workers and how to reskill those losing jobs due to automation. It has already rolled out a skills programme under a new ministry to tackle this.Historically, workers’ unions have focused on protecting jobs and wages. In Germany, they are also negotiating to train and upskill workers as technology shakes up the job and corporate landscapeWithin a decade, Germany, the sick man of Europe, has turned into an economic superstar. In many developed countries, globalisation and entry of India and China into the global labour market hurt manufacturing and shop floor workers, pushed up unemployment rates and adversely impacted trade balance (think US). Not Germany, which enjoys robust exports, low unemployment rate and a vibrant manufacturing sector.How did Germany manage this turnaround? An academic research paper co-authored by Christain Dustmann, Bernd Fitzenberger and Uta Schoenberg puts this to the rise in worker productivity that outpaced wages over the last decade, improving German competitiveness vis-a-vis its trading partners. Germany rolled out Hartz reforms in 2003 that decentralised wage bargaining, adversely impacting powerful worker unions. The reforms also capped unemployment benefits and gave training vouchers to workers. The economic distress of the 1990s and the unions’ shrinking influence forced them to rethink strategy and become more flexible and constructive in their approach.As a result, unions now look beyond just protecting jobs and wages to focus on initiatives to train, skill and upgrade workers.Not surprisingly, while German firms have moved a lot of low-skilled manufacturing to low-cost, emerging markets like China, most high-skilled manufacturing and high-end manufacturing jobs have remained in Germany. Worker unions did play an important role in making this happen.Amid structural shifts and layoffs in sectors like IT services, new workers’ unions are being formed. Focusing on upskilling workers rather than just protecting jobs might be a more constructive path for unions.Will shorter work hours boost worker productivity and reduce stress and burnout of workers? Government and companies in Sweden are trying some pilotsIn an old people’s home in the Swedish city of Gothenburg in 2015, 68 nurses saw their eight-hour workday cut to a six-hour day with the same salary payout. The intent was to reduce staff stress and improve their health and satisfaction levels. The two-year experiment was largely successful as it led to nurses feeling healthier, taking fewer sick leaves and improved patient care. But early last year, city officials decided to discontinue it because the experiment was financially unsustainable.The cut in working hours required the old people’s home to hire 17 extra staff, which cost around $1.3 million annually.While the Swedish government, worried about burdening tax payers, abandoned the project, some tech startups in the country still like the idea. App developer Filimundus introduced six-hour workday in 2016, with its CEO saying it boosts worker productivity. Another SEO-focused startup Brath.com, which rolled out a sixhour workday in 2012, says it is a good talent-hiring and retention tool and raises productivity.Europe’s 40-hour work week is a pipedream for Indians logging 52 hours (according to Manpower Report). But productivity, instead of work hours, may come under sharper focus as automation wave sweeps corporate corridors.What happens when people get money for nothing? Do they get lazy or escape poverty? Amid rising inequality, tech honchos and policy wonks see UBI as a possible solutionUniversal basic income or UBI is a cash transfer programme to ensure that everyone, irrespective of their social and work status, has the minimum means to live. Support for UBI is growing across the spectrum.From tech honchos like Sam Altman and eBay’s Pierre Omidiyar to NGOs like Give Directly and governments in countries like Canada, the Netherlands and Finland are experimenting with some form of UBI. These experiments are in the pilot phase right now. The goal is to understand what happens to the quality of life and motivation to work when people receive free money and more security in their lives.Give Directly has rolled out the world’s largest UBI experiment in rural Kenya where 26,000 people in 200 villages will receive an average monthly payout of $22, just enough to cover food and other basic needs. While 45 villages will get UBI for 12 years, another 80 will get it for two years in monthly payout or lumpsum. The three sets of villages will be compared with another 100 villages that will receive no UBI to understand work and behavioural impact of UBI. How will it affect work habits, productivity levels and spends, including on temptation goods? Already, these unconditional cash transfers are disproving many misconceptions.Instead of spending on temptation goods like drugs, alcohol and gambling, empirical evidence suggest that a majority are using UBI money to pay for essentials like school fees, medicines, home repairs and for growing their small businesses.These are yet early days for UBI. But with so many pilots rolled out globally, wait for behavioural economists, governments, NGOs and worried tech honchos to weigh in more deeply on UBI and its efficacy in future.With 200 million Indians living below $1.9 a day, the government is exploring some kind of UBI for the poor. Global experiments will help hone India’s UBI plans.(All illustrations by Anirban Bora)