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Community, Health, and Family

Working in the margins: Exploring informal work in rural communities Amanda McMillan Lequieu*, Amanda McMillan Lequieu, Emily Wornell, Justin Schupp, Ellen Whitehead, Jean Hardy,

This talk explores preliminary analyses of 50 interviews with informal workers and on-the-ground observation in two rural communities—one on the Wisconsin/ Michigan border and the other in central Pennsylvania. A large portion of these interviewees work informally in person—for instance, work that offers under-the-table services, like babysitting/nannying, lawn care, construction, or in-person sales events, like farmers or flea markets. Other interviewees work and network primarily online, i.e. through selling on Facebook Marketplace or Craigslist or via platform-based gig work like driving for Uber or picking up groceries for InstaCart. This project explores how these workers, and their work, shape their individual and community resilience to social, technological, and economic changes. This project is part of a broader, mixed method study funded by the USDA which examines nonstandard work arrangements in rural communities.