Social protection for workers outside the traditional employment contract – a Swedish example

This chapter contains an outline of the Swedish social security system with a focus on sickness benefits in the social security and unemployment insurance. The Swedish legislator’s ambition has been to create parity between different forms of employment as well as between those who are self-employed and those who operate in different company structures. Legislative amendments in this area have mainly provided those self-employed with the same rights of pay level as well as basic access to relevant insurance policies, but there are still legislative problems. Swedish labour- and social security legislation still focus on permanently employed in large firms with regular working hours and incomes for whom the system is built. A particular challenge has now arisen in the new digitalised economy and its performing parties, crowdworkers