You write that “China’s delivery platforms compete to offer better worker benefits” (Report, FT.com, March 11). If only that were the real story.
By adding state insurance to the delivery drivers, the primary beneficiary would be the state insurance fund, whose coffers have been emptied by mismanagement, corruption, and most importantly, misguided Covid restrictions.
If the platforms were really into paying their workers better, this is an extremely inefficient way of doing so. After all, through the state health insurance fund a box of medicines can be three times as expensive as, say, on Meituan, and the delivery is free (negative if the drivers decide to fetch the meds themselves or ask a colleague to do so)!
And if the driver doesn’t get sick, it would be dead money.
As usual, the most expensive item in the market is the visible hand from the government. Maybe something could be done about that.
Zhao Xiaoou
Shanghai, China
