Analysis of the Development Status and Trends of Flexible Employment from the Perspective of Labor Economics

The deep integration of digital economy and platform technology has made flexible employment a key part of China's labor market, playing a prominent role in stabilizing employment, expanding domestic demand, and promoting innovation. This article is based on the theoretical framework of labor economics, combined with data and research reports from authoritative institutions such as the National Bureau of Statistics, to systematically analyze the current development status, market impact, and structural contradictions of flexible employment. Research has shown that China has a large number of flexible employment groups, and new types of flexible employment continue to expand, showing characteristics of youthfulness, platformization, and urban agglomeration; Internet technology optimizes the supply and demand matching of labor force, and significantly improves the elasticity of the employment market. However, flexible employment groups still face problems such as low social security coverage, skill mismatch, and ambiguous definition of labor relations. Based on the panel data of the China Family Tracking Survey (CFPS), the empirical analysis verifies the positive impact of Internet use on the self employment probability and labor supply time of flexible employees, and the substitution effect is greater than the income effect. Finally, suggestions are put forward from the dimensions of institutional improvement, skill enhancement, and innovation guarantee, providing reference for building a labor market system that is suitable for new forms of employment.