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This paper estimates the magnitude and distribution of surplus from the knowledge worker gig economy using data from an online labor market. Labor demand elasticities determine workers' wages, and buyers' past market experience shapes both their job posting frequency and hiring rates. We find that workers on the supply side capture around 40% of the surplus from filled jobs. Under counterfactual policies that resemble traditional employment regulation, buyers post fewer online jobs and fill posted jobs less often, reducing expected surplus for all market participants. We find negligible substitution on the demand side between online and offline jobs by assessing how changes in local offline minimum wages affect online hiring. The results suggest that neither online or offline knowledge workers will benefit from applying traditional employment regulation to the online gig economy.

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When experience goods compete, consuming one product can be informative about value for similar untried products. We study a two-period model of duopoly competition in markets that have this feature and where firms can price discriminate between consumers based on purchasing history. Price dynamics, firm profits, and consumer surplus depend on how information spillovers shape demand from the consumers who have trialed the rival product--the potential switchers. In the first period, rather than competing intensely for all future profits, firms compete only for the difference in future profits between repeat and switching consumers. Demand-side information spillovers offer an explanation of how competing firms in new product markets can be profitable in all periods even when selling products that are indistinguishable ex ante.