  Online labor markets give people in poor countries direct access to buyers in
rich countries. Economic theory and empirical evidence strongly suggest that
this kind of access improves human welfare. However, critics claim that abuses
are endemic in these markets and that employers exploit unprotected, vulnerable
workers. I investigate part of this claim using a randomized, paired survey in
which I ask workers in an online labor market (Amazon Mechanical Turk) how they
perceive online employers and employers in their host country in terms of
honesty and fairness. I find that, on average, workers perceive the collection
of online employers as slightly fairer and more honest than offline employers,
though the effect is not significant. Views are more polarized in the online
employer case, with more respondents having very positive views of the online
collection of employers.
