Stephen Odeogbola, a recent graduate of the University of Iowa College of Law and the 2025 student commencement speaker, has been awarded first place in the Louis Jackson Memorial National Student Writing Competition. His paper, “Exploited Online Labor Platform Workers and the Myth of the ‘Laptop Class,’” was selected from submissions across the country for its insight, originality, and legal analysis in the field of labor and employment law.
The competition, sponsored by Jackson Lewis P.C. and administered by Chicago-Kent College of Law’s Martin H. Malin Institute for Law and the Workplace, recognizes the best legal writing by law students on workplace-related issues. The anonymous review process is conducted by a panel of law professors from across the U.S., and the winner receives a $3,000 scholarship prize.
Odeogbola’s award-winning paper was written last fall in Professor Rosado’s Law of Low Wages seminar and draws from his personal experience as a legal freelancer in Nigeria. During the COVID-19 lockdown, Odeogbola turned to online freelance platforms like Upwork for work, where he often earned as little as $2 per hour providing legal services to clients in the U.S. and other Global North countries. In his paper, he analyzes the systemic issues behind such exploitative practices, incorporating not only his own story but also interviews with other similarly situated legal professionals.
“I was shocked by the low-ball offers for professional services on these platforms, sometimes as low as $3 gross an hour,” he said. “I also observed how many workers, especially those from countries in the Global South, scrambled for these jobs in a race to the bottom.”
Through the lens of U.S. labor and employment law, Odeogbola critiques how current legal frameworks fail to protect freelance workers operating in a globalized digital economy. He challenges the myth of the so-called “laptop class”—a term often used to describe remote workers as uniformly affluent professionals.
“People tend to see remote workers as a homogeneous group of middle-class workers—the ‘laptop class,’” he said. “The reality is that a global low-wage laptop class is emerging, and without judicial and/or legislative intervention, both local and foreign workers will be paid less.”
Odeogbola’s paper presents a forward-looking approach to addressing these inequalities. “This paper presents some initial thoughts on what a local, national, or transnational minimum wage might entail,” he explained. “I hope that it provides a roadmap for a more comprehensive design and enforcement of a minimum wage law that covers the global low-wage laptop class.”
The $3,000 award comes at an opportune moment, as Odeogbola prepares to begin his legal career clerking for Justice Boatright of the Colorado Supreme Court in September. His achievement not only highlights his talent and dedication but also reinforces Iowa Law’s strong reputation for legal writing and commitment to social justice.