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Comment by cribbles | Hacker News Reader

Uber bolsters its fleets in part by offering predatory loans to drivers who are effectively indentured to work full-time with the company.[1] This is a core aspect of its growth strategy and is not incidental to its operating economics.

Regardless, the ability of a company to provide transitory part-time labor should not be considered as an end in itself. A part-time worker whose earnings are subject to change at the whim of Uber's fare adjustments is even less likely to make major financial commitments than a part-time worker in a low-wage service position. This has a negative effect on the growth and security of the economy as a whole.

If anything, we should encourage the transition of these contract positions into "just another jobs." Those gigs on Craigslist will be available in any case.

[1] http://www.citylab.com/commute/2016/06/uber-subprime-auto-le...

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Uber's "predatory loans" work on a week to week basis, with a minimum rental period of 4 weeks. Please explain how it is predatory.

Subprime leases at 50% more than the national average lease $/week. Seems pretty unethical to me; Companies lending to people who have no business borrowing money...reminds me of the 2007/08 mortgage crisis.

> Subprime leases at 50% more than the national average lease $/week.

I'm pretty anti-Uber, but that's not shocking given the unlimited mileage provision. My last car lease quoted additional mileage over the 10k/year at $0.21/mile, which'd add up extremely quickly as a taxi driver.

> Subprime leases at 50% more than the national average lease $/week. Seems pretty unethical to me; Companies lending to people who have no business borrowing money...reminds me of the 2007/08 mortgage crisis.

Subprime loans are expensive because they're risky. Nobody is stopping those people from taking the normal lease, except that they can't get one because they have bad credit.

The problem with the mortgage crisis was that banks were making loans to people they knew would default on them and then reselling the loans as AAA loans, and insurance companies selling credit-default swaps under the same assumption. Then suddenly everyone finds out that so many of the loans are garbage that it made huge institutions insolvent.

There is none of that going on here. Uber is just willing to take the risk of defaults for the benefit of having more drivers.

> Subprime loans are expensive because they're risky. Nobody is stopping those people from taking the normal lease, except that they can't get one because they have bad credit.

So everyone is stopping them.

Uber isn't stopping them.

This is bullshit. There is unlimited miles and they can return the car whenever they want. There's nothing predatory about it. I've had Uber drivers who bemoan the fact that they bought their own car instead of getting the lease.

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