Uber Is Hurting Drivers Like Me in Its Legal Fight in California

Conversely, I feel like I keep seeing "woe is me" whining from corporations when there are calls for them to maintain even the barest pretense of responsibility to their employees. I've lived in both CA and MA and both states have rolled out gradual increases in minimum wage, with employers gnashing their teeth all the way and claiming they'll be ruined and need to start huge rounds of layoffs.

There has been a growing gap for decades now between productivity and real wages https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/

It is only rational for the people being left behind - often the ones doing the labor that generates all this value - to demand their fair share

which in the end comes down to the fact that wealth distribution is very lobsided compared to two or three decades ago.

People decry for this mainly because it is very hard, if not impossible for many people to gather more wealth.

The thing is that I've seen this rhetoric also come from e.g. college students (about income tax from the top 1%), among others.

I mean, I get that wealth inequalities are disparate and that everyone wants more of nice things. It just makes it harder to sympathize with someone's cause when their line of argumentation boils down to "to solve the problem, just give me more money". I want more money too, get in line!

To be frank, the healthcare thing is a US problem (admittedly this is about California).

But in countries where that's a solved problem then the problem becomes Uber/Lyft have no duty of care for sickness or holidays, they're doging other labor laws.

So in the UK, the gig economy argument is focused on that instead, no sickness/holiday pay means drivers are working when they shouldn't, or ending up broke if a long-term illness hits.

There's even been contractors being fined for being sick because they're unable to do deliveries. Which fundamentally goes against the social contract companies are supposed to have in the EU, making them very parasitic.

Then again, most American companies are coming off as extremely parasitic in the EU, doging taxes, etc.

> 1) Universal Healthcare, regardless of employment status

But this isn't a problem that Uber can fix. I too wold love to decouple healthcare from employment, and it doesn't have to be single payer: Something where people buy their own insurance from healthcare.gov would be fine for me. (Obviously employers would have to increase salary to account for the healthcare costs they are no longer paying.)

But right now we need to solve this within the constraints of what is available. Decoupling healthcare isn't something that's going to happen any time soon, although California could just go and do it, same as Massachusetts, they don't have to wait for the Federal government.

- Agree completely on decoupling healthcare from employment.

- But don't agree on universal healthcare and taxing more aggressively over x. Aren't people already being taxed about 50%, if not more. Instead of higher taxes to withstand astronomical costs of healthcare, won't it be better to work towards that problem by reducing healthcare costs and let people decide how to spend their money. Often seems the conversation is who pays the high costs of healthcare - govt, employer, insurance etc. but not about why is it that high and how can that be lowered. For e.g. I'd rather tax sale of processed sugar foods more to support healthcare for the impact they have on the healthcare system than taxing everyone who makes more money than x

I agree. This shifts the curve so that the burden becomes lower all around. I just don't think this is realistically achievable any time soon.

Thats pretty dismissive to the problem at hand. Uber could run an operation with full time employees and benefits. The downside is that they would have to hire less people, those people would have to work set hours, and there would be a good chance they pull out of rural markets.

For many Uber drivers, the flexibility is the selling point. You could work 60 hours, or you could work 3. You can work only during the weekends or during the summer and still maintain your regular job.

Like many things in life, this problem is more nuanced. I'm curious where it will go.

There's a lot of nuance at play here. To what degree are the drivers being "exploited"? There's no doubt that there exist some that rely almost entirely on app-based gig work for their livelihood, but is that true for the majority of them?

Finally, if an ideology can be quoted in a single pithy quote, maybe it isn't sophisticated enough to stand up to scrutiny.

While that's true, where does that leave the workers? If we consider the benefits of the drivers, does Uber and Lyft going out of business help them? Seems like what they (or at least the driver in the article) wants is for Uber to keep paying him, but just pay more.

We could say the same thing about unprofitable startups that aren’t forced to worry about profits.

If a healthcare system is based on you having to get benefits through your job, maybe we need a better health care system.

If you add enough conditions and move the hurdle higher you can always force some business to be no longer viable. If you make minimum wage $30 an hour most retail business are no longer viable. Doesn't really speak to what should happen or where the line is though. In fact having a higher burden probably benefits more established businesses over upstarts and SMBs.

Market forces are imperfect. Market forces decided child labor and unsafe working conditions were just fine. You can argue that you don't like some specific regulation or that its failing to meet the moment but there's plenty of examples of why "let the market decide" wasn't good enough in the past (as well as plenty of examples it was the perfect solution).

Yes that's one view of it. That if drivers aren't happy with driving for uber as it is well then don't drive for uber. On the other hand that's true for the general labor market too, yet we do have minimum wage in place for a reason. I don't have a strong opinion either way, but I don't think it's quite as simple as let the market sort it out.

They're expensive because supply is explicitly limited by a license limit and the taxi license holders extract monopoly rents. On top of that they are often in cahoots with local politicians and form a symbolic relationships where politicians limit their competition in exchange for political support, with organized crime connections that are too petty for most federal investigators to take notice.

Actual taxi drivers are paid shit too. Often have to pay something like $3000/month to rent the license & car from the actual license owner as independent contractors, at the end of the month you end up with Uber-esque pay anyway.

Talk to a taxi driver and ask them how it actually works, it might surprise you.

Black car as a niche possibly, but it was also a very narrow niche. Taxis as a whole I'm not sure how sustainable it was. Taxi drivers weren't exactly rolling in cash. A lot of the ones I've spoken too were also exploited drivers that rents a medallion from rent seekers and they don't make much more than minimum wage if even minimum wage. Seems to be Uber just opened up the market so that it's more accessible and arguable better quality. So the incentives of hiring a black car is greatly diminished.

If uber and lyft disappears, some of the drivers may go drive black cars sure, but I think most will be driving taxis or looking for work else where.

Did you read the poll?

The questions were fairly straightforward:

"Thinking about your work driving or delivering with app-based rideshare and food delivery companies, do you prefer to be an independent contractor or an employee?"

"Even though you are not sure, if you had to choose would you prefer to be an... Independent contractor 58 Employee 42"

"Thinking about your own income, for you is rideshare driving/delivery: Your only personal source of income 19 Your biggest source of personal income, but not the only source 17 A significant source of personal income, but not the biggest 25 Just supplemental income, not a significant source of personal income 38"

I recommend reading through the entire thing: https://ac32b1ba-8f5b-411f-91ab-b7ae9a046606.usrfiles.com/ug...

To reiterate, there is no substitute for a full election, and the design of polling questions will be litigated forever. But it's still better than a single heartfelt anecdote.

They had over a year to comply since the law was enacted. And even more since Dynamax was ruled on.

It could hurt their margins big time. They’re public now - investors want cash flow.

It certainly doesn't provide as many protections as being an employee. Hence the compromise part. The reason they don't want to classify them as employees is because of the onerous cost of doing so. At the same time, the people doing the work want the flexibility of being a contractor while getting some of the important benefits of being an employee.

So yes, it's a compromise, but it seems like a pretty fair compromise.

Right now employment law says that if you offer benefits then you have to call them an employee. But if you call them an employee, the expense is so high for the employer it isn't worth it unless they work many hours a week.

This basically fixes that hole and creates a middle ground -- a person who has the flexibility of a contractor but the benefits of an employee if the work enough hours, without getting classified as an employee.

Based on my experience, almost no one reads them. Every two years I put together a California voters guide and post it on Facebook for my friends. Many of my friends are very politically engaged, and even they have told me that they appreciate my effort because the don't have the time to do the research. I read the full text, I "follow the money", and I read the editorials from all the major papers in the state, if available, and then summarize that. Obviously I have a personal bias which shows through, but I try to use as much objective fact as possible.

It seems like most people don't get much further than the legislative analysis, if they even get past the headline. And the headlines have been getting worse every cycle. It's obvious that the people writing the propositions know that most people vote based on the title alone.

I'm the only person I know who reads the full text of every proposition.