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Comment by jedberg | Hacker News Reader

Prop 22 is the ballot initiative in California that will overturn AB5, the law that Uber is fighting against.

They have a huge uphill marketing battle ahead of them. Every time I see an ad for prop 22, almost all the comments say roughly: "I'm voting no because drivers deserve health care and sick leave!"

These folks don't realize (because the prop 22 people are doing a terrible job at marketing) that prop 22 actually requires those things to be provided. I think a lot more people would favor prop 22 if they actually read it.

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Most of what it provides are far less than existing state law. It counts "engaged time" only as the time a driver is actually carrying a fare. They're suggesting a 30 cents/mile reimbursement rate; the IRS 2020 rate is 57.5 cents/mile. CA worker compensation laws also provide much stronger protection for workers, crucially on a no-fault basis.

The pro-22 companies have contributed $110 million to the campaign. That's plenty to hire some good PR, and two orders of magnitude more than the groups opposed. So one could hypothesize their terrible marketing on 22's employee protections is because it has poor protections compared to the alternative

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.

I just read it. It sounds like the proposition is treating the drivers as employees via a big compromise, where the companies cover people falling through the cracks. Do companies typically offer contractors such protections? It sounds like employment to me.

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.

I always wonder what % of people actually read them compared to those who just see a slogan and decide based on that.

Probably similar to "read headline" vs "read article"?

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.

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