Why is it legal for businesses in the US to ask employees to work around the clock like this? It seems like an insane and unethical practice
Now on the other hand, consider people who are stuck in part time jobs that treat them terribly for minimum wage. They don't have the freedom to quit because they can't afford to miss a paycheck.
In general, I don't think people who freely opt into anything should get sympathy for it.
It happens all over the place... medical students and residents are run ragged and brutally overworked. Young investment bankers are in the office constantly and always on call. Same thing with young lawyers in biglaw.
These are not people being abused or taken advantage of - they're making their own choices. You're suggesting that we should not allow people free choice in this context, and I think that's a much worse thing to do to them than to allow them to pick a job that's unpleasant.
We can think that they are free to go elsewhere like we can think that those in abusive situations can simply go elsewhere, but there are financial considerations, gas-lighting, just-another-month syndrome that leads to burn-out. Life is just in theory pack-your-bags-and-go easy.
If you thought going to work at Uber was going to be normal-ish, then you just didn't do your homework. That's on you. No reason we should make policy to protect people who won't do basic research.
You cite financial considerations, but again, these people are getting paid huge amounts of money. Unless you consider golden handcuffs to be a financial consideration that would prevent someone from leaving, that just doesn't apply here. That's the point - the tradeoff they're making enables them to leave whenever they want.
I did not work for Uber, despite receiving a decent offer (a 4-yr package that given the current Uber valuation would have been worth between 1.5 and 2 million USD) 3 years ago.
Many people don't have many options and companies abuse the shit out of that because people don't want to be homeless, get kicked out of the country or dead when they can't pay medical bills. Etc. Thus the need for legislation. And the lack of such legislation partially explains fabulous areas like skid row.