Majority of gig economy workers are earning below minimum wage: research

The lack of empathy of some commenters here is truly shocking.

My friends - the level of naivete on this board is beyond pale: the 'gig' economy companies are absolutely founded on the principle of having extra leverage over workers so they can be de facto considerably lower than standard net packages.

This is the business plan.

Large companies have power over individuals, which is why we have regulations, min. wage and sometimes unions (and laws for unions). Even thinks like 'weekends' are effectively legislated.

So, by adjusting the terms of contracts, putting in fine print, especially leveraging things like lack of understanding of 'hidden costs' (aka wear and tear on vehicles), etc. they can eke out a profit where there might be none otherwise.

In a magical world where we could talk exclusively about 'excess labour' aka 'everyone had a full time job and wanted to make a few bucks on the side' - this might work out in some ways, but generally speaking, it doesn't.

'Gig economy' is toxic for the working class and mostly is just a giant wealth transfer.

The people creating and investing in these companies absolutely know this, this is their 'secret sauce' or 'IP' or 'special insight' etc. that makes it work.

I think much of it would survive if min. wage were required, but not all of it.

I suggest it's not actually efficient for middle class people to have 'gig servants' in most cases, the efficiency just is not there - again 'slack labour' notwithstanding.

Finally, we may be a couple of steps away from it working - notably, there are a lot of 'hiccups' that happen with delivery, such as people not present, addressing problems, bad food selection, etc. and working through a lot of that may bring efficiency across the threshold to where the 'grocery bill' is just a 'little bit more' because the delivery guy is able to do it very efficiently, and so the economics add up.

I think we might be there with Uber but I don't think we're there with Instacart.

This is how every salaried person's pay already works and it should apply to hourly workers too.

Hyberbole aside, how would that even work? The further away from work someone lives, the more "commute time" they get paid? That has perverse incentives:

* I no longer take mass transit because driving myself is slower and I get paid more.

* I move further away, and take longer to get to work, and spend that time listening to audio books. My employer pays all that time, I'm doing a leisure activity, and I'm having a greater negative impact on the environment.

Okay, you're at home and you want to be downtown. Open the app, wash the dishes from last night, take out the trash, by then someone near you wants a ride downtown. You get paid, and then you're downtown where you can get paid again right away.

I bet Uber absolutely de-prioritizes "unreliable" workers.

Taxi drivers were never working to pay the salaries of hundreds/thousands of SWEs, international sales teams etc.

The medallion system is specific to a few cities and has major issues in even fewer. People talk about taxis as if every city is New York.

You need hard money before you attempt this.

All of the UBI supporters need to do the math on it, it's 'extremely expensive'.

The 'economic collapse' part happens when 'not working' becomes normative, and socially acceptable - and be assured that it will.

The idea of 'working for a living' when you can just 'do whatever you want' is a bit glib. I suggest the only reason people would work, is to pay for that 'special thing' they want aka 'trip' or 'iphone'.

The ideological problem with UBI is the same as any broad social welfare program and that it doesn't reward material output. That is 'extremely bad'.

Finally - I do suggest that it may be possible to 'very simplistically means tested welfare' for people (to get rid of overhead) - and - to allow some of those people to have jobs so they don't get caught in that trap.

In fact, I suggest for people 65+ we'll need a program like this because they can still work, and frankly, working may be very good for their health, and they can do things that are 'extremely needed' right now, such as help to take care of the very elderly.

Whatever number you come up with is going to be arbitrary. A country wide minimum wage is stupid because the cost of living in New York is very different from Lousiana, a state wide makes more sense, but even so, it varies greatly from city to city within the same sate, so a city wide makes even more sense, if you keep adding granularity you'll reach the individual level, because the cost of living within cities changes fast, and there's a plethora of other factors to consider.

I have worked for really low wages in the past, even the lowest of unskilled worker still provides a value. Senior programmers on NYC are worth at least $60/h, now, how much a really low skilled worker is worth? At the time I was an unskilled worker it was was around $10, and thats how much I got paid despite the minimum wage being $8, anyone could get a job for $10, so thats the value a worker with essentially no skills was able to provide. The $8 minimum wage didn't make a difference on wages, because unskilled workers were already providing more value than the minimum wage, so policy makers were behind in raising it, which they did.

Raising the minimum wage and matching it to the market price at $10 wouldn't make any difference either, however, raising it to $15 would wreak havoc, you are basically saying that any worker whose job isn't worth at least 15$ should not be working.

A Minimum wage value written on a piece of paper can't magically increase the true value of a worker, wages won't drop to $1 if you set it as $1, and also won't raise to $50 if you set it to $50.

Besides which, this is not the equivalent of making a bartender clock out during his break. It's the equivalent of making him clock out while he stands at the bar waiting for the next customer.

It might be illegal across the USA, but I do know at least that in Oregon, this is illegal. I know someone that got several hours of backpay for unpaid lunch breaks because someone reported the business for not allowing them to leave during unpaid lunch breaks.

Requiring people to stay on premises during lunch wasn't illegal, but if the requirement was there, they have to be paid during the lunch break. If you are clocking out, then you MUST be allowed to leave.

If you are not paid for that time, they have no right to require anything.

Wtf is this attitude to employees as if they are property.

Ok, so you take _some_ of the jobs, just enough to appear to be working reasonably. And then someone needs to figure out what "some" is. Plus half the point of a gig job is you decide when/what you are willing to work.

As noted, I don't believe there is NO solution... I just don't think it's as simple as "well, just require each person gets paid minimum wage". Because there's a lot of things to consider.

We do, it's their family. Young people are (typically) still living at home, so most of their large expenses are already taken care of or greatly reduced.

There are exceptions, of course, but we can't fashion a society around exceptions.

If I open a hot dog stand or buy a taxi cab, nobody cares if I pay myself minimum wage or even make a profit.

No, the expectation is that operating the business is their choice and they shut it down if they don't like the profit margin

"Minimum wage legislation emerged at the end of the nineteenth century from the desire to end sweated labor which had developed in the wake of industrialization. Sweatshops employed large numbers of women and young workers, paying them what were considered nonliving wages that did not allow workers to afford the necessaries of life. Besides substandard wages, sweating was also associated with long work hours and unsanitary and unsafe work conditions."

Some other countries have universally binding collective agreements [2] that have the same outcome of establishing a salary floor.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_wage_in_the_United_Sta... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_agreement

> What if there are simply not enough jobs available at the rates that people want to be paid?

Decisions are made by others that put people in a position where there is practically no self volition, only struggle.

There is no shortage of resources or capital that requires us to put these people in that position, as evidenced by the, ever growing, vast sums of wealth controlled by a tiny minority.

We could choose to restructure things in such a way that people are paid more fairly, and everyone works less.

Or what if there are, but it turns out there are aspects of employment other than money?

Suppose you can get a job at minimum wage, but then you have to own and maintain a car to get there, and sit in it for three hours a day uncompensated, and have an inflexible schedule that rarely lets you see your kids.

Or you can spend 8 hours a day driving, but all of them are compensated, so you have 8 hours of work time instead of de facto 11 hours, and you set your own schedule. But you get paid 20% less for 28% less of your time. Or consume 10 hours of time for the same amount of money as 11 but are now paid "20% less per hour" because 3 hours of driving time weren't being accounted for as work time.

Are we so sure the people taking this deal are victims who need to be prohibited from doing this?

We've seen this name come up in different ways in different time periods. Recently, it's 'late stage capitalism'. Or it's a failure of neolibetalism as a monetary policy.

And these failures are old enough that even Marx and Engels saw it in the 1800s, with their critique of capitalism.

Exploiters will exploit in a capitalist economy. It'll always be easier to exploit than to make laws to prevent exploitation. Or in this case, yet to make laws to prevent it.

The billionaires didn't get rich on hard work. They got rich on your hard work, and by keeping the surplus on every transaction. And with "gig work", they take their cut from both sides, due to information asymmetry. But you do the work, and you keep the pennies.

And anyone smart enough can put together that scams like Uber count on no commercial insurance coverage, not being paid for wear/tear/gas/time, not getting essentials like workers comp if injured.

Remember, 'gig work' a Shrodingers Job: it's a job until it isn't.

And you also have to remember what money is: it's a crystallization of goods+services+time. What if there's not enough good jobs, due to mass automation? If it's a socialist country that planned for it? It's a good thing. It frees people up to do their interests. There's 12 Earth's of food made per year. Why are there hungry people.

And that answer: neolibetalist capitalism. Having hungry, homeless, poor people is the 'stick' in this system.

I grew up.

To exploit someone's desperation for personal gain is an idea that has no place in a civilised society. More so when that society is fully capable of ensuring no-one ends up in that position.

Sure, we could go elsewhere and look for another signal that might have some value.

We should do this in a study, not by asking people at work.

Have you ever worked in retail, customer service, or other emotional labor positions? You are literally not allowed to look or be sad for most of the day, or you will be fired. Looking happy is part of the work.

> They can all do basic math.

Sadly, this isn't true. Financial literacy is super low, and no, people driving for uber do not understand the math behind deferred risk. If they did, none of them would take the job.

Do you know any uber drivers? Anyone in low paid positions at all?

Companies cut their costs by pushing more and more jobs to this cheaper (low rights, no progression, no holiday, no health, no benefits) gig work. They quickly out-competed. Everyone is forced to hire on the same terms to stay competitive. Very quickly it's not that "the alternatives" aren't good enough, they just don't exist any more.

Shitty gig work conditions exist because we permit it. If we didn't, employers would hire part time staff like they used to, instead of forcing everybody to be a zero-hours "contractor".

There is work that needs doing. That hasn't changed. What's been changing is companies are working skirting worker rights rules to get the same work without paying as much.

Lets apply the same system to your job then?

Anyone can decide that they're now working your job. You can compete with them for tasks and whoever completes them will be the one to get paid.

Artificially restricting the supply of your job is obviously limiting the economic capabilities of the business. Just think how many more hours could be worked!

People who could make a living for their family and fund retirement off of taxi driving alone? :P

Sure, there were problems in medallion-heavy cities.

> > Good question.

> I’ll give my father’s answer: because gig work is better than regular jobs for people who value their own independence. If you work at a restaurant then you don’t have a choice about when you work, the manager sets your shifts. You also don’t have any control over the nature of the work. If the manager wants you peeling and dicing onions all day, that’s what you’re doing.

Another possible answer is that at the precariate level people may have multiple jobs. If your main job doesn't give you much control over hours, then at least your second gig job does. How many uber drivers are also dishwashers at restaurants?

> You’ll get fired instantly if you walk out during peak hours.

You don't get paid more for peak hour work, whereas some of the apps do pay more for peak hour work. And if these peak hours overlap, then you may get a better paycheck by doing gig work instead of restaurant work.

As a freelance writer, I charge by the page and say something like "I typically get it back to you within a week." In reality, I usually get it back a lot quicker than that but saying that gives me latitude for being too sick to work unexpectedly sometimes for a few days.

Charging by the page means it's my problem, not yours, if I can't focus and have to read it three times and it takes me longer than usual. Sometimes, I can do it efficiently and sometimes I can't.

I have zero desire to have any kind of "job" ever again. My life works vastly better as a freelancer who can do the work whenever the hell I manage to get my act together for the day without punching a clock.

This is literally worth millions of dollars in medical care not being required that normally would be for someone like me.

I'm dirt poor. I hate it so fucking much and wish it weren't true.

It's also the version of my reality where unicorns fart rainbows compared to what I'm supposed to be enduring.

Edited because auto-corrupt strikes again.

Min wage. changes the supply, not demand. It may or may not yield less employment depending on elasticity.

A business is a balance of power between investors, execs, labour, customers and suppliers. More money to labour means less for the others at least nominally.

If businesses are flush with profits, then they'll eat the higher labour input and that's it - and the 'cost' will be to investors.

Otherwise, prices may rise - this may or may not cause a material reduction in sales, it depends.

Or reduced payments to suppliers.

Corporate entities are often very inefficient and will not get off of their buts to seek out better efficiencies unless they have to.

There is a F100 retailer that I know of that is flush with profits, they pay crap wages, and their distribution is a mess, people handing of XLS files all around. They don't care. If they had a 'union' they might have to seek efficiencies there (which may imply cuts to labour somewhere, or less money to vendors).

Most importantly, it's an issue of power. 'Skills and Abiblity' for example, give people power in an equation, some have very little power, which is why there are market interventions for wages (and safety by the way).

You can see this more acutely in healthcare, where there are stronger regs, because the power asymmetry is bigger aka the supplier has the power of 'life or death' over the customer.

Is it reasonable to say that anyone who is currently a gig worker with Uber and wanted to could get a job as a HCV driver could do so by getting the license or taking an apprenticeship program? ( https://www.gov.uk/training-hgv/apprenticeships )

On the other hand, if people would rather work for Uber than a trucking company, is it fair to blame Uber for the labor shortage for truck drivers? Additionally, if people would rather work for Uber than a trucking company, is it unfair for Uber to pay less than the trucking company?

(Note: I categorically against the 'disrupt the industry by ignoring regulations and miscategorize workers' that many gig based companies seek to exploit and while this does cause problems it isn't necessarily the root cause of the problems that exist from inefficiencies in current regulations and employment options)

As an aside on the licensing in this situation https://www.gov.uk/guidance/use-a-driver-cpc-national-vocati... : Drive an HGV or bus professionally while you're training - Apply to drive an HGV, bus or coach professionally for up to 12 months before taking all the qualifying tests if you’re doing certain training courses.

But there are some sectors (building, cleaning etc.) that do have a government set minimum pay, because they often would exploit foreign workers.

Actually, our foodora bicyclists a while back formed a union, striked, and got a tariff deal. So got rid of some of the problems around their gig-work.

A non-automated McDonalds extracts money from a certain population(the target market of the McDonald's) and funnels it to the owner, but the owner has to employ people(typically from the same area/market) to give some of that money back to.

Without those jobs, money is being extracted from the target market without any being given back.

You have to tax differently because different productivity mechanisms have different societal value (not economic, importantly). There is a short story or proposal I recall consuming a long time ago about different types of money, one for things with no or low marginal cost, and one for things produced by humans. The former money would be printed and distributed somewhat freely, the latter not. Similar idea. If someone recalls a link to this idea, please comment!

I think reasonable thing to always consider is how many deliveries does average person make in hour and then price of each of them. And after that remove taxes and expenses. Now could this be lived on or not is sensible question.

But overall, the market is that people are not willing to pay a lot for delivery, or perhaps if they order very rarely. Here in the UK I think you'd hard pressed to find delivery beyond £4 on, say, Delivery and average is lower than that.

Since delivery is factually low productivity wages cannot be anything but very low and this is compounded by the use of a middleman (the platform).

In which of these places does the economy only go up?