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The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about t

The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about the same number of jobs in the end, since the same amount of work still needs to be done. > Many would have to abandon $150,000 investments in clean trucks I read this as: truckers will no longer be expect to supply their own $150,000 trucks to get into the business. > and the right to set their own schedules I read this as: truckers will no longer be expected to "comply with the laws, wink wink" to meet impossible schedules in ways that legally aren't the contracting company's fault.

dsfyu404ed 7y ago
>The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about the same number of jobs in the end, since the same amount of work still needs to be done. >I read this as: truckers will no longer be expect to supply their own $150,000 trucks to get into the business. Loads formerly carried by owner/operators and small fleets will in steal be hauled by Swift, Schneider and the like. Those are the kinds of companies that have enough people to absorb these new laws with little cost other than shuffling drivers and trucks around to comply. Owner/operator and small fleet is where truckers go after they've put in their time working for the bottom of the barrel driving sweatshops (the big dry van companies). Removing those small operators is basically removing the part of the industry that sucks the least to work in. This is basically the trucking equivalent of replacing the independent sandwich shops with Subway and saying it's no big deal because meals are still getting served. Sure it may be an improvement for some people but the rigidity that comes with working for a big company (yes I know it's a franchise but the franchise tightly controls each location so bear with me here) be bad lot of the people formerly working for the small shops. >I read this as: truckers will no longer be expected to "comply with the laws, wink wink" to meet impossible schedules in ways that legally aren't the contracting company's fault. This doesn't remove the federal electronic logs mandate and DOT working hours rules. Edit: improved restaurant analogy.
- fzeroracer 7y ago
  Independent restaurants still have to comply with the law and provide a basic level of care for their employees. Now if you had a restaurant that tried to claim their staff were all independent contractors (because they worked for multiple restaurants in the same chain) in order to avoid complying with labor law, you'd have a closer analogy. Ultimately this sounds like they wanted to get away with offloading the risks of trucking to the individual rather than deal with it at a business level.
  - prostoalex 7y ago
    > Independent restaurants still have to comply with the law and provide a basic level of care for their employees. The analogy is not 100% equivalent, as truckers in question are independent owners and operators. Closer restaurant analogy would be someone opening a taco truck, and getting hired to cater a small event. California now says that whoever hires that taco truck is responsible for benefits and other labor regulations, so pay up or hire caterers from a well-established corporate entity like Wendy's. For analogy's sake let's also consider that the taco truck owner has already invested a six-digit amount into their [now useless] food truck. This benefits large established corporations in favor of small independent businesses. It helps no one, as truckers always had a choice to go work for one of those large corporate entities (the churn in corporate trucking is consistently high, which is why you tend to see those "We're hiring" signs on the back of the trucks) if they wanted a full array of benefits and schedule/routes set by someone in corporate. For whatever personal reasons (larger take-home income, benefits provided by spouse, ability to choose preferred routes, schedule preferences, etc.) they chose not to. For what it's worth, labor law specifically carves out restaurant owners and their family members (including things like minimum wage). Truckers want the same carveout.
    - wahern 7y ago
      > California now says that whoever hires that taco truck is responsible for benefits and other labor regulations The law says no such thing. The biggest change from pre-existing law regards the second prong of the new law, which asks whether the type of work is within the usual course of the hiring entity's business. This is the same test in pre-existing law, it's just that this test is applied strictly rather than only given weighted consideration. Are you a company that organizes and dispatches taco trucks? You're likely effected. Are you a company that hires a taco truck every Tuesday for employee lunch? I'd bet money that you're safe. Are you a family hiring a taco truck for a birthday party? It's ludicrous to suggest the new test imposes a legal burden on you.
pmcginn 7y ago
I'm in finished vehicle logistics, and I've worked directly with a wide variety of truckers, including three years in California. You are very right that the amount of cargo that needs to be moved will not change because of this law, but you are, in my opinion, wrong about everything else. I don't want to stereotype truckers because it is a diverse group. But I will say that in my anecdotal experience, this is a job that tends to attract people who want to be left alone. These are people who value freedom and hard work above everything else and many of them will change careers or retire if they are forced to work for big corporations. The average trucker is 55 years old, and many of them will just sell their and retire if AB5 is not overturned. Supplying a $150,000 truck is not at all a barrier to entry. There is a major shortage of truckers and employers are offering free training, big sign on bonuses, and high starting pay to attract talent. Walmart, which is certainly not known for paying its employees well, pays truckers an average of almost $88,000 per year--and Walmart supplies the truck. The people spending $150,000 on a truck are doing it because they want to, not because they have to. This is not a medallion situation. As for your "wink wink" comment, ELD's have been mandated since the end of 2017, and even companies that are small enough to not legally be compelled to use one are often forced to comply due to customer contracts. (Shippers want the data the ELD provides to offer better ETAs to their customers.) In my opinion, the most likely outcome of this law is that some truckers retire and sell their rigs to big corporations, some decide to work for big corporations, and prices go up for everyone who ships goods or buys shipped goods. Unless you're in asset based trucking and looking to expand, the chances are that AB5 is going to hurt you, not help you.
- trianglem 7y ago
  Everything you said makes sense except for the part where prices go up. Why would prices go up?
  - ska 7y ago
    Net drop of supply (truckers) I think was the reasoning.
  - MaulingMonkey 7y ago
    Less supply of able and willing truck drivers at their current level of compensation means companies will have to increase said compensation to try and keep or attract truck drivers to avoid decreasing capacity. Increased driver compensation means increased costs for the company employing said drivers, which in turn means passing on the costs to whomever wants things shipped. Econ 101 supply and demand curves.
manigandham 7y ago
There's a strange political narrative (in California and elsewhere) that people can't possibly make their own living without being ripped off. All it's doing is taking freedom and choice away by squashing freelancers, not creating any new opportunities.
- katmannthree 7y ago
  I think the point is more to set the floor for work conditions (such as with minimum wage laws) so that the very desperate and those who have difficulty assessing long-term costs (such as with MLMs or Uber) don't set the minimum conditions for everyone.
  - manigandham 7y ago
    So set the floor and increase education. This regulation doesn't do any of that, instead it just removes that way of working as if these people can't make the choice for themselves.
    - katmannthree 7y ago
      How do you set that floor if not with this (or similar) regulation? I'm 100% with you on increasing education, but that has a delayed effect of many years. And even with the delay, there will likely always be some people who need to make rent or feed their kids who'll accept the equivalent of a $5/hr job because it's all they can get. I was once that person, filling out quizzes on amazon's mechanical turk for what was effectively about $4/hr. I appreciate having had the work, but it still feels like a loophole around having a minimum wage. I've been on the 1099 side of the fence for a handful of jobs. It's a difficult place. You're on your own for a large portion of taxes and likely need to make estimated quarterly payments, there are no benefits (health insurance, etc), and there's a tangible lack of stability compared to a standard W2 situation. The only solution I see is twofold, first providing adequate social services so that people can survive reeducation / changing careers and then legislation exactly like this which ensures that employers act in a manner that's compatible with long-term social stability.
Camillo 7y ago
In 2019 socialism, workers owning the means of production is oppression.
- arcticbull 7y ago
  In 2019 America, "Socialism" explicitly does not mean the state or workers own the means of production. 2019 American "Socialism" is capitalism with guard rails, raising up the bottom class a bit at the cost of the top. Regardless how you feel about that, Sanders is no Marx, and the breathless ranting over on Fox is just that. The government has no interest in the means of production lol, and frankly, neither do the workers. Union participation is at an all-time low.
  - manigandham 7y ago
    Capitalism with guard rails is just capitalism. It's never socialism or communism. No country has a completely unfettered free market, it's always on a spectrum with many socialist policies and regulations for the greater good. The question is which policies are used and how they're enforced, and America has always tended toward more individual choice over state mandated actions.
    - arcticbull 7y ago
      That's my point actually! :)
anonuser123456 7y ago
>The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about the same number of jobs in the end, since the same amount of work still needs to be done. Well, not by magic, by well understood economic principles. It would be very unusual for the demand for shipping to be inelastic to price. So as prices rise due to labor cost increases, demand will fall. I'm not advocating one way or another. I'm simply saying the impact can be reasonably anticipated.
dragonwriter 7y ago
> The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, Also, since the new gig economy law just enshrined in statute the rule already adopted and enforced by state courts, while adopting some new exceptions not germane to the immediate issue, the law substantively hasn't even changed.

dsfyu404ed 7y ago

>The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about the same number of jobs in the end, since the same amount of work still needs to be done. >I read this as: truckers will no longer be expect to supply their own $150,000 trucks to get into the business. Loads formerly carried by owner/operators and small fleets will in steal be hauled by Swift, Schneider and the like. Those are the kinds of companies that have enough people to absorb these new laws with little cost other than shuffling drivers and trucks around to comply. Owner/operator and small fleet is where truckers go after they've put in their time working for the bottom of the barrel driving sweatshops (the big dry van companies). Removing those small operators is basically removing the part of the industry that sucks the least to work in. This is basically the trucking equivalent of replacing the independent sandwich shops with Subway and saying it's no big deal because meals are still getting served. Sure it may be an improvement for some people but the rigidity that comes with working for a big company (yes I know it's a franchise but the franchise tightly controls each location so bear with me here) be bad lot of the people formerly working for the small shops. >I read this as: truckers will no longer be expected to "comply with the laws, wink wink" to meet impossible schedules in ways that legally aren't the contracting company's fault. This doesn't remove the federal electronic logs mandate and DOT working hours rules. Edit: improved restaurant analogy.

fzeroracer 7y ago
Independent restaurants still have to comply with the law and provide a basic level of care for their employees. Now if you had a restaurant that tried to claim their staff were all independent contractors (because they worked for multiple restaurants in the same chain) in order to avoid complying with labor law, you'd have a closer analogy. Ultimately this sounds like they wanted to get away with offloading the risks of trucking to the individual rather than deal with it at a business level.
- prostoalex 7y ago
  > Independent restaurants still have to comply with the law and provide a basic level of care for their employees. The analogy is not 100% equivalent, as truckers in question are independent owners and operators. Closer restaurant analogy would be someone opening a taco truck, and getting hired to cater a small event. California now says that whoever hires that taco truck is responsible for benefits and other labor regulations, so pay up or hire caterers from a well-established corporate entity like Wendy's. For analogy's sake let's also consider that the taco truck owner has already invested a six-digit amount into their [now useless] food truck. This benefits large established corporations in favor of small independent businesses. It helps no one, as truckers always had a choice to go work for one of those large corporate entities (the churn in corporate trucking is consistently high, which is why you tend to see those "We're hiring" signs on the back of the trucks) if they wanted a full array of benefits and schedule/routes set by someone in corporate. For whatever personal reasons (larger take-home income, benefits provided by spouse, ability to choose preferred routes, schedule preferences, etc.) they chose not to. For what it's worth, labor law specifically carves out restaurant owners and their family members (including things like minimum wage). Truckers want the same carveout.
  - wahern 7y ago
    > California now says that whoever hires that taco truck is responsible for benefits and other labor regulations The law says no such thing. The biggest change from pre-existing law regards the second prong of the new law, which asks whether the type of work is within the usual course of the hiring entity's business. This is the same test in pre-existing law, it's just that this test is applied strictly rather than only given weighted consideration. Are you a company that organizes and dispatches taco trucks? You're likely effected. Are you a company that hires a taco truck every Tuesday for employee lunch? I'd bet money that you're safe. Are you a family hiring a taco truck for a birthday party? It's ludicrous to suggest the new test imposes a legal burden on you.

pmcginn 7y ago

I'm in finished vehicle logistics, and I've worked directly with a wide variety of truckers, including three years in California. You are very right that the amount of cargo that needs to be moved will not change because of this law, but you are, in my opinion, wrong about everything else. I don't want to stereotype truckers because it is a diverse group. But I will say that in my anecdotal experience, this is a job that tends to attract people who want to be left alone. These are people who value freedom and hard work above everything else and many of them will change careers or retire if they are forced to work for big corporations. The average trucker is 55 years old, and many of them will just sell their and retire if AB5 is not overturned. Supplying a $150,000 truck is not at all a barrier to entry. There is a major shortage of truckers and employers are offering free training, big sign on bonuses, and high starting pay to attract talent. Walmart, which is certainly not known for paying its employees well, pays truckers an average of almost $88,000 per year--and Walmart supplies the truck. The people spending $150,000 on a truck are doing it because they want to, not because they have to. This is not a medallion situation. As for your "wink wink" comment, ELD's have been mandated since the end of 2017, and even companies that are small enough to not legally be compelled to use one are often forced to comply due to customer contracts. (Shippers want the data the ELD provides to offer better ETAs to their customers.) In my opinion, the most likely outcome of this law is that some truckers retire and sell their rigs to big corporations, some decide to work for big corporations, and prices go up for everyone who ships goods or buys shipped goods. Unless you're in asset based trucking and looking to expand, the chances are that AB5 is going to hurt you, not help you.

trianglem 7y ago
Everything you said makes sense except for the part where prices go up. Why would prices go up?
- ska 7y ago
  Net drop of supply (truckers) I think was the reasoning.
- MaulingMonkey 7y ago
  Less supply of able and willing truck drivers at their current level of compensation means companies will have to increase said compensation to try and keep or attract truck drivers to avoid decreasing capacity. Increased driver compensation means increased costs for the company employing said drivers, which in turn means passing on the costs to whomever wants things shipped. Econ 101 supply and demand curves.

manigandham 7y ago

There's a strange political narrative (in California and elsewhere) that people can't possibly make their own living without being ripped off. All it's doing is taking freedom and choice away by squashing freelancers, not creating any new opportunities.

katmannthree 7y ago
I think the point is more to set the floor for work conditions (such as with minimum wage laws) so that the very desperate and those who have difficulty assessing long-term costs (such as with MLMs or Uber) don't set the minimum conditions for everyone.
- manigandham 7y ago
  So set the floor and increase education. This regulation doesn't do any of that, instead it just removes that way of working as if these people can't make the choice for themselves.
  - katmannthree 7y ago
    How do you set that floor if not with this (or similar) regulation? I'm 100% with you on increasing education, but that has a delayed effect of many years. And even with the delay, there will likely always be some people who need to make rent or feed their kids who'll accept the equivalent of a $5/hr job because it's all they can get. I was once that person, filling out quizzes on amazon's mechanical turk for what was effectively about $4/hr. I appreciate having had the work, but it still feels like a loophole around having a minimum wage. I've been on the 1099 side of the fence for a handful of jobs. It's a difficult place. You're on your own for a large portion of taxes and likely need to make estimated quarterly payments, there are no benefits (health insurance, etc), and there's a tangible lack of stability compared to a standard W2 situation. The only solution I see is twofold, first providing adequate social services so that people can survive reeducation / changing careers and then legislation exactly like this which ensures that employers act in a manner that's compatible with long-term social stability.

Camillo 7y ago

In 2019 socialism, workers owning the means of production is oppression.

arcticbull 7y ago
In 2019 America, "Socialism" explicitly does not mean the state or workers own the means of production. 2019 American "Socialism" is capitalism with guard rails, raising up the bottom class a bit at the cost of the top. Regardless how you feel about that, Sanders is no Marx, and the breathless ranting over on Fox is just that. The government has no interest in the means of production lol, and frankly, neither do the workers. Union participation is at an all-time low.
- manigandham 7y ago
  Capitalism with guard rails is just capitalism. It's never socialism or communism. No country has a completely unfettered free market, it's always on a spectrum with many socialist policies and regulations for the greater good. The question is which policies are used and how they're enforced, and America has always tended toward more individual choice over state mandated actions.
  - arcticbull 7y ago
    That's my point actually! :)

anonuser123456 7y ago

>The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, which would strongly suggest there will be about the same number of jobs in the end, since the same amount of work still needs to be done. Well, not by magic, by well understood economic principles. It would be very unusual for the demand for shipping to be inelastic to price. So as prices rise due to labor cost increases, demand will fall. I'm not advocating one way or another. I'm simply saying the impact can be reasonably anticipated.

dragonwriter 7y ago

> The loads hauled by these truckers aren't going to magically vanish because the employment laws have changed, Also, since the new gig economy law just enshrined in statute the rule already adopted and enforced by state courts, while adopting some new exceptions not germane to the immediate issue, the law substantively hasn't even changed.