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Uber, Postmates Sue California to Block Gig-Worker Law
- lykr0n 7y agoOf course they do. The entire Gig Economy is based around paying the workers as little as possible, while the companies take as much as they can.
- smallgovt 7y ago>> The entire Gig Economy is based around ... the companies tak[ing] as much as they can. This isn't true. Almost all these high flying gig economy companies are running huge losses because they're not charging customers enough. Also, it's unclear whether AB5 will result in workers getting paid more. Uber/Lyft may simply lower their hourly wage even more to make up for the required taxes and benefits. The only clear winner here is the government since they'll be collecting employment-related taxes. The most worker friendly solution is to create a new class of contractor that requires a livable wage and benefits, but doesn't require companies to pay employment related taxes.
- ericlewis 7y agoIf they charged customers more, they would still fight this. Because it is still lower profit. They don't want to pay workers.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- smallgovt 7y agoI agree with you there. My point is that these companies aren't trying to 'take as much as they can'. They're sustaining huge losses with no end in sight.
- PretzelFisch 7y agoThis is only really the case because there is an Uber and Lyft. Their only goal right now is to outlast the other so that they can price discover the top end of what riders will pay for this service and the bottom end of what a driver will take to do the work.
- icebraining 7y agoOnce one goes out of business, a new one will appear. My country alone has four operators, surely some will try to explore the US if that spread gets enticing.
- fatbird 7y agoDon't forget externalizing risk and fixed costs to "non-employee" workers.
- blueline 7y agowhen you put it that way, i'm not too sure it's specific to the gig economy..
- influx 7y agoWould you support Uber hiring all the California drivers, and then forcing them to only drive on their platform? If so, do you think that would be better or worse for the drivers and consumers?
- claudiulodro 7y agoIf they got paid an hourly minimum, I don't see why someone would want to drive for other platforms. The only reason people drive for multiple platforms is because it's needed in order to consistently make money. Other than maybe to slightly optimize the max amount of money they make, I can't imagine why someone would continue wanting to drive for multiple platforms if they were w2.
- viro 7y agohow much are you willing to pay for a uber?
- lykr0n 7y agoPeople pay $100 for an Uber from JFK to Manhattan when a Taxi is ~$60. So, yeah. People will pay a lot for the convenience.
- viro 7y ago... umm those people are bat sh!t. I can only imagine how much that will be after this change.
- ghaff 7y ago>... umm those people are bat sh!t. Why? I don't have a real opinion on getting into Manhattan from JFK given that I haven't done that trip in years. But I go to and from my home airport with a private car service all the time.
- influx 7y ago
- gotoeleven 7y agoWhat is the best argument for why this intervention is necessary? If workers don't like the pay, they can quit. Given that workers can always quit whenever they want for whatever reason (with the exception of certain high level jobs) how much regulation of the business/worker relationship is really necessary? Safety regulations, sure, but regulating hours and pay rates etc etc? Does this actually benefit anyone? edit: oh no my fake internet points!
- standardUser 7y ago"The entire Gig Economy is based around paying the workers as little as possible" Remove the word "Gig" from that sentence and you're on the right track. There is a bizarre tenancy for people to proscribe the worst attributes to these newer corporations when the big old corporations have being doing this and vastly worse for literally generations.
- allthecybers 7y agoThe title could more descriptively read "Corporate overlords sue to avoid paying workers a living wage because it threatens to topple their unsustainable business model" Edit: This is getting down voted, but the fact remains that it would literally tank these companies to pay good wages/provide benefits to their drivers. The business model is flawed from the start and yes, many companies besides Uber/Lyft/Postmates do this. Google, FB, Microsoft (to name a few) all employee a contingent or expendable workforce without the same comp/benefits and opportunities of their corporate employees.
- whalesalad 7y agoWith an on demand business model that lets you work (or not work) whenever you want — why do these companies owe anyone a livable wage? If you want a livable wage, work somewhere that pays you a livable wage.
- Analemma_ 7y agoBecause paying less than a livable wage means those workers have to make up the difference with government benefits. It’s companies trying to shift their operating costs onto taxpayers, which should be discouraged/forbidden.
- viro 7y agowasn't ride sharing created as a side money thing not a main source of income
- learc83 7y agoIt was, but just like with airbnb and renting out your house when you were on vacation, there's not enough supply to support an industry that will supply the enormous returns VCs are looking for. So eventually ride sharing started courting full time drivers.
- ghaff 7y agoEssentially all the freelance writers I know are also vehemently opposed to the bill.
- lokar 7y agoI've read that Germany and Canada have a middle ground between independent contractor and employee, the dependent contractor. Does anyone know how well that works out in practice? Are Uber drivers dependent contractors in these countries?
- rolltiide 7y agoWe only like false dichotomies around here
- Waterluvian 7y agoI don't know (re: Canada) but given you can be an Uber driver and do other driving jobs too (I think?) there's no exclusivity, which I think is what delineates the contractor types.
- JumpCrisscross 7y ago> there's no exclusivity If there were a middle ground between independent contractors and employees, where such "dependent contractors" e.g. worked exclusively for one client, I'd bet some drivers would pick teams. A middle ground for contractors makes sense. It makes more sense than the status quo, where ersatz employees get no benefits. And it makes more sense than the Californian law, which effectively outlaws freelancing and part-time contracting. Such a middle ground relationship would involve some obligations of employment (e.g. re-imbursement for expenses, paid sick leave and time off, basic health benefits) but not all (e.g. no retirement accounts, limited dismissal recourse, no training), just as it would entail some of the restrictions of employment (e.g. exclusivity), but not all of them (e.g. no gardening leaves, corporate NDAs, time management, et cetera).
- kekebo 7y agoI can only speak for Germany, here "Uber’s ride-hailing business works exclusively with professional and licensed private-hire vehicle (PHV) companies"[1] Not sure how that plays out in terms of dependent contractors. At the same time they just got hit with another ban in relation with their app[1] [1] https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/19/ubers-ride-hailing-business-hit-with-ban-in-germany/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/19/ubers-ride-hailing-busines...
- justinzollars 7y agoGood for Uber. California has its hands on too many things. It has so many ethics it has destroyed the middle class. I want much less regulation.
- lokar 7y agoIMO, often arguments about "less regulation" related to employment law (and generally how large employers treat workers) tend to neglect the fact that these arrangements don't happen in a vacuum. The seeming less-regulated employment is in fact supported by a great deal of government safety net programs taxpayers. Many of these low paying / independent contractor / "gig economy" jobs are really only feasible due to government support. Given that, it seems more reasonable for the government to regulate.
- justinzollars 7y agoI'm not sure this is in fact true. We have experiments going on at the state level. People have a higher standard of living in states with less regulation. IMO I would argue California's new law is not about protecting workers, who are actually able to earn more money as independent contractors, but about protecting higher tax revenues collected on employees. In San Francisco where I live, we have almost no middle class primarily because it's so expensive to live. Thats right no middle class. We have effectively outlawed housing with 7 year approval cycles, and exclusionary zoning. It's nearly impossible to develop in California. What does the data show? People are leaving California to move to states like Texas. Half of Californias are thinking of leaving the state. Poverty is shrinking everywhere except California where 18% of the population is living in poverty.
- mwfunk 7y agoOh no, not ethics! Next thing you know it’ll have morals.
- justinzollars 7y ago* ethics and morals at the expense of being able to see the failure of their own policy. How many homeless people did they have to ignore to win a cheap political argument? (a lot)
- pmikesell 7y agoAs an aside, is there a term for the kind of virtue signaling comment torrent this post is likely to elicit? Perhaps "Business Woke"?
- Waterluvian 7y agoCan you comment a bit more on what you're referring to? I'm not sure I understand. I learned about "woke" a while ago and I dunno what's PC these days but it's a huge red flag to me of controlled speech and samethink.
- peterwwillis 7y agoIt's not PC, it's slang for "aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice)". It was added to Merriam Webster Dictionary in September 2017.
- pmikesell 7y agoYes - I just meant that we're going to see a ton of comments here from people who want to let it be know that they think Uber, Postmates, etc are super evil and everything the government can do to shut them down is what they deserve. It is samethink. A lot of people posting here hold these positions because they read them in the last story about these companies and they want to join in on the rabble. And discussion or nuance gets lost in this blizzard of conformity of opinion. It gets boring after a while.
- Waterluvian 7y agoI think that's what bothers me about "woke". It applies a binary state to a considerably more complex concept. It's like being "in shape." It's not a yes or no state. You don't achieve "in shape" and move on to something else. It's an entire lifestyle that requires constant work. The concept of being woke is a convenient cop-out to declare in a single word that yes you agree with all those things all those other people are saying. Also get off my lawn. I'm cranky about fundamental principles I hold dear being distilled down to a slang word so that it fits Twitter culture conversations better.
- jswizzy 7y agoCalifornia a once beautiful state ruined by terrible government, citizens, and tech companies.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- mwfunk 7y agoAnd yet it’s the 5th largest economy in the world.
- jayd16 7y agoYou're right it's terrible. Don't come.
- tchaffee 7y agoSo ruined that it's one of the most desirable places in the world to live and work, and housing prices are super high as a result. California's "problem" is that it is so successful compared to other states.
- peterwwillis 7y agoThe "gig economy", aka the "income inequality economy", or the "we need multiple jobs to get by economy", or the "human labor as commodity economy".
- JumpCrisscross 7y ago> the "human labor as commodity economy" Unskilled labor is a commodity. That doesn't justify treating people callously.
- peterwwillis 7y agoI'd argue the opposite. The whole point of a commodity is to not care about who produced it or how, to treat it as an abstract in a trade for goods and services. There is a specific lack of care required. Ask anyone who consumes a commodity how they feel about the cow their milk came from, or the orange grove their orange juice came from, or the oil well their gas came from, or the farmstead their coffee beans came from, or the factory farm their pre-sliced chicken breast came from. If labor itself (not the product of labor) is a commodity, then nobody cares about the labor. The laborer is merely the vessel for the labor, so they're even more disconnected from the commodity, like the dirt that a corn cob grows in. All you need is to make sure the dirt can keep producing corn; none of the consumers or producers care about the quality of the dirt. This is more visible when you look at unskilled labor around the world, where people usually are treated poorer the lower the wage is for their labor. Take Foxconn's workers. They work very long hours, basically every day, and live in very cramped quarters, with no time for a real life. They're treated as a commodity, and the "exchange" is that they get to send money home. But what kind of life is afforded them personally? Who cares? They're just husks assembling iPhones. Around the world, the environment of a commodity is often given poor treatment. The subject's very reduction of value leads directly to a lack of care in its treatment, as long as the good produced remains of a sufficient value to its consumer. You see this in the environment of the commodity being slowly eroded, surrounding communities being poisoned, 3rd world governments being corrupted and eaten away, as the commodity product is carried off. This has been going on since empire has existed, and continues with the rise of capitalism as a mechanism to convert valuable goods into cheaper commodities. So I personally think that treating people callously is a result of commoditization.
- rossdavidh 7y agoSo, I'm looking forward to the onslaught of insightful, balanced, and deliberative discussion that will accompany this article. Idea for HN: the balance of downvotes and upvotes on an article is a useful piece of information in and of itself. It might not be a good idea to show that on each particular article, but an end-of-year analysis of what words in an article title often corresponded to lots of downvotes (relative to the upvotes), would be an interesting way to measure which topics are currently hot-button issues.
- fatbird 7y agoThe idea that an "insightful, balanced, and deliberative" discussion should happen implies that the topic is either unfamiliar and requiring exploration, or is somehow otherwise of indeterminate status with respect to norms, morality or consequences. At this point, if someone isn't at least dubious of Uber and the gig economy's value, given everything that's been publicly determined about them, I don't feel like I have a lot of time to waste on a "balanced" discussion.
- rossdavidh 7y agoAn "insightful, balanced, and deliberative" discussion is able to determine the truth about a matter more effectively than one imbalanced, that is not deliberative or insightful. So even if you have an opinion on a topic, it is a useful way to proceed to discuss it if you are wanting to gain some insight. If you're not wanting to learn anything from the discussion, why even have it? It's not as if a flame thread on the internet is going to actually convince anyone of anything, or really accomplish much of anything.
- fatbird 7y agoHow many times do we have to have a balanced discussion to determine the truth before we accept that, with reasonable certainty, we've determined the truth and can discuss subsequent issues on that basis? I'm not suggesting a flame thread is more productive. I'm suggesting that a civility/debating club fetish keeps us rehashing basics and is itself an impediment to deeper learning.
- nradov 7y agoThe real problem here is that benefits such as health insurance and retirement savings depend on being an employee. Those benefits should be decoupled.
- viro 7y agoThose benefits and taxes are why they are fighting it tho.
- smallgovt 7y agoI think OC is pointing out that these companies are willing to provide benefits to their workers. They're primarily fighting this because the employment-related taxes and costs are expensive. What Uber/Lyft want is a new class of contractor that allows them to provide benefits to their workers without paying the taxes.
- PretzelFisch 7y agoI don't think Uber/Lyft want to pay for contractor's benefits. It doesn't provide any advantage to them to foot the cost of that bill. What they seem to want is a contractor they can treat as an employee in terms of time worked and tools used.
- nimbius 7y agoid argue that during the Obama administration steps were taken in the right direction to try to ween insurance companies off the employed/insured racket, but presently outside of this setup theres limited ability for real people to acquire health insurance on their own for a reasonable rate. Part of this is due to the obstinate nature of some 8 US states that refuse to expand medicare, and part of it is due to multiple healthcare providers such as Kaiser walking out of the open marketplaces proposed by the Obama administration during his term. Then you have to look at what states are explicitly willing to cover as part of their expansion, or rather, what they wont cover. Abortion and contraceptive birth control come to mind, and certainly during the open drafting of the ACA these were outright muddled or restricted in nature. This means private/corporate insured people always have access to family planning, while those on the open market do not. It poses an uncomfortable class delineation. If i had to postulate as to how US Healthcare will eventually reform, it would be with a whimper. Medicare will soon become large enough that the contraceptive mandate wont matter. Corporations (uber, lyft, amazon) are all becoming fairly callous to the idea that employees get anything at all, let alone healthcare, so its possible they will simply force the states hand.