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To cast your shed-building example in the Uber model: * You submit a desire to build a shed to a market-making company that controls much of the market * T
by sk5t 7y ago
To cast your shed-building example in the Uber model:
* You submit a desire to build a shed to a market-making company that controls much of the market
* The market-maker sets a price you will be billed
* The market-maker alerts nearby builders of a construction project
- without the location
- without the project cost
- without the project plans
* A builder (capriciously) clicks "accept project" and travels to your building site
- upon arriving the market-maker discloses to the builder the project cost and plans
- if the builder declines to implement the project at the dictated cost, the market-maker might penalize the builder and/or exclude them from the market
- wccrawford 7y agoThat formatting isn't just bad for mobile users. The end of that last sentence is cut off on desktop.
- pishpash 7y agoPray tell, why does the builder capriciously click "accept project", repeatedly, knowing that some projects are more worthwhile than others, other than that they are compensated adequately for the risk? On what basis should someone presume to contradict the builder's calculus on this kind of tradeoff?
- sk5t 7y agoWell, those are the terms of the sometimes-lousy arrangement they have with the market-maker, which arrangement certain jurisdictions will construe as employment, due in large part to the builder/employee's lack of true contractor-like agency to consider and set a price for assignments. That some people are willing to participate in this zany scheme doesn't mean the court necessarily ought to view them as non-employees. Were there a bidding process with a reasonable and sufficient amount of transparency to the worker--what and where exactly is the job, what does it pay?--then the scales could tilt towards contractor-dom.
- pishpash 7y agoI think that's where the problem lies. A functioning market imposes certain restrictions on participants. A good regulator also adds requirements to ensure fairness, access, etc. One requirement (for instance) could be that you need to provide certain kinds of information about the work. Instead of doing this, what's the point of beating around the bush and inventing that one of the marks of employment is a "sometimes-lousy arrangement"? When did that become the defining characteristic of employment, as opposed to simply an unfavorable contract?
- sk5t 7y ago> what's the point of beating around the bush and inventing that one of the marks of employment is a "sometimes-lousy arrangement"? I don't think anyone seeks to apply such a test; the lousiness of the arrangement is incidental. I had attempted to argue that the mere fact that workers knowingly take a questionable or even bad deal does not mean they are contractors. The legal status of employee vs. contractor does not hinge on that.
- toxik 7y agoPlease stop abusing code formatting for just about anything -Mobile users
- sk5t 7y agoI live in the hope that someday HN will apply the tiniest scrap of markdown support, and then the weird scrolling boxes will bloom as beautiful nested lists and code snippets.
- masklinn 7y agoMaybe that would not be an issue if HN had markup worth using. Like bulleted lists.
- toxik 7y agoExcellent point, but in the meantime, let's not make our mobile users suffer!