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> The behaviour of some full-time uber drivers is simply irrational and that is effectively being exploited by companies like Uber. Irrational to you. > If on

by bhupy 7y ago

> The behaviour of some full-time uber drivers is simply irrational and that is effectively being exploited by companies like Uber. Irrational to you. > If one includes the cost of operating and maintaining the vehicle, not to mention the depreciation, the risk of losing work if it actually breaks down and so on you're not arriving at a salary that is even remotely sane or competitive. There are a lot of reasons why people still make the economic decision to drive on ridesharing platforms, even considering all of this. 1) If the car is a sunk cost (I.e. they would have owned the car, Uber or not), then it isn't accurate to include its cost in the equation. 2) Some people will happily trade-off the slightly less competitive pay in return for not having a boss and not having to clock into a job. > Just look at who has to pick up the cost during the corona crisis now because these people are effectively broke if they can't drive, it's everyone else. This is literally true everywhere in the world. Coronavirus is a once-in-a-generation black swan event, and most governments' responses have been mass shut-downs of the economy and forced unemployment. The taxpayers foot the bill for most workers, employee or not. "Employment" status would not have changed that. > In the name of flexibility we are loading social responsibility of regular employers onto the public because drivers overestimate the benefits and underestimate the risks and companies like Uber want to line their pockets. This is how safety nets work. In many developed countries, health insurance is decoupled from employees and taxpayers foot the bill. Would you not consider this an abrogation of responsibility of Danish/Canadian employers to provide benefits for their workers?

Barrin92 7y ago
It's actually not the same everywhere, and not even Taleb considers this a 'black swan' but a white swan, because people have been warning everyone about pandemics just about the last twenty years. And there's a black swan now every ten years anyway. In parts of Europe the employment situation is significantly less bad, in particular in countries with proper corporatist structures. In Germany unemployment went up by 250k. The US has seen 10 million unemployment claims already, mind you per capita that's worse by a factor of ten. And yes I would consider this an abrogation of responsibility by Danish and Canadian employers. It doesn't matter though because Denmark has a few million people in it and the government can basically jump in every time anyway. The fact aside that the US lacks this sort of generosity for many reasons, what the gig economy has produced is a permanent precariat and tech companies without obligations. You have an army of semi-employed service workers who get wrecked by every crisis, be it a mortage crisis or a virus because there is no security in such a society. You don't need to pray for a potiticized safety net if you have employers and companies that take care of their workers and invest into their long term human capital and don't lay them off during the crisis, that is you have organisational capacity, something the American labour market lacks completely. It's everyone for themselves as soon as the alarm bells go off.
- bhupy 7y ago
  > In parts of Europe the employment situation is significantly less bad, in particular in countries with proper corporatist structures. In Germany unemployment went up by 250k. The US has seen 10 million unemployment claims already, mind you per capita that's worse by a factor of ten. The US saw 10 million unemployment claims because the official policy of all governments (Federal & State) was forced unemployment. The CARES stimulus includes a $600/week unemployment insurance _on top of_ the existing state UI. The state with the least generous UI is Mississippi, at $940/month — with the CARES stimulus clocks in at $3340/month. You can see the full break-down here [1]. In every state, the unemployment benefit is actually higher than the median wage. Businesses know this, and proactively lay off / furlough their employees so that they may collect this benefit (which extends to gig workers as well). In European nations, the approach has been to offer stimulus packages to employers to keep their employees paid while they temporarily shut down. The net effect is the same, people are getting money to be able to sustain themselves during a global social distance shutdown. In America, because half the stimulus is in the form of direct insurance payments to people, and unemployment is the means of receiving that, you will see high unemployment numbers. Not only is this expected, it is intended. > You don't need to pray for a potiticized safety net if you have employers and companies that take care of their workers and invest into their long term human capital and don't lay them off during the crisis, that is you have organisational capacity, something the American labour market lacks completely. It's everyone for themselves as soon as the alarm bells go off. This seems directly at odds with your point about Coronavirus. In a Coronavirus world, if governments are forcing enterprises to pause their business, the only way to make sure people don't starve is to have a politicized safety net. Either it is in the form of corporate subsidies to keep employees on payroll, or it's in the form of direct cash to people. Right now, the US is doing both[2]. [1] https://imgur.com/a/AifRmdD https://imgur.com/a/AifRmdD [2] https://imgur.com/a/db2DC2s https://imgur.com/a/db2DC2s

by bhupy 7y ago

Barrin92 7y ago

It's actually not the same everywhere, and not even Taleb considers this a 'black swan' but a white swan, because people have been warning everyone about pandemics just about the last twenty years. And there's a black swan now every ten years anyway. In parts of Europe the employment situation is significantly less bad, in particular in countries with proper corporatist structures. In Germany unemployment went up by 250k. The US has seen 10 million unemployment claims already, mind you per capita that's worse by a factor of ten. And yes I would consider this an abrogation of responsibility by Danish and Canadian employers. It doesn't matter though because Denmark has a few million people in it and the government can basically jump in every time anyway. The fact aside that the US lacks this sort of generosity for many reasons, what the gig economy has produced is a permanent precariat and tech companies without obligations. You have an army of semi-employed service workers who get wrecked by every crisis, be it a mortage crisis or a virus because there is no security in such a society. You don't need to pray for a potiticized safety net if you have employers and companies that take care of their workers and invest into their long term human capital and don't lay them off during the crisis, that is you have organisational capacity, something the American labour market lacks completely. It's everyone for themselves as soon as the alarm bells go off.

bhupy 7y ago
> In parts of Europe the employment situation is significantly less bad, in particular in countries with proper corporatist structures. In Germany unemployment went up by 250k. The US has seen 10 million unemployment claims already, mind you per capita that's worse by a factor of ten. The US saw 10 million unemployment claims because the official policy of all governments (Federal & State) was forced unemployment. The CARES stimulus includes a $600/week unemployment insurance _on top of_ the existing state UI. The state with the least generous UI is Mississippi, at $940/month — with the CARES stimulus clocks in at $3340/month. You can see the full break-down here [1]. In every state, the unemployment benefit is actually higher than the median wage. Businesses know this, and proactively lay off / furlough their employees so that they may collect this benefit (which extends to gig workers as well). In European nations, the approach has been to offer stimulus packages to employers to keep their employees paid while they temporarily shut down. The net effect is the same, people are getting money to be able to sustain themselves during a global social distance shutdown. In America, because half the stimulus is in the form of direct insurance payments to people, and unemployment is the means of receiving that, you will see high unemployment numbers. Not only is this expected, it is intended. > You don't need to pray for a potiticized safety net if you have employers and companies that take care of their workers and invest into their long term human capital and don't lay them off during the crisis, that is you have organisational capacity, something the American labour market lacks completely. It's everyone for themselves as soon as the alarm bells go off. This seems directly at odds with your point about Coronavirus. In a Coronavirus world, if governments are forcing enterprises to pause their business, the only way to make sure people don't starve is to have a politicized safety net. Either it is in the form of corporate subsidies to keep employees on payroll, or it's in the form of direct cash to people. Right now, the US is doing both[2]. [1] https://imgur.com/a/AifRmdD https://imgur.com/a/AifRmdD [2] https://imgur.com/a/db2DC2s https://imgur.com/a/db2DC2s