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Err, is the "casual use of the gig economy" good? These are jobs, not hobbies, and people need to eat. This certainly isn't going to make getting bread on the t

Err, is the "casual use of the gig economy" good? These are jobs, not hobbies, and people need to eat. This certainly isn't going to make getting bread on the table any easier except in the extremely short term—and that's assuming a collective, vindictive, corporate withdrawal from the state.

gogopuppygogo 6y ago
The People have voted and they desire low cost transportation options more so than protecting vulnerable transportation workers. The state will not get its payroll tax. The employees will not get their benefits. Wait till the people get to vote on public sector pension plans...
- username90 6y ago
  The state gets its payroll tax, being an independent contractor doesn't prevent that. The drivers will get their benefits, prop 22 added benefits to them without making them employees.
  - novok 6y ago
    The big tax loss is all the removal of deductions that the state gets if they’re employees, which nobody talks about with AB5 on the govt side because they know it wouldn’t go over well.
anonuser123456 6y ago
>vindictive, corporate withdrawal from the state Companies withdraw operations when they are unprofitable. That's how business works. Capital get allocated based in margins. The AB5 restrictions make profitability unlikely. That means uber/lyft jobs simply won't exist. Is that a better outcome?
- mola 6y ago
  Since when is uber profitable?
  - zaroth 6y ago
    Uber has been profitable in the USA for years now. https://fortune.com/2016/02/18/uber-profitable-us/ https://fortune.com/2016/02/18/uber-profitable-us/
    - mdorazio 6y ago
      No it hasn't. Please stop saying this. If you read their actual financial filings instead of press releases, it is very clear that they are not profitable on a GAAP basis without accounting games in any region, especially this year. They hide their unprofitability with non-GAAP figures and loss allocation to departments where they don't really belong (ex. technology development).
      - remote_phone 6y ago
        If you knew anything about accounting you would understand that what you’re saying is preposterous. Hiding by allocating their losses to the technology department? If you have proof of this please bring it up because what you’re saying is blatantly illegal and the CEO, CFO etc will all be liable. Otherwise if you’re just speculating then say so. As to GAAP you don’t understand what that term is because that’s more about having a standard way of representing numbers but GAAP numbers don’t show the true numbers because of many different accounting rules like accounting for employee stock, which does not hit cash flow.
      - Jommi 6y ago
        I've read the filings many times. Ubers NA ridehailing business is vastly profitable.
- NormenNomen 6y ago
  Isn't this forum all about markets? I'm sure you can put where I'm going with this together. Anyway it's beyond rich describing half these companies as "profitable" in the first place. They're burning the cash at both ends to not get kicked out of california. I have no clue how you could imagine they're the people with leverage with a straight face.
  - anonuser123456 6y ago
    I'm not sure I understand your comment. I sincerely doubt uber/lyft/instacart etc. will ever be profitable and have margins that make them viable businesses. Lyft/Uber etc. have zero leverage; inorder for them to make their margin and retain profitability, they depend on low labor costs. If those costs go up they aren't in business (e.g.demand elasticity of price will kill them). So they aren't pushing this as a 'I have leverage' play. It's an existential issue for them. They cannot exist with the labor prices demanded by the AB5. If they cannot make their margin, they go out of business and then there is no more ride share business. Then the existing jobs go away. And this is the point of my comment. These jobs only exist with low wages. Raise the wages and the jobs go away because the business becomes unprofitable and exits.
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
> These are jobs, not hobbies, and people need to eat. The point is that this often isn't someone's primary job. They take a job at Walmart or driving a school bus, it doesn't pay very well, so they get off work and pick up some rides to supplement their income before going home. They don't need health insurance because they got it through their first job or their spouse, and imposing that cost on the second job only requires them to get paid less or have less flexibility etc. as the trade off the company has to make to justify paying the additional cost of mandatory benefits.
- bergstromm466 6y ago
  > The point is that this often isn't someone's primary job. They take a job at Walmart or driving a school bus, it doesn't pay very well, so they get off work and pick up some rides to supplement their income before going home. > They don't need health insurance because they got it through their first job or their spouse, and imposing that cost on the second job only requires them to get paid less or have less flexibility etc. as the trade off the company has to make to justify paying the additional cost of mandatory benefits. Interesting to follow your thinking and your strategies, thanks for open sourcing it. From a European perspective all this sounds absurd though. Having medicare for all and a social safety net is standard in all European countries and other Global North countries.
  - bhupy 6y ago
    > Having medicare for all and a social safety net is standard in all European countries and other Global North countries. No disagreements that having a robust social safety net is a necessity, but just want to nit-pick a little here and point out that not all European/Global North countries have "Medicare for all" or single payer systems. Germany has a public-private mix, Netherlands has a purely private universal healthcare system, Switzerland has a purely private universal healthcare system, Australia has a public-private mix (44% choose private), Singapore has universal catastrophic coverage but everything else is driven by savings accounts and private insurance among the upper-middle class, etc etc — Belgium, South Korea (technically "single payer" but only covers 60% of costs, private insurance fills in the gaps), Japan, etc. Even "Medicare" in the US, is a public-private mix: roughly 37% of Medicare beneficiaries are on a private health insurance plan (Medicare Advantage), and we expect that number to reach 50% by 2025.
bhupy 6y ago
> These are jobs, not hobbies, and people need to eat. How about neither? They're overwhelmingly part-time side work. This was pretty clear in the polls.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

gogopuppygogo 6y ago

The People have voted and they desire low cost transportation options more so than protecting vulnerable transportation workers. The state will not get its payroll tax. The employees will not get their benefits. Wait till the people get to vote on public sector pension plans...

username90 6y ago
The state gets its payroll tax, being an independent contractor doesn't prevent that. The drivers will get their benefits, prop 22 added benefits to them without making them employees.
- novok 6y ago
  The big tax loss is all the removal of deductions that the state gets if they’re employees, which nobody talks about with AB5 on the govt side because they know it wouldn’t go over well.

anonuser123456 6y ago

>vindictive, corporate withdrawal from the state Companies withdraw operations when they are unprofitable. That's how business works. Capital get allocated based in margins. The AB5 restrictions make profitability unlikely. That means uber/lyft jobs simply won't exist. Is that a better outcome?

mola 6y ago
Since when is uber profitable?
- zaroth 6y ago
  Uber has been profitable in the USA for years now. https://fortune.com/2016/02/18/uber-profitable-us/ https://fortune.com/2016/02/18/uber-profitable-us/
  - mdorazio 6y ago
    No it hasn't. Please stop saying this. If you read their actual financial filings instead of press releases, it is very clear that they are not profitable on a GAAP basis without accounting games in any region, especially this year. They hide their unprofitability with non-GAAP figures and loss allocation to departments where they don't really belong (ex. technology development).
    - remote_phone 6y ago
      If you knew anything about accounting you would understand that what you’re saying is preposterous. Hiding by allocating their losses to the technology department? If you have proof of this please bring it up because what you’re saying is blatantly illegal and the CEO, CFO etc will all be liable. Otherwise if you’re just speculating then say so. As to GAAP you don’t understand what that term is because that’s more about having a standard way of representing numbers but GAAP numbers don’t show the true numbers because of many different accounting rules like accounting for employee stock, which does not hit cash flow.
    - Jommi 6y ago
      I've read the filings many times. Ubers NA ridehailing business is vastly profitable.
NormenNomen 6y ago
Isn't this forum all about markets? I'm sure you can put where I'm going with this together. Anyway it's beyond rich describing half these companies as "profitable" in the first place. They're burning the cash at both ends to not get kicked out of california. I have no clue how you could imagine they're the people with leverage with a straight face.
- anonuser123456 6y ago
  I'm not sure I understand your comment. I sincerely doubt uber/lyft/instacart etc. will ever be profitable and have margins that make them viable businesses. Lyft/Uber etc. have zero leverage; inorder for them to make their margin and retain profitability, they depend on low labor costs. If those costs go up they aren't in business (e.g.demand elasticity of price will kill them). So they aren't pushing this as a 'I have leverage' play. It's an existential issue for them. They cannot exist with the labor prices demanded by the AB5. If they cannot make their margin, they go out of business and then there is no more ride share business. Then the existing jobs go away. And this is the point of my comment. These jobs only exist with low wages. Raise the wages and the jobs go away because the business becomes unprofitable and exits.

AnthonyMouse 6y ago

> These are jobs, not hobbies, and people need to eat. The point is that this often isn't someone's primary job. They take a job at Walmart or driving a school bus, it doesn't pay very well, so they get off work and pick up some rides to supplement their income before going home. They don't need health insurance because they got it through their first job or their spouse, and imposing that cost on the second job only requires them to get paid less or have less flexibility etc. as the trade off the company has to make to justify paying the additional cost of mandatory benefits.

bergstromm466 6y ago
> The point is that this often isn't someone's primary job. They take a job at Walmart or driving a school bus, it doesn't pay very well, so they get off work and pick up some rides to supplement their income before going home. > They don't need health insurance because they got it through their first job or their spouse, and imposing that cost on the second job only requires them to get paid less or have less flexibility etc. as the trade off the company has to make to justify paying the additional cost of mandatory benefits. Interesting to follow your thinking and your strategies, thanks for open sourcing it. From a European perspective all this sounds absurd though. Having medicare for all and a social safety net is standard in all European countries and other Global North countries.
- bhupy 6y ago
  > Having medicare for all and a social safety net is standard in all European countries and other Global North countries. No disagreements that having a robust social safety net is a necessity, but just want to nit-pick a little here and point out that not all European/Global North countries have "Medicare for all" or single payer systems. Germany has a public-private mix, Netherlands has a purely private universal healthcare system, Switzerland has a purely private universal healthcare system, Australia has a public-private mix (44% choose private), Singapore has universal catastrophic coverage but everything else is driven by savings accounts and private insurance among the upper-middle class, etc etc — Belgium, South Korea (technically "single payer" but only covers 60% of costs, private insurance fills in the gaps), Japan, etc. Even "Medicare" in the US, is a public-private mix: roughly 37% of Medicare beneficiaries are on a private health insurance plan (Medicare Advantage), and we expect that number to reach 50% by 2025.

bhupy 6y ago

> These are jobs, not hobbies, and people need to eat. How about neither? They're overwhelmingly part-time side work. This was pretty clear in the polls.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]