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Just declaring "oh this is a transitory job" doesn't make it so. Yes, according to Boomer legend, fast food joints used to be exclusively staffed by high schoo

Just declaring "oh this is a transitory job" doesn't make it so. Yes, according to Boomer legend, fast food joints used to be exclusively staffed by high school students for whom $8.25 is more than enough for an adequate weed supply. But that's just not true anymore, is it? And yet, its used as argument to deny full protection (for Uber) or not raise minimum wage (my fast food example). At the very least, it should be uncontroversial to include these assumptions in legislation: require full benefits, but only for drivers driving > 15h per week. If your assumptions hold, Uber shouldn't need to oppose this, considering they have few drivers it would apply to.

intricatedetail 6y ago
So why people who don't want protections should be limited to 15 hours?
- rtkwe 6y ago
  It's the same distinction between part time and full time work, a lot of things kick in when you work more than 35-40 hours for a company. It's not about limiting people's time it's about making sure companies don't take advantage of people. You can make a similar argument about all labor regulations, eg why limit people to 40 hours if they're willing to work more for the same pay if their employer doesn't want to pay overtime?
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    > You can make a similar argument about all labor regulations, eg why limit people to 40 hours if they're willing to work more for the same pay if their employer doesn't want to pay overtime? Which is why all such regulations are ridiculous. You "help" someone by requiring higher pay for overtime, the employer responds by prohibiting overtime. The worker still wants more than 40 hours, so they take a second job, still don't get any overtime, but now they have the expense of a second commute and get paid less because the second job has to duplicate all of the employment benefits the first job was already providing instead of paying that money as wages.
    - rtkwe 6y ago
      There's no voluntary out for overtime because companies usually demanded that employees worked those longer hours and employees then and now had very little protection against retaliation if they didn't want to. A lot of the 'employee choice' arguments depend on an illusion of free association when the employer has almost all the power to set work conditions and can let the employee go at will with no compensation.
      - JumpCrisscross 6y ago
        > companies usually demanded that employees worked those longer hours When the 41st hour costs as much as the 39th, yes. When it cost more, one hires more people. Or a temp agency.
      - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
        > A lot of the 'employee choice' arguments depend on an illusion of free association when the employer has almost all the power to set work conditions and can let the employee go at will with no compensation. The "illusion" existed at a time when there were company towns and a Big Three automaker cartel and you really couldn't just go work for somebody else. It's a pretty outdated argument when if you don't like working for Walmart you can realistically just go across the street and take a job at Target.
        rtkwe 6y ago
        There are maybe some jobs that are that fungible (even then I'd love to see numbers on time between jobs on any industry) but for better jobs that aren't paying minimum wage the threat of losing your job is real and the gap before getting a similarly paying job is real and threatening to a lot of people. Even in low paying 'fungible' jobs the threat of losing your job and the gap between one minimum wage job and the next stops all sorts of laws from being properly enforced because employees can't afford to lose their job in retaliation while waiting for a payout. Take basic wage theft one of the largest loses of money for people in the US every year totaling possibly billions of dollars. Companies are paying below minimum wage, refusing to pay over time, requiring off clock time, etc and employees feel like they can't come forward because they can't afford any interruption in their wages because of a number of things but chief among them is if you're living paycheck to paycheck even missing one week's wages can put you in a debt spiral. When companies are about to pull this off I find it hard to believe that things like overtime protections and hourly limits are 'limits on choice' more than they're protections against abuse. https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-from-workers-paychecks-each-year/ https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-fro... - just minimum wage violations https://www.gq.com/story/wage-theft https://www.gq.com/story/wage-theft

intricatedetail 6y ago

So why people who don't want protections should be limited to 15 hours?

rtkwe 6y ago
It's the same distinction between part time and full time work, a lot of things kick in when you work more than 35-40 hours for a company. It's not about limiting people's time it's about making sure companies don't take advantage of people. You can make a similar argument about all labor regulations, eg why limit people to 40 hours if they're willing to work more for the same pay if their employer doesn't want to pay overtime?
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  > You can make a similar argument about all labor regulations, eg why limit people to 40 hours if they're willing to work more for the same pay if their employer doesn't want to pay overtime? Which is why all such regulations are ridiculous. You "help" someone by requiring higher pay for overtime, the employer responds by prohibiting overtime. The worker still wants more than 40 hours, so they take a second job, still don't get any overtime, but now they have the expense of a second commute and get paid less because the second job has to duplicate all of the employment benefits the first job was already providing instead of paying that money as wages.
  - rtkwe 6y ago
    There's no voluntary out for overtime because companies usually demanded that employees worked those longer hours and employees then and now had very little protection against retaliation if they didn't want to. A lot of the 'employee choice' arguments depend on an illusion of free association when the employer has almost all the power to set work conditions and can let the employee go at will with no compensation.
    - JumpCrisscross 6y ago
      > companies usually demanded that employees worked those longer hours When the 41st hour costs as much as the 39th, yes. When it cost more, one hires more people. Or a temp agency.
    - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
      > A lot of the 'employee choice' arguments depend on an illusion of free association when the employer has almost all the power to set work conditions and can let the employee go at will with no compensation. The "illusion" existed at a time when there were company towns and a Big Three automaker cartel and you really couldn't just go work for somebody else. It's a pretty outdated argument when if you don't like working for Walmart you can realistically just go across the street and take a job at Target.
      - rtkwe 6y ago
        There are maybe some jobs that are that fungible (even then I'd love to see numbers on time between jobs on any industry) but for better jobs that aren't paying minimum wage the threat of losing your job is real and the gap before getting a similarly paying job is real and threatening to a lot of people. Even in low paying 'fungible' jobs the threat of losing your job and the gap between one minimum wage job and the next stops all sorts of laws from being properly enforced because employees can't afford to lose their job in retaliation while waiting for a payout. Take basic wage theft one of the largest loses of money for people in the US every year totaling possibly billions of dollars. Companies are paying below minimum wage, refusing to pay over time, requiring off clock time, etc and employees feel like they can't come forward because they can't afford any interruption in their wages because of a number of things but chief among them is if you're living paycheck to paycheck even missing one week's wages can put you in a debt spiral. When companies are about to pull this off I find it hard to believe that things like overtime protections and hourly limits are 'limits on choice' more than they're protections against abuse. https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-from-workers-paychecks-each-year/ https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-fro... - just minimum wage violations https://www.gq.com/story/wage-theft https://www.gq.com/story/wage-theft