3 ms·

The parent comment you are replying to is acknowledges this, validates what you are saying, and even goes as far as to say that "Insiders legitimately want driv

The parent comment you are replying to is acknowledges this, validates what you are saying, and even goes as far as to say that "Insiders legitimately want drivers to have flexibility without fear of penalties, and there are some major projects in the works to try to make things better for drivers" Maybe you disagree that they are actually trying but, at least according to this comment chain, everyone at uber agrees with you.

dekervin 5y ago
Totally disagree with you. The parent you are referring to is framing the debate desingenously. Uber, and Uber insiders, are free to ponder all the intricacies and challenges of running Uber in its current form. As long as they recognize that drivers are not in practice independent contractors, with all ensuing legal consequences. If they still insist on saying drivers are independant contractors, none of their whining about "tragedy of the commons" is anybody's business. Just provide information to market participants.
- lhorie 5y ago
  > If they still insist on saying drivers are independant contractors, none of their whining about "tragedy of the commons" is anybody's business You're confusing things a bit. Uber itself doesn't "whine" about tragedy of the commons, the other stakeholders (drivers and riders) are the ones who do. Also, for everyone going on about how Uber doesn't provide info upfront, and parroting the old drivers-should-be-employees clueless hot take, perhaps they missed this other recent article[0]: > The company says the new feature provides drivers with more transparency. They [drivers] see more details of a prospective ride before accepting it, such as the fare and pick-up and drop-off locations, which is something drivers say they’ve been asking for. In the past, most drivers wouldn’t receive this information until after they accepted a ride. So yes, Uber knows what drivers want and it wants to provide it to them, and it obviously has a vested interest in avoiding scenarios where drivers cannibalize themselves to death. What's not obvious to y'all outsiders is that Uber has to figure out all of the unspoken complexity and cleverness required to enable changes like this to be rolled out in a way that basically looks like what all the armchair analysts were saying it should have been done, without running into the previously known risks of rolling out such a thing. And even then, there's always some cherrypicky over-simplified scenario to bitch about (as the very article I linked to does). Everyone who keeps making statements that "Uber wants drivers to be employees it can rip off" fundamentally do not understand what they are talking about. As an insider, I don't owe it to anyone to "argue" with them. I can just inform them that I've heard from many other insiders that they think independent contractor status is a good thing (i.e. McDonalds FTE already exists and more options on top of that are always a good thing), that the implementation still has room for improvement, and that they want to make it better. [0] https://themarkup.org/working-for-an-algorithm/2022/03/01/secretive-algorithm-will-now-determine-uber-driver-pay-in-many-cities https://themarkup.org/working-for-an-algorithm/2022/03/01/se...
  - ipaddr 5y ago
    Wait, they are hiding the route for the benefit of all? Uber doesn't want the driver to know how far they have to travel but forced them to take a route after they accept.

dekervin 5y ago

Totally disagree with you. The parent you are referring to is framing the debate desingenously. Uber, and Uber insiders, are free to ponder all the intricacies and challenges of running Uber in its current form. As long as they recognize that drivers are not in practice independent contractors, with all ensuing legal consequences. If they still insist on saying drivers are independant contractors, none of their whining about "tragedy of the commons" is anybody's business. Just provide information to market participants.

lhorie 5y ago
> If they still insist on saying drivers are independant contractors, none of their whining about "tragedy of the commons" is anybody's business You're confusing things a bit. Uber itself doesn't "whine" about tragedy of the commons, the other stakeholders (drivers and riders) are the ones who do. Also, for everyone going on about how Uber doesn't provide info upfront, and parroting the old drivers-should-be-employees clueless hot take, perhaps they missed this other recent article[0]: > The company says the new feature provides drivers with more transparency. They [drivers] see more details of a prospective ride before accepting it, such as the fare and pick-up and drop-off locations, which is something drivers say they’ve been asking for. In the past, most drivers wouldn’t receive this information until after they accepted a ride. So yes, Uber knows what drivers want and it wants to provide it to them, and it obviously has a vested interest in avoiding scenarios where drivers cannibalize themselves to death. What's not obvious to y'all outsiders is that Uber has to figure out all of the unspoken complexity and cleverness required to enable changes like this to be rolled out in a way that basically looks like what all the armchair analysts were saying it should have been done, without running into the previously known risks of rolling out such a thing. And even then, there's always some cherrypicky over-simplified scenario to bitch about (as the very article I linked to does). Everyone who keeps making statements that "Uber wants drivers to be employees it can rip off" fundamentally do not understand what they are talking about. As an insider, I don't owe it to anyone to "argue" with them. I can just inform them that I've heard from many other insiders that they think independent contractor status is a good thing (i.e. McDonalds FTE already exists and more options on top of that are always a good thing), that the implementation still has room for improvement, and that they want to make it better. [0] https://themarkup.org/working-for-an-algorithm/2022/03/01/secretive-algorithm-will-now-determine-uber-driver-pay-in-many-cities https://themarkup.org/working-for-an-algorithm/2022/03/01/se...
- ipaddr 5y ago
  Wait, they are hiding the route for the benefit of all? Uber doesn't want the driver to know how far they have to travel but forced them to take a route after they accept.