Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says • Hacker News Board

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#151

Post by ghshephard » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:45 PM UTC

jdlyga wrote: post #147

Uber, Lyft, and Juno only exist because the Taxi apps are bad or non-existent. If there was a Taxi app that worked exactly like these 3 apps, and not just for hailing taxis, then there would be no need for this.

That is entirely dependent on where you live and the quality of the Taxis. For example, in the London and Singapore, Taxis are awesome. In California, (particularly in the Bay area) - Taxis are horrible beyond belief. The cars are unsafe and uncomfortable, the drivers are terrible and lack knowledge. It's often the case that I will come out of a peninsula hotel (Say, San Mateo) and see a queue of taxis waiting to pick up passengers, and at the same time, a queue of people (myself included) waiting 5-10 minutes for an Uber to arrive. And that's just Uber X. Can you imagine executives used to Uber Black ever getting in a Taxi again?

I've taken thousands of taxi rides and over a thousand uber rides. No comparison between the two in certain regions.

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#152

Post by spaceflunky » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:47 PM UTC

csomar wrote: post #66

Two things: 1. The cost is absorbed by another entity, usually the parents. It is the parents' car, or your parents bought you a car. You need some quick cash, so you basically "eat out" of that car to generate that "cash". 2. You are trapped in a situation where you need quick cash. So you "eat out" of your vehicle to generate that cash. This also happens when you have a low "realization" consciousness. (ie: You are…

Just curious, what do you mean by "renting"? Renting your car? Apartment? Rental property?

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#153

Post by Someone » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:48 PM UTC

pfortuny wrote: post #117

regulation_d wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let’s say I’m a dry wall contractor. A general contractor comes along and offers me $20k for a job. I say “$25k?” and he says, “No, $20k.” If I take the job I am not magically transformed into an employee of his, simply because I lacked the bargaining power to negotiate the rate. The reason I am still a contractor is that I have absolute control over whether to agree to do that job at that price. There are obviously…

MMmmmh, but you do not lose your job as a dry wall contractor. You lose your “uber driver” job if you do not accept uber’s fares. What am I missing?

“Uber Driver” isn’t a job (in the USA; some other countries disagree); you’re a contractor, and you’re free to find customers via other means (e.g. via Lyft, paying their margins, via word-of-mouth, via your own web site, etc.)

Yes, that may be hard or effectively impossible, but a bad dry wall contractor will not be able to hold his business afloat, either.

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#154

Post by csomar » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:50 PM UTC

spaceflunky wrote: post #152

csomar wrote: post #66

Two things: 1. The cost is absorbed by another entity, usually the parents. It is the parents' car, or your parents bought you a car. You need some quick cash, so you basically "eat out" of that car to generate that "cash". 2. You are trapped in a situation where you need quick cash. So you "eat out" of your vehicle to generate that cash. This also happens when you have a low "realization" consciousness. (ie: You are…

Just curious, what do you mean by "renting"? Renting your car? Apartment? Rental property?

Was referring to real estate.

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#155

Post by echevil » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:52 PM UTC

derekp7 wrote: post #33

The problem isn't the profit, but that there are a number of people using this as one of their primary income sources. I'm not sure how Uber et. al was originally promoted to drivers, but I've originally seen it as something like "I'm heading home from work, let me turn on my uber app and see if anyone around me needs a ride going in that direction". Or, "I feel like riding around tonight, no particular place to go,…

With heavy investments in self-driving cars, I doubt if Uber would really want to improve drivers' income. It'll all become irrelevant when self-driving taxis become available. It may not happen soon, but it's quite worrisome if people are using as one of their primary income sources.

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#156

Post by jtuente » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:53 PM UTC

beager wrote: post #106

derekp7 wrote: post #33

The problem isn't the profit, but that there are a number of people using this as one of their primary income sources. I'm not sure how Uber et. al was originally promoted to drivers, but I've originally seen it as something like "I'm heading home from work, let me turn on my uber app and see if anyone around me needs a ride going in that direction". Or, "I feel like riding around tonight, no particular place to go,…

> I know that back when I was around 18 - 22 or so, I would often spend a saturday night just cruising with the radio playing, windows down, and enjoying the ride. Fairly sure that the parameters of driving for Uber/Lyft preclude every single aspect of what makes that activity enjoyable for an 18-22 year old.

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/tools/lp/Bo/LogicalFalla...

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#157

Post by gyrgtyn » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:53 PM UTC

We should make a web spreadsheet Uber Profits Calculator and a nice little print flyer to quietly leave behind in the back seat.

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#158

Post by oasisbob » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:54 PM UTC

calvinbhai wrote: post #48

Liquix wrote: post #18

What is the incentive to drive for one of these services at that price point? Couldn't these people make more money (and not have to replace their car in five years) flipping burgers or the like? Are drivers misled into believing they will make more? Is the cost per mile intentionally hidden from them?

Subprime leasing programs. Initially the lease looks very attractive, because you get a swanky new car, combined with bonuses and stuff that you get as a new driver. Few months in, the incentive turns into a shackle. You start realizing that incentives are dwindling and the monthly payments are eating into most of your Uber earnings, which was masked by higher new driver incentives initially. At this point, loss aver…

Yeah, Ubers in India are ridiculously cheap.

One of the strangest experiences I had in an India Uber was the driver getting pulled over and borrowing 100₹ from me so he could pay the bribe. "If you don't do this, things will be very bad for me"

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#159

Post by neaden » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:55 PM UTC

maratd wrote: post #145

taneq wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about the U.S. but in Australia there are strict rules about 'sham contracting'. To be treated as an independent contractor you can't get more than 80% of your income from any one source. If you 'contract' to just one employer you're an employee for both tax purposes and protections.

> If you 'contract' to just one employer you're an employee for both tax purposes and protections. That's not the case in the US. Our laws bar the contractor from having set hours, a set place of work, and a myriad of other rules. So if a contractor comes in 9 to 5 and has his own desk, he'll be classified as an employee. Honestly, I would prefer a similar % rule, that seems simpler and I think would accomplish the i…

The problem with the percent rule is that people could easily fall in and out of it. If we imagine someone who is an Uber driver but also works part time as an employee at another business, depending on how many hours they get in a given week as a part time employee they could go above or below the 80% figure. From Uber's standpoint you could also have two people who each drive for 10 hours a week earning the same pay, one of whom that is the only source of income, the other it's only 20% of their income.

Re: Uber, Lyft Drivers Earning a Median Profit of $3.37 per Hour, Study Says

#160

Post by s73v3r_ » Fri, Mar 02, 2018, 5:56 PM UTC

CodeWriter23 wrote: post #110

calvinbhai wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Subprime leasing programs. Initially the lease looks very attractive, because you get a swanky new car, combined with bonuses and stuff that you get as a new driver. Few months in, the incentive turns into a shackle. You start realizing that incentives are dwindling and the monthly payments are eating into most of your Uber earnings, which was masked by higher new driver incentives initially. At this point, loss aver…

If you’re going to do this, I recommend renting weekly through the Lyft/Hertz or Uber/Enterprise route. It costs more per week, but both networks have a quota where free rent kicks in. But you’ll have to drive superhuman hours and only for the one network to hit the quota.

Its for that reason that, unless you really, really need a car, I would suggest not doing that. If you want to have any kind of a life outside of driving, then you're likely not going to make the high quotas.