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Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

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Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#111

Post by cdoxsey »

chii wrote: post #99
cdoxsey wrote: post #97

Lyft and Uber allow you to tip your driver. If you feel like they're not payed a sustainable wage, why not voluntarily give them more money? I suspect a significant number of riders are pretty well off. Why not be exceedingly generous? Tip the driver 10 or 20$.

I do not like the idea that tipping is required for sustainable pay. tipping should be a bonus, for a job well done. Tipping is meant to be a reward for extra-mile service. Tipping is NOT for just merely doing the job. By making tipping part of sustainable wage, you're just subsidising the wages that the employer should be paying. It's both unfair and unethical.

I'm paying the person I received the service from. Me handing someone extra cash is neither unfair nor unethical.

If you feel like Uber is doing something wrong there's a trivial solution. Just pay your driver more.

Sure it doesn't solve Uber's problems, it doesn't change the behavior of anyone else, but it does solve your personal culpability. (If you feel you have such culpability)

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#112

Post by SN76477 »

frotak wrote: post #23

My girlfriend tried out the Instacart gig for a while as she finally got her chronic low energy and fatigue addressed through B12 shots and wanted something to occupy her and give her a little extra spending money outside of what's budgeted. That experience was absolutely demoralizing in terms of what she was able to actually make. Granted we live in a lower density city in the southeast so that result makes sense. B…

My company was bleeding money so I had to close it down over this past fall. Spent all of my savings and had to start making money asap.

I turned to uber eats, grubhub, and doordash. None of the companies value the drivers. If anything it feels like the companies are trying to milk the drivers so that the company can profit.

If the drivers are happy the customer will be happy and profits can be made. Raising rates for customers, lowering payouts for contractors is a bad idea short term. Automation of transportation is not close enough to discourage all of your contractors from working.

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#113

Post by whoisjuan »

Pxtl wrote: post #76

Sooner or later the us is going to have to sit down and have a long and hard conversation about this "independent contractor" nonsense.

If you think this is bad, you should look at the gig economy in South America and South Asia. It's literally a notch above slavery.

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#114

Post by usaphp »

russdpale wrote: post #86
usaphp wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know what you do but to me working as a programmer, thinking all day and solving problems, is much harder than just driving around people.

Yeh but so is loading 1000 packages into 4 or 5 trucks. Or 2500 packages into an 18 wheeler.

You can load packages into an 18 wheeler for 20 years and you wont really learn much. A new person can come in tomorrow and do the same job pretty much without any learning. When you work as an engineer you constantly have to learn and keep your knowledge up to date on top of that.

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#115

Post by auber »

I did Uber driving a while ago. I just called Uber support and they told me that my pay in the Bay Area is now 68 cents per mile and 29 cents per minute. In November it was 99 cents per mile and 18 cents per minute. I’ve randomly pulled up a ride I gave in November in which I took a guy 3.8 miles taking 17 minutes. Back then I was paid 8.5 and if I did it today I would have been paid 9.1. Shorter trips would of course not fare so well. But short trips suck even with higher pay per mile because short trips rack up dead miles — the unpaid miles between trips.

Before, I prioritized miles. Getting the most miles in the shortest amount of time seemed like the best thing to do although I never sat down and thouroughly worked out what strategy would pay the most. There are lots of subtleties that make the calculation difficult. But with this new pay scheme it might actually pay off to go slowly. This would make rides safer overall but might increase incidences of missing an exit when your fare is lost in instagram.

Maintaining a Toyota Corolla costs roughly 20 cents per mile, especially if you do your own oil changes. And that includes depreciation.

If anyone from Uber happens to read this, I have to say that paying for dead miles would do a lot of good. I would happily give up tips for paid dead miles. Eliminating dead miles would allow drivers to drive anywhere and change the equation in a way that would be very beneficial to Uber overall as a service.

Also add a tiny fee for people who cancel ride after ride looking for the shortest eta. On average a driver wastes 20 cents every time someone does that, probably. So charge 20 cents for cancelling even if it’s immediately. The small group of people who like to treat Uber like an eta slot machine can do so, drivers won’t sit and wait for several minutes to trigger the cancelation fee and the vast majority of riders who don’t do it will only see a small improvement in service quality with no increase in price.

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#116

Post by NeedMoreTea »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #43
pmorici wrote: post #26

The IRS deduction for business vehicle use in 2019 is 58 cents per mile. So they have effectively reduced the per mile payment to the cost of operating the vehicle. Seems like they are on the verge of turning driving for Uber into a reverse mortgage for your car.

And quite frankly the business model might be to just bank on a steady supply of ex-criminals who have a hard time getting other work and may not understand the financial arrangement they are entering into. Exploit them for a while and when they realize they aren’t making money, just chalk it up to built-in turnover and on to the next unwitting driver.

No need of ex-criminality. Youth, inexperience, naivete, desperation will all suffice.

Following the long established model used by couriers, despatch riders etc. It appears to work only temporarily until the real maintenance and depreciation costs become apparent.

Not exactly an ethical base upon which to build - scamming your drivers until they realise it's effectively a scam.

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#117

Post by creato »

chii wrote: post #108
creato wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Programming is certainly harder than most jobs in the sense that fewer people are capable of doing it, which is the one that matters for economics. That doesn't mean other jobs are not harder in other ways that matter too.

> not harder in other ways that matter too. those ways don't matter to the company doing the paying of wages. The only "way" that matters is the scarcity of people willing to perform said job. This is what our society has currently come to, and no individual can make that change without making a personal sacrifice.

I acknowledged that:

> which is the one that matters for economics

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#118

Post by adamqureshi »

My brother works for uber, He is 54 years old smokes a pack day and has had 2 heart attacks. He drives a Cadillac and pays $500-month for commercial insurance and has a monthly payment for his car. He has TLC plates to work in NYC ( fees apply) he makes about $300 a day works like a dog 12-14 hours a day. All of his friends are the same (uber drivers in NYC) Here you have the typical uber driver who does this for a living as his main gig not some side gig while building a start up or some bullshit side thing. These are the left over drivers from when the yellow cab money / industry dried up in NYC. The job is literally killing him. It's the classic frog in boiling water syndrome. The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability or unwillingness of people to react to or be aware of sinister threats that arise gradually rather than suddenly. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog

Re: Uber is dropping rates for drivers down from 80 cents/mile to 60 cents/mile

#119

Post by chii »

fucking_tragedy wrote: post #42
grecy wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> for many people, driving for Uber beats not being able to pay bills, going hungry or being homeless. So then nothing here is Uber's fault, and Uber shouldn't get any blame. The problem is the the country that make people unable to pay bills, get food or housing, right? I wish Americans would lampoon their own government/country as much as they lampoon big businesses.

> So then nothing here is Uber's fault, and Uber shouldn't get any blame. Interesting that this is the line of thought that you decided to follow and refute, despite the fact that I never claimed that Uber was at fault for those particular problems a person may face. I'm not really a fan of engaging strawmen. It's entirely possible that for some people, driving for Uber is a rational choice. It is also entirely possi…

How can choosing uber rationally as a driver, and be taken advantage of by uber both be true at the same time?

If a driver chose uber rationally, that means they have considered all their options, and this is their best one. Therefore, uber is not undervaluing their labour, nor is taking advantage (where 'taking advantage' means to trick or coerce through any means to lead to the person to choose uber rather than the proper rational choice).

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