To satisfy the "C" of "ABC", I reckon this provides an opportunity for small companies to start up, with drivers as employees, to contract out driving work for both Uber and Lyft.
Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
361–370 of 781 posts
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#362Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the US, I think it's Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act. It's referenced from the Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_fixing
I'm, to say the very least, not sure that the Sherman Anti-trust Act prevents collective bargaining.
Given that the price in question is put on consumers and Uber only takes a cut, this indeed sounds more like price-fixing than collective bargaining.
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#363Earlier quoted context omitted.
And maybe if you keep signalling to a company that you want to do contract work for them but never submit any bids for what they put out as jobs, they'll start ignoring you as not serious. Being a contractor doesn't mean you get to pick where you work, it means you get to pick where you work out of the people willing to hire you for contract work. Many companies have different criteria for what they require out of co…
Turning down a ride request is not the same as not submitting a bid.
Why not?
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#364Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes and? If I owned slaves and called them unpaid indefinite interns the law would rightly disagree. You can call the relationship whatever you like, but the law is there to keep the playing field level for everyone. That it's taken Uber so long to play by the same rules as everyone else is a travesty and should take a billion dollar law suit or two for damages to sort out.
Uber is in a legal grey area. They are independent contractors in the sense that they can choose how much and when to work. They are employees in that they cannot negotiate rates. I don't think it's so clear cut.
> They are employees in that they cannot negotiate rates.
Hmm... How is an Uber driver different from a plumber here?
Let's say Google needs some pipes fixed at one of its offices and they tell me how much they'll pay, refusing to budge from that figure. That doesn't make me Google's employee. I can choose to do the work for that price, or I can go fix Apple's pipes instead. What am I missing?
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#365Earlier quoted context omitted.
So we can have a worker with even less rights than a contractor? Sounds absolutely terrible.
That isn't remotely what the comment you're replying to said. I agree that thinking about the gig economy as a different type of worker opens to door to a "how might we" conversation where everyone has the opportunity to win.
> thinking about the gig economy as a different type of worker opens to door to a "how might we" conversation where everyone has the opportunity to win.
We, the readers of Hacker News, are going to fix the gig economy! Everyone, download a copy of your local laws and send a pull request to your country's highest Court.
But seriously, I think having a discussion, working out a perfect system where we'll all be better off is more than a bit hopeful.
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#366Earlier quoted context omitted.
not at the same time, you can't, unless you're talking about a taco bell/kfc joint.
not at the same time, you can't Just as a ride hailing driver can't simultaneously have an Uber and a Lyft passenger in his car. What's your point?
No his point is that under the California law waiting tables at two restaurants would (supposedly?) make him employees of both.
I certainly know it is true of journalist freelancers.
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#367Earlier quoted context omitted.
You realize there are tons of jobs with employees that allow employees to chose their own hours. There is nothing in this ruling that prevents Uber from allowing people to chose rides _exactly_ as they are doing it now. The changes are: 1. Uber needs to pay into unemployment insurance. 2. Uber needs to pay into workers compensation. 3. Uber needs to pay into social security. 4. Uber needs to collect payroll taxes in…
Current employment law really isn't well suited for cases where someone can be an "employee" of 4 or 5 companies at a time, and stop and start on a whim as they see fit. I mean, just look at unemployment insurance. When the nature of the job is essentially a bid out to people willing to do the work, what does it mean for someone to be unemployed in the first place if there is just less work to go around? Flexibility…
I wonder if a model, more like the SAG-AFTRA union would be possible. Register with the union and workers can operate on as many platforms as possible. Common reporting on hours could prevent worker overlapping across platforms against a minimum wage. Health insurance is available through union with companies paying portions in.
Workers can choose platforms that maximize the worker's wages while platforms would need to minimize costs for customers. The more efficient the platform gets, the better position they would be in vs competitors.
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#368dont contractors get to write off their car? if they are employees they no longer get write offs correct?
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#369Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm afraid you're repeating Uber's favorite talking point, which is that everyone should respect the worker's decision to be an employee or contractor. Nobody disputes that Uber can have employees or contractors (or both), or that drivers should, in principle, be able to choose what status they hold. The problem is that Uber currently exerts so much control over its "independent contractor" relationships that they ha…
Having been a driver for 1.5 years my questions for you are these: 1. If Uber and Lyft allow their drivers to choose, would it be reasonable for them to make "having the other app on at the same time" cause for dismissal? I know of no other employee that is allowed to simultaneously bill time on a competitor. Contractors, absolutely. Employees, no. 2. What if Uber, instead, charged $1.00/mo for the drivers to use the…
1) if they forced that requirement on drivers, that would 100% indicate an employment relationship. But note that it is generally regarded as fraud to double bill multiple clients for the same unit of time.
2) irrelevant to the employee/contractor determination. It is possible for an employee to also be a contractor, see for example restaurants...
Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees
#370Earlier quoted context omitted.
The argument which won was not that there is some legal reason Uber can’t have both independent contractors and employees, but rather that the relationship between Uber and it’s drivers is de facto employment and should therefore be subject to employment law.
Huh? The whole point is that the California judiciary is literally saying that legally Uber cannot classify drivers as contractors. So no, they cannot have independent contractors, unless you mean for the operations side of their business, which nobody is talking about so I hope not.
I don't think so... The ruling is that the relationship as it is in employment. The test is:
A) the worker is free from the control and direction of the hiring entity in connection with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the performance of the work and in fact; and
B) the worker performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business; and
C) the worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business of the same nature as the work performed.
Of course you can argue about the minutia of each test (that's what lawyers are for) but there's nothing stopping the hiring of drivers as contractors per se. It's just that the judge thinks the current relationship as it is does not pass this test.