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Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

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Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#861

Post by lhorie »

whakim wrote: post #851
lhorie wrote: post #817

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Instead of telling people "hey go drive around endlessly in SF, hours from where you live. Also, you get no benefits" we can choose to bolster those local economies or we can choose to force companies to provide benefits. Either one of those options will make their lives better. We have chosen the latter Well, no. Prop 22 would force companies to provide benefits, and the rideshare companies themselves are behind i…

The "it'll take time to make this change and so we're suspending services for a while" argument is just a PR stunt. Even if you disagree with the law, Uber/Lyft knew it was coming - they've known for a long time now. Instead of getting ready for it, they chose to spend their time filing lawsuits (which were never going to succeed) and preparing for a ballot initiative. So let's not argue that the law itself "put driv…

"knew it was coming" is hindsight 20/20 thinking. They've been fighting it tooth and nail the whole time. If prop 22 passes (as it seems it will), then can we really say we "saw it coming"? And likewise, legislators knew about the Austin precedent, so they can't say they "didn't see it coming" either.

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#862

Post by [deleted] »

Daishiman wrote: post #171
bgorman wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The heart of the issue is big labor unions want more power, and independent contractor status is a threat to their power.

Labor unions in the US are comparatively powerless next to countries with actual, functional unions that are quite capable of striking, and have little lobby. No, the heart of the issue is definitely the dismal state of health care in the US.

[deleted]

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#863

Post by [deleted] »

cactus2093 wrote: post #604
AgloeDreams wrote: post #461

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Ridesharing' (Which is a hilarious term for the simple fact that the ride is not being shared, the driver is not intending to go to your favorite bar. ) isn't a 21st century situation or solution. It's not a profitable or a good force in an economy, it does not pay a reasonable wage for anyone to live on, it is not environmentally friendly unless done in large quantities of people,(which is called a bus). Ridesharin…

I agree with you on one point, "ridesharing" is a silly word. I would call it something like an "Open Car Service". The main reason I can't get on board with the rest of this line of argument is that it ultimately just comes down to paternalistic protection of the poor disenfranchised gig workers that you clearly view as being less than capable, rational adult humans. The number of gig economy workers has been growin…

[deleted]

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#864

Post by alpha_squared »

manigandham wrote: post #857
AlexandrB wrote: post #819

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> AB5 was written to impose a 20th century employment model to a 21st century situation. Why should employees give up rights just because it's the 21st century? Make no mistake, that's Uber/Lyft's entire advantage over traditional taxis: skirting hard-won employment regulation to lower costs at the expense of workers.

They're not employees. What rights are missing? Do you have an issue with contractors in other industries? Why or why not?

> They're not employees.

Why does this keep getting repeated? They're not contractors. They have little-to-no control over who their "clients" are. They don't develop relationships for repeat service with those clients; don't set their rates (I'd gladly pay some drivers more than others); are forced to jump through hoops to maintain 4.X ratings or they're booted. The only thing they do have control over is when to start and stop working. That's just a much more flexible part-time job as far as I can tell.

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#865

Post by SquishyPanda23 »

cactus2093 wrote: post #604
AgloeDreams wrote: post #461

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Ridesharing' (Which is a hilarious term for the simple fact that the ride is not being shared, the driver is not intending to go to your favorite bar. ) isn't a 21st century situation or solution. It's not a profitable or a good force in an economy, it does not pay a reasonable wage for anyone to live on, it is not environmentally friendly unless done in large quantities of people,(which is called a bus). Ridesharin…

I agree with you on one point, "ridesharing" is a silly word. I would call it something like an "Open Car Service". The main reason I can't get on board with the rest of this line of argument is that it ultimately just comes down to paternalistic protection of the poor disenfranchised gig workers that you clearly view as being less than capable, rational adult humans. The number of gig economy workers has been growin…

> Gig economy workers have overwhelmingly spoken that they like this work, by continuing to sign up for it in massive numbers.

This reflects the fact that they like to eat.

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#866

Post by ww520 »

dmode wrote: post #231

I dislike Uber and Lyft's practices as much as the next guy. But I also believe AB5 is a terrible bill and will be voting in November to exempt Uber and Lyft from AB5. AB5 was written to impose a 20th century employment model to a 21st century situation. As such, the bill is distorted that it carve out hundreds of exemptions to musicians, freelancers, journalists, doctors, hair stylists and so on and so forth. A bill…

Can we get a list of the AB5 legislative backers?

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#867

Post by jjulius »

core-questions wrote: post #663
TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok - so we can't afford to pay people for their work any more. We can't afford benefits. We can't afford unemployment. We can't afford to create an economy where people reliably earn enough to buy housing and pay for essentials. And this in one of the most prosperous economies in the world. Do you not understand that this is what you're arguing for? Do you also not understand that if you don't already have a huge pil…

> Ok - so we can't afford to pay people for their work any more We can afford to pay people, but the problem here is that it's not just me paying you a bit of money to cover your gas, insurance, mechanics, and time; it's also me paying for tens of thousands of employees and cloud datacenters and all the rest to connect me to you. That's a lot of overhead, and it's duplicated by virtue of multiple companies being in t…

>We can afford to pay people, but the problem here is that it's not just me paying you a bit of money to cover your gas, insurance, mechanics, and time; it's also me paying for tens of thousands of employees and cloud datacenters and all the rest to connect me to you. That's a lot of overhead, and it's duplicated by virtue of multiple companies being in the mix doing the same thing.

Having a high overhead and not charging customers enough to recoup it sounds like a flawed business model to me.

>Also, it was never really supposed to be a career - it was supposed to be something you could do on your way to work to help subsidize your own commute. Making a career out of a side job is certainly one's own choice, and I don't want to get in the way of that, but... are people getting benefits and guaranteed hours for busking, or being a living statue? Are people guaranteed a certain minimum pay for their lemonade stand?

No, but they're also not told that they can make a living, get benefits, etc. for busking, being a living statue or running a lemonade stand. They understand from the outset that none of that will be happening. The difference here is that Uber/Lyft imply - if not state explicitly - to their drivers that it can be their sole source of income.

If it's supposed to be a method of subsidizing your own commute, shouldn't Uber/Lyft be restricting who drivers can pick up to only those customers who are heading in the same direction/on the same route that the driver has told the app they're going?

If it's supposed to be a method of subsidizing your own commute, why do Uber/Lyft assist car-less folk with obtaining rentals?

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#868

Post by manigandham »

Majromax wrote: post #615
manigandham wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's nothing new. Employees can already have flexible hours and part-time employment. The issue is that they're still considered employees which means predetermined shifts and control rather than fluid supply meeting demand by the minute. This changes the service (which matters more than the price for customers) so that it no longer works at the current scale.

> The issue is that they're still considered employees which means predetermined shifts Is there anything in California labour law or AB5 that requires predetermined shifts? What would prevent Uber/Lyft from allowing its now-employees to volunteer for an X-hour shift at any point that demand forecasts suggest it would be useful?

That's a predetermined shift. Your only option is to accept it or not. Not work when and where and however long you want.

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#869

Post by OCASM »

enumjorge wrote: post #801
PHGamer wrote: post #730

Earlier quoted context omitted.

moral victory? this is government overreach. people set their own hours. they are contractors not employees. the government changed the rules not because they care for you but because they collect more taxes from employers than contractors.

How is enforcing worker protection government overreach? It’s what they’re supposed to do. And there’s lots of gig workers who aren’t happy with the setup. It’s not like the government took this up on their own accord. As someone else mentioned Uber and Lyft impose restrictions on these workers that a typical contractor would not have. The litmus test isn’t simply whether you can set your number of hours.

And there's plenty who are fine with this setup. Why should they get screwed over? Calling the removal of worker choice a right is truly perverse.

Re: Rideshare operations are being suspended in California

#870

Post by ProcNetDev »

AlexandrB wrote: post #819
dmode wrote: post #231

I dislike Uber and Lyft's practices as much as the next guy. But I also believe AB5 is a terrible bill and will be voting in November to exempt Uber and Lyft from AB5. AB5 was written to impose a 20th century employment model to a 21st century situation. As such, the bill is distorted that it carve out hundreds of exemptions to musicians, freelancers, journalists, doctors, hair stylists and so on and so forth. A bill…

> AB5 was written to impose a 20th century employment model to a 21st century situation. Why should employees give up rights just because it's the 21st century? Make no mistake, that's Uber/Lyft's entire advantage over traditional taxis: skirting hard-won employment regulation to lower costs at the expense of workers.

Everyone keeps saying the substitute for Uber/Lyft is taxis. Maybe this is HN bay-area bias but it is just wrong. The substitute for Uber/Lyft in 95% of the US is driving your own car! Driving your own car has significant externalities, eg. More need for parking, more emissions, more drunk driving.

I don't live in CA but used to do a fair amount of work travel out there. If they don't have Uber/Lyft in the future, I'll just make work get me a rental car.

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