Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay • Hacker News Board

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#391

Post by dahfizz » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 12:59 AM UTC

gamblor956 wrote: post #323

ng12 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let them decline rides without facing penalties by the platform The independent contractor model works both ways. Uber has the right to avoid working with contractors who continually refuse work. You can't be picky about your work but also demand the company keep contracting you like you weren't. The independent contractor model doesn't map perfectly to gig work but it's much closer than traditional employees.

The point of Uber's alleged model is that Uber is not employing the driver, but rather that it is simply matching up drivers to passengers as a marketplace. If that's the case, then Uber has no right to avoid working with contractors simply because they continually refuse work. That indicates a non-independent agency arrangement between Uber and the driver (aka "employee") and that's what they're claiming they don't…

I disagree. Solely from the perspective of the person running the platform, it makes lots of sense to factor in "likelihood of accepting" into your driver selection algorithm.

If I know driver X rejects all rides from a certain area, I'm going to stop showing them rides in that area. That way the user gets their driver faster.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#392

Post by sudosysgen » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:05 AM UTC

labcomputer wrote: post #306

all_blue_chucks wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should all care. Uber doesn't provide health insurance. Instead Uber drivers get their healthcare costs covered by the rest of us (either via ACA subsidies or written-off care provided to the uninsured).

> Uber drivers get their healthcare costs covered by the rest of us So what? People without jobs also get their healthcare covered by MediCal (with zero out of pocket expenses). Is that also a problem? Wouldn't it be better if we had universal healthcare?

It would be better if we had universal healthcare, but that will not happen for, at the very least, 6 years. Meanwhile, Uber should not be allowed to undercut competitors by simply offloading costs to the common man.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#393

Post by cvbnm » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:06 AM UTC

mardifoufs wrote: post #340

throwawaygh wrote: post #72

When companies like Uber/Lyft depend on safety nets like unemployment without ever paying into the system, what’s happening is that our children are paying for returns on VC capital. People profiting from these types of companies should feel bad about themselves.

That's pretty much the total opposite of what's happening right now. Uber (and the recent group of "tech but not really" unicorns in general) have if anything burnt hundreds of billions of VC/PE money thus directly subsidizing the costs of hundreds of millions of users, for very slim profits at best. Yes, it's because they are expecting future returns on their "burnt" money. But considering the risks, the enormous am…

What is also less discussed is that (unlike many other tech platforms) Uber/Lyft facilitates wealth transfer in local economies (to some extent) due to how locally it operates.

Uber has claimed that more than 80% of all the fares ever collected has directly gone to drivers. By creating massive demand mostly in the well-off parts of a city, it opens up a channel for one-to-one wealth transfer to the predominantly less well-off drivers.

This is quite different from other platforms that suck up money from local economies and then disburse most of them to the elite few, or park the cash in some offshore accounts.

I think there's a nuance here that is often lost in this kind of discussion about inequality.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#394

Post by sudosysgen » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:07 AM UTC

Skunkleton wrote: post #23

blakesterz wrote: post #6

"Uber and Lyft say drivers prefer the flexibility of working as freelancers, while labor unions and elected officials contend this deprives them of traditional benefits like health insurance and workers’ compensation." I was curious about what drivers think. I guess they're not happy [1] but want to be independent contractors still [2]. 1. https://therideshareguy.com/uber-driver-survey/ 2. (In a May online survey dra…

> ...Uber drivers reported earning $13.47 per hour, which means that on average, drivers report that their car is costing them over $6 per hour to operate. If you were to drive full time, that would get you about 27k/year, which is about the average income that a taxi driver makes. Rideshare companies are asking you to take more personal financial risk than you might as a taxi driver, but giving you more flexibility.…

It's also important to note that the 13.47$ an hour is heavily biased towards expensive cities, where it really isn't much, and is actually often under the minimum salary.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#395

Post by Supermancho » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:07 AM UTC

dahfizz wrote: post #391

gamblor956 wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of Uber's alleged model is that Uber is not employing the driver, but rather that it is simply matching up drivers to passengers as a marketplace. If that's the case, then Uber has no right to avoid working with contractors simply because they continually refuse work. That indicates a non-independent agency arrangement between Uber and the driver (aka "employee") and that's what they're claiming they don't…

I disagree. Solely from the perspective of the person running the platform, it makes lots of sense to factor in "likelihood of accepting" into your driver selection algorithm. If I know driver X rejects all rides from a certain area, I'm going to stop showing them rides in that area. That way the user gets their driver faster.

> That way the user gets their driver faster.

How is that relevant? If you are an agency, you are advertising availability both ways. If you filter on behavior, you are no longer acting as an independent agency but as an agent for one side.

Disclosing pattern behavior (has rejected 12 rides this hour) is the correct way to provide value-add, not silently making decisions for parties.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#396

Post by dahfizz » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:09 AM UTC

sudosysgen wrote: post #389

brian_cloutier wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> these workers need unemployment insurance, as Covid has shown, and somebody needs to pay for it: be it the workers or the ridesharing businesses. The state could also pay for it, through tax revenue. Unemployment insurance seems like a great fit for a government, since any kind of massive correlated unemployment, as we're experiencing now, would absolutely wipe out any private insurer.

Sure. Once the State nationalizes unemployment insurance and healthcare insurance then we can reclassify them as contractors.

This perfectly lays bare why I disagree with the ruling: you don't actually think drivers are employees, you just want them classified as employees so they get X benefits. It's a legislative hack.

It's seems so obvious to me that we need to create a third kind of worker: not an employee, not a contractor, but a new category that has some of the extra freedom of contracting and some of the benefits of employment.

It's important that we maintain integrity in our legal system. Uber drivers are not employees, and saying "we need to classify them as employees so they get insurance" is fundamentally backwards.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#397

Post by sudosysgen » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:10 AM UTC

username90 wrote: post #361

matmann2001 wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes! If the free market results in employers offering shitty choices that take advantage of workers with limited options, the government should step in and attempt to correct the power-imbalance that puts the workers at life- and liberty-threatening disadvantages. Extrapolating from your logic, indentured servitude would still be allowed to exist.

Banning a form of work where workers owns the means of production doesn't seem to be in the workers interest. I'd rather they regulate it in a better way, for example rewrite union laws to make it possible for gig workers to unionize.

Uber drivers do not own the means of production, as ruled by the recent California courts, because they do not own the capital of their employers, which is the IP of Uber. This is why socialists are developing and operating open-source and decentralized alternatives to Uber in many countries, so that they will indeed own the means of production.

That said, I agree that employment laws need a rewrite for these situations, but we won't get the needed reform to get the gig-worker system to work under either Biden or Trump, so not for at least 6 years.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#398

Post by dang » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:11 AM UTC

cltby wrote: post #111

> Seems like a loss for everyone except bureaucrats Not true, it's a great opportunity for javascript developers to get up on their soap boxes and share with us their moral and economic wisdom.

Please don't post unsubstantive comments or snark here.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24228435.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#399

Post by sudosysgen » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:12 AM UTC

username90 wrote: post #321

asdasfasdfasdf wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>While you think you're giving full-time employment and benefits to all of these people what you're really doing is taking certain kinds of opportunities away. This is some of the most phenomenal bullshit I've ever read. There's nothing stopping Uber and Lyft from allowing people to work their own hours and also giving them benefits if they meet hourly qualifications. You're talking about people making <$30k a year w…

> There's nothing stopping Uber and Lyft from allowing people to work their own hours and also giving them benefits if they meet hourly qualifications. There is, if the driver drives in bad hours making their income not come up to minimum wage uber would be forced to pay the driver anyway. In order to avoid this uber would be forced to limit when and where people can drive. Being an employee means that the company ha…

Uber can simply adjust their algorithm and refuse to give shifts to drivers if there is enough drivers to cover the "bad" time period, which would be the exact equivalent of Uber drivers right now not getting rides (and not getting paid) when there is no demand.

Re: Uber and Lyft shutdown in California averted as judge grants emergency stay

#400

Post by dang » Fri, Aug 21, 2020, 1:13 AM UTC

asdasfasdfasdf wrote: post #45

Skunkleton wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...Uber drivers reported earning $13.47 per hour, which means that on average, drivers report that their car is costing them over $6 per hour to operate. If you were to drive full time, that would get you about 27k/year, which is about the average income that a taxi driver makes. Rideshare companies are asking you to take more personal financial risk than you might as a taxi driver, but giving you more flexibility.…

"personal risk" This is kind of the state of the country really. Ridesharing is an OK gig until you get into an accident, you're fine without health insurance until you get injured, you don't really need a union until you start getting treated unfairly, you can pay for college as long as you consistently have a good salary... we're being statistically gaslit with the idea that most people can scrape by without higher…

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