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Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

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Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#121

Post by shagie »

alwa wrote: post #95
demondemidi wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to fly into Pittsburg and take an Uber to my grandparents house 40 miles away. For years I could always get an Uber but then after the pandemic my trip was rejected so frequently that I had to start renting a car. So basically no one wanted the gig and Uber never told me my ride was unreasonable. Something changed in the algorithm to benefit drivers, Uber, or both, at the expense of the customer, and that info…

I’m curious: would you have felt better if Uber had just rejected your ride request upfront (“Sorry, we can’t offer rides that far” or something)? Or is this attitude of “hey, it’s a long shot, but let’s give it a try and see if anybody takes the job” closer to the attitude you’d like to see? If the latter, how would you communicate that to the users? I had an occasion a long time ago where I needed to request an Ube…

> I had an occasion a long time ago where I needed to request an Uber for a ride similar to what you’re describing. At that time, apparently the driver didn’t find out the route until they’d committed to the ride.

A similar (though not a break down in tears situation) - My 300 Mile Lyft Ride From Chicago to Bradford - https://whatever.scalzi.com/2019/07/23/my-300-mile-lyft-ride... ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20508238 - 186 comments)

The relevant section:

> I considered about it for a minute, and then thought, why the hell not, and scheduled the ride. The worst case scenario in this situation is that no one would take the fare, and I would be no worse off than I already was. After a few seconds, I was matched with a car, and I went out to meet the driver.

> I had a suspicion that the app might not tell the driver exactly where I was going, so when the driver — Victor — pulled up, I double-checked with him.

> “I want to be absolutely clear what you’re getting into,” I told him. “I’m asking you to drive me to Ohio.”

> “The state?” he asked.

> “Yes.”

> He thought about it for a second, consulted his own Lyft app (which hadn’t, in fact, told him the destination, just that it was more than 30 minutes away), and then looked back to me, and sort of shrugged. “I like long trips. This could be fun.” Then he popped the trunk for my luggage.

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#122

Post by doctor_eval »

braza wrote: post #22
febeling wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had similar thoughts. But let's not overlook the information asymmetry, which contributed to the dissatisfaction. I don't want to live in a world which is controlled unilaterally, and intransparently by a group of people who assume they have a full picture of the situation and assume they understand moral completely, and also don't think it necessary to explain how they think so highly of themselves.

> I don't want to live in a world which is controlled unilaterally, and intransparently by a group of people who assume they have a full picture of the situation and assume they understand moral completely I have thought about this topic for a while at the time that I worked with Law data (e.g. Family Law and Military Law), and I just came to the conclusion that several societal institutions and it's agents are inher…

> That's one of the reasons I would like to have a more algorithmic society with human in the loop calling the final shots and placing the rationale on top

But isn’t that what the rule of law is supposed to be? A set of written rules with judges at the top to interpret or moderate them when all else fails.

The problem is that, for a variety of complex reasons, the rules are not applied evenly, and sometimes only enforced opportunistically.

So I don’t see how an algorithmic society is any different from today’s society. The problem is not the ability to operate algorithmically, which we already have, but in determining what the rules should be, how they should be enforced, what the penalties should be, who pays for what, and, perhaps most importantly, how to avoid capture of the algorithmic process by special interests.

None of these problems go away with an algorithmic approach, less so if there is a judge sitting on top who can make adjustments.

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#123

Post by pixl97 »

pxx wrote: post #90
toss1 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YES. If Shipt is actually trying to incentivize better performance, it seems the best way is to be completely transparent about the rewards algorithm. "Short high-value trips are now somewhat de-rated, and trips requiring more effort now have improved rewards, specifically ..." or whatever. This "communications team" approach did everyone a disservice if Shipt mgt were really trying to improve results. OTOH, if the a…

even if total compensation was decreasing, the results for the company can be improved by being able to provide their services at a lower price point by cutting costs. cutting costs is not "screwing workers". cutting costs is key to acting in a competitive market.

I mean cutting costs can be screwing workers as workers are a cost.

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#124

Post by cryptonym »

smabie wrote: post #109
cryptonym wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can set offers however they like and you are free to not accept. If the algorithm detects that you are likely to accept for little money and short you with lower offers compared to other users, is it still morally fine?

Sure, this is how negotiate and hiring have always worked.

Some companies underpaying part of their staff for the same job doesn't make it moral. In some cases, it tends to correlate with genetics which makes it even more questionable. A black box algorithm may unknowingly introduce such bias.

Anyway what is moral depends on your personal values, not the law nor how things are done, it's expected to disagree.

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#125

Post by usgroup »

or_am_i wrote: post #3

I am not defending Shipt and there is no doubt gig workers are in a very vulnerable position. However, the data analysis results as presented in the article do not support the article's main point. "40% are getting paid at least 10% less" is not unnatural to expect whenever pay is redistributed, especially since some 30+% are getting at least 10% more. Imagine a _hypothetical_ situation where Shipt is 100% on point a…

The article says the same:

> For the shoppers who were being paid under the new algorithm, we found that 40 percent of workers were earning more than 10 percent less than they would have under the old algorithm. What’s more, looking at data from all geographic regions, we found that about one-third of workers were earning less than their state’s minimum wage.

> It wasn’t a clear case of wage theft, because 60 percent of workers were making about the same or slightly more under the new scheme. But we felt that it was important to shine a light on those 40 percent of workers who had gotten an unannounced pay cut through a black box transition.

Those paragraphs are then literally followed by a graph showing the conservation of fees overall but the redistribution of wages to other workers.

Seems to me that workers started cherry picking assignments leaving a bulk of orders which could not be realised, so they decided to (1) change the algorithm to avoid this, and (2) not publish it so it couldn't be gamed as easily.

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#126

Post by robocat »

russdill wrote: post #73
theptip wrote: post #51

A clear case of adverse selection in the old pricing model. From a game-theoretic perspective in a gig marketplace you don’t want jobs that are strictly better, else sophisticated market participants (workers) will select the best ones leaving chaff - and a worse experience - for the less sophisticated participants. What you are looking for is preference optionality, eg one Uber driver might prefer not to do very lon…

We are entering an era where corporations have perfect data. They can charge each customer exactly the maximum amount possible, and pay each worker the exact minimum amount possible

> They can charge each customer exactly the maximum amount possible

The company captures the consumer surplus. Generally currently we often get way more value than we pay for. We hate having that surplus taken away from us and we hate being charged what something is worth to us.

Two questions: How do we fight back? Is it unfair that we pay the amount that something is worth to us individually?

Currently think of any service you use and the value you get from it. What happens when Apple or Google start to try and capture the consumer surplus we receive?

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#128

Post by pertymcpert »

lmm wrote: post #114
SoftTalker wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Driving an EV at 110mph is going to sap the range horrendously. The power needed to overcome air resistance/drag is proportional to the cube of the speed.

It'll sap the range of any kind of vehicle, but refilling an EV is a whole lot cheaper, so higher speeds are more economic for an EV than a petrol car. (Assuming you don't reach the point of running out in the middle of a shift of course)

Actually no that’s not how it works. ICEs being inefficient actually reduces the relative impact of increasing drag vs EVs.

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#129

Post by simoncion »

robocat wrote: post #126
russdill wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are entering an era where corporations have perfect data. They can charge each customer exactly the maximum amount possible, and pay each worker the exact minimum amount possible

> They can charge each customer exactly the maximum amount possible The company captures the consumer surplus. Generally currently we often get way more value than we pay for. We hate having that surplus taken away from us and we hate being charged what something is worth to us. Two questions: How do we fight back? Is it unfair that we pay the amount that something is worth to us individually? Currently think of any…

> [W]e hate being charged what something is worth to us.

I'll rephrase this in a way that's more straightforward and clear:

> We hate being charged every penny we could conceivably pay for a given thing.

In part because many ordinary folks believe that a fair deal is for businesses to cover the cost of R&D for the thing and the cost of getting it to us, as well as a reasonable profit to cover both expected future support and future R&D for improvements and/or new products.

And also in part because most folks can figure out what's likely to happen when every company out there demands that we pay them not just enough to cover the above, but every penny we could conceivably pay for the thing. (To spell it out: One suddenly has to make very hard choices about what one does without... likely for an uncomfortably long time. [0])

[0] If you think that this wouldn't happen, or that if it did it would be over in a matter of weeks (rather than years) remember the aphorism "The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.".

Re: Shipt’s algorithm squeezed gig workers, who fought back

#130

Post by robocat »

simoncion wrote: post #129
robocat wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They can charge each customer exactly the maximum amount possible The company captures the consumer surplus. Generally currently we often get way more value than we pay for. We hate having that surplus taken away from us and we hate being charged what something is worth to us. Two questions: How do we fight back? Is it unfair that we pay the amount that something is worth to us individually? Currently think of any…

> [W]e hate being charged what something is worth to us. I'll rephrase this in a way that's more straightforward and clear: > We hate being charged every penny we could conceivably pay for a given thing. In part because many ordinary folks believe that a fair deal is for businesses to cover the cost of R&D for the thing and the cost of getting it to us, as well as a reasonable profit to cover both expected future sup…

> as well as a reasonable profit to cover both expected future support and future R&D for improvements and/or new products.

That would be a weird definition of profit. Profit is what is left after expenses (like future support and R&D). But I will admit R&D is an oddball (there a taxation difference between R&D, compared against earning profits then investing the profits into a startup).

Do you have a pension, or own shares, or want to own your own business? Profit and some types of interest are rewards for risk.

But yeah, people think they pay too much for everything, that profits are unethical, and most people in wealthy countries don't understand how they get their lifestyle, and then get ignorantly angry at everything!

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