Income of an uber driver • Hacker News Board

Re: Income of an uber driver

#41

Post by naz » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 6:57 PM UTC

sakopov wrote: post #23

Correct me if i'm wrong, but Uber started out as a service that connected people without a ride to those who happened to be on the road within a few miles away and willing to give a lift for a few bucks. So what happened? Did Uber pivot or did people start building their lives around Uber and became dissatisfied with the their business model? I don't quite understand this mainly because I don't live in a city where U…

You're thinking of Lyft. Uber has always been a professional cab or limo service.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#42

Post by jsprogrammer » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 6:57 PM UTC

sakopov wrote: post #23

Correct me if i'm wrong, but Uber started out as a service that connected people without a ride to those who happened to be on the road within a few miles away and willing to give a lift for a few bucks. So what happened? Did Uber pivot or did people start building their lives around Uber and became dissatisfied with the their business model? I don't quite understand this mainly because I don't live in a city where U…

You'd need to look at Uber's current marketing materials. Most current drivers are probably fairly newly recruited.

Within the last three months, I've seen short text ads where driving for Uber is marketed as a job that pays $21+/hr.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#43

Post by jsprogrammer » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 7:00 PM UTC

Zarel wrote: post #25

HaloZero wrote: post #17

To those of who you are against including the depreciation cost of the car. Here's the math: Income: He works 10-12 hours to make $150/day and works every day of hte year. He will make $54,750 Expenses: He calculated 94,900 miles driven total assuming working 365 days a year. That's about 260 miles a day of driving. Gas cost $12,775 Oil changes $855 Tire replacement $960 Misc Repairs: $5000 So that adds up to $19,950…

On the other hand, most minimum wage jobs don't reimburse you for the costs or time spent commuting to and from work. I wonder if that significantly impacts the comparison. In the other direction, I think the US also has higher self-employment taxes, and of course you don't get health insurance and other benefits. I wonder if that impacts the comparison, too.

>On the other hand, most minimum wage jobs don't reimburse you for the costs or time spent commuting to and from work

Uber definitely does not compensate your commute back to your home when you turn the app off.

I'm also pretty sure that Uber does not compensate you during your drive to pick up your first passenger, so unless your first passenger is waiting at your parking location, you have an un-reimbursed commute to work as well.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#44

Post by hoopd » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 7:02 PM UTC

kenrikm wrote: post #21

A modern car from honda/toyota maintained properly is good for well over 250k miles. I've seen plenty of these calculations and they always seem to use the worse case as the example. Also.. Next time don't buy a chevy.

Maintained properly but also driven softly. When you drive for money you drive hard plus stop-and-go city driving is hard on a car by itself.

A used car with 100k Uber-miles on it will be worth considerably less than the same car with 100k highway miles, and rightfully so.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#45

Post by njloof » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 7:04 PM UTC

Think of the positives of an Uber job: (a) you can use your car for your 2nd job for free; (b) you meet your state's welfare-to-work requirements!

Re: Income of an uber driver

#46

Post by potatolicious » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 7:05 PM UTC

sakopov wrote: post #23

Correct me if i'm wrong, but Uber started out as a service that connected people without a ride to those who happened to be on the road within a few miles away and willing to give a lift for a few bucks. So what happened? Did Uber pivot or did people start building their lives around Uber and became dissatisfied with the their business model? I don't quite understand this mainly because I don't live in a city where U…

> "Correct me if i'm wrong, but Uber started out as a service that connected people without a ride to those who happened to be on the road within a few miles away and willing to give a lift for a few bucks"

This never happened, as much as Uber would like to imagine themselves a grassroots, populist movement.

Uber started out a service that connected black cars/limos to riders. The idea was to provide competition to taxis, and the easiest existing source of professional drivers was limo drivers, who had a great deal of down time between bookings - and Uber helped fill in the gaps and provide extra income.

Uber was never a "connect riders to random people willing to give a lift" - other companies tried this model, most notably Sidecar, though even then I think most of its driver-base were at least semi-profesisonal.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#47

Post by naveen99 » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 7:56 PM UTC

Uberpool will be nice. Then you only pick up customers if they are on your route, like on the way to or back from work, or on a road trip.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#48

Post by lenley » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 8:43 PM UTC

russell_h wrote: post #16

My sense is that Uber's current rates aren't entirely sustainable for drivers. They're able to recruit people who already own a car, and treat it mostly as a sunk cost, when in reality being an Uber driver will significantly decrease the vehicles lifespan and increase maintenance costs.

Mine too, but I'd say it is more that Über is exploiting driver behavior.

If you assume there's the $9.50 wage someone calculated above. + maybe some premium for being able to schedule work hours yourself. + surge pricing, which doesn't seem accounted for.

Transportation companies are making money on the inability of drivers to calculate their expenses properly. People are likely "more satisfied" w/ Uber b/c they don't calculate what the actual money they make.

It's interesting, b/c it makes you wonder about other questions around Uber's model in the longer term as drivers have more information.

== This brings up an interesting issue -- will driverless cars actually _reduce_ profits (of transportation companies) and _increase_ competition?

Re: Income of an uber driver

#49

Post by Zarel » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 9:23 PM UTC

jsprogrammer wrote: post #43

Zarel wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, most minimum wage jobs don't reimburse you for the costs or time spent commuting to and from work. I wonder if that significantly impacts the comparison. In the other direction, I think the US also has higher self-employment taxes, and of course you don't get health insurance and other benefits. I wonder if that impacts the comparison, too.

>On the other hand, most minimum wage jobs don't reimburse you for the costs or time spent commuting to and from work Uber definitely does not compensate your commute back to your home when you turn the app off. I'm also pretty sure that Uber does not compensate you during your drive to pick up your first passenger, so unless your first passenger is waiting at your parking location, you have an un-reimbursed commute…

The $9.5/hour or $10.9/hour figure mentioned in the OP compensates for the time/distance traveled to pickup point, including your drive to pick up your first passenger. That was the figure I was referring to. You get misleading results if you compare a gross income from a minimum wage job to a net income from Uber.

Re: Income of an uber driver

#50

Post by Zarel » Sat, Jul 18, 2015, 9:25 PM UTC

prostoalex wrote: post #39

Zarel wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, most minimum wage jobs don't reimburse you for the costs or time spent commuting to and from work. I wonder if that significantly impacts the comparison. In the other direction, I think the US also has higher self-employment taxes, and of course you don't get health insurance and other benefits. I wonder if that impacts the comparison, too.

> most minimum wage jobs don't reimburse you for the costs or time spent commuting to and from work The compensating factor here would that Uber drivers are not compensated for the time/distance traveled to pickup point. > I think the US also has higher self-employment taxes The carrot with that is more generous allowances for tax optimization (deductions, SEP IRA limits). > you don't get health insurance and other b…

> The compensating factor here would that Uber drivers are not compensated for the time/distance traveled to pickup point.

The $9.5/hour or $10.9/hour figure mentioned in the OP compensates for the time/distance traveled to pickup point, including your drive to pick up your first passenger. That was the figure I was referring to. You get misleading results if you compare a gross income from a minimum wage job to a net income from Uber.

> That is on par with other minimum wage jobs.

I asked a friend working a minimum wage job and she said she got benefits including insurance. Maybe she's an outlier?