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The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

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11–20 of 44 posts

Re: The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

#11
post #8

I’m not quite sure Uber ever intended for their drivers to be able to own $900,000 homes (that’s about what a $4k mortgage would get you with 20% down). To me that smacks of a very rigged game with some sort of agenda behind it.

With a bad credit rating and 10% down before 2007, you could definitely pay that much for a less expensive home.

Re: The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

#13
post #8

I’m not quite sure Uber ever intended for their drivers to be able to own $900,000 homes (that’s about what a $4k mortgage would get you with 20% down). To me that smacks of a very rigged game with some sort of agenda behind it.

>To me that smacks of a very rigged game with some sort of agenda behind it.

Total bills would have been much more appropriate, unless Uber drivers themselves are reporting $4k/mo mortgages, in which case loan approvals need some serious regulation.

Regardless, this game is about someone on the edge of financial failure. The only option is selling the house and hoping for some profit to pay for relocation.

Re: The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

#15
It really annoyed me that the game forced me to make errors. I don't oversleep and I have a generous dataplan that doesn't force me to buy "unlimited." I also didn't get a choice to stay in Sac. The feeling of "this is hard" was lost and was replaced by "this is not a useful demonstration."

Re: The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

#16
post #8

I’m not quite sure Uber ever intended for their drivers to be able to own $900,000 homes (that’s about what a $4k mortgage would get you with 20% down). To me that smacks of a very rigged game with some sort of agenda behind it.

>To me that smacks of a very rigged game with some sort of agenda behind it. Total bills would have been much more appropriate, unless Uber drivers themselves are reporting $4k/mo mortgages, in which case loan approvals need some serious regulation. Regardless, this game is about someone on the edge of financial failure. The only option is selling the house and hoping for some profit to pay for relocation.

>>Loan approvals need some serious regulation

There's probably other recent evidence to support this idea...

Re: The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

#17
I scored around $1016 after costs were removed. I don't think a $1000/week mortgage is reasonable, if you're an Uber driver on those costs, you need to rethink your entire life.

That being said, if mortgage was actually $1000/month and I still have 3 other weeks, being an Uber driver is suddently not so bad.

Re: The Uber Game: Can you make it in the gig economy?

#20

If taxi companies produced marketing material like this and promoted it in cities where they wanted to fight off Uber, they’d probably have a much easier time. That was entertaining and sickening all at once.

Is anyone besides people from HN playing that game?
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