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Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

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Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#101

Post by calimac »

leereeves wrote: post #90
radcon wrote: post #59

This seems like it could also torpedo their Contractor vs. Employee argument. Contractors get to set rates, employees don't. So you can't say they're contractors AND accuse them of committing fraud when they try to set their own rates. Now if only someone would develop an app that does this for entire cities. The app could be their version of a union.

Under the theory that Uber/Lyft employees are contractors and allowed to set prices, wouldn't coordinating ("conspiring") to do so en masse be considered price fixing? Personally I think they should be considered employees, but a pro-management federal prosecutor could make some trouble for them.

would they have to have more control over the liquidity of the market to be price fixing?

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#102

Post by codedokode »

leereeves wrote: post #90
radcon wrote: post #59

This seems like it could also torpedo their Contractor vs. Employee argument. Contractors get to set rates, employees don't. So you can't say they're contractors AND accuse them of committing fraud when they try to set their own rates. Now if only someone would develop an app that does this for entire cities. The app could be their version of a union.

Under the theory that Uber/Lyft employees are contractors and allowed to set prices, wouldn't coordinating ("conspiring") to do so en masse be considered price fixing? Personally I think they should be considered employees, but a pro-management federal prosecutor could make some trouble for them.

I don't think they are allowed to set prices. Furthermore, they are probably somehow punished if they don't accept the orders that app offers.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#103

Post by Donald »

kdot wrote: post #65

What's the rational for percentage based fees? The technology cost for a 4 mile ride is the same for a 50 mile ride.

An imbalance of power between a a $70 billion dollar company like Uber and folks who need an extra $200/week to make rent.

Also keep in mind that even at these fee levels, Uber and Lyft are somehow not profitable.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#104

Post by llamataboot »

Few things interesting here -

One is that the workers are getting paid more per the algorithm that these companies designed to charge customers - that is, they are getting the company to facilitate higher payments but the company itself isn't being charged more! So in that case, the drivers are simply arguing that uber/lyft are artificially undervaluing their time because clearly these passengers are willing to pay 15% more to them to get home...

--

It is telling to me how often Lyft/Uber/et all emphasize that their philosophy is that these gig economy jobs are just something you do a tiny bit extra to get some extra cash in your pocket. That is they are designed to be a small supplement to the job that provides you with most of your income, so hey, we don't really have to worry about working conditions, etc.

But I'm not sure I believe their stats. Over the past few years it is nearly 100% of the drivers I get that are doing it full-time, and many/most of the "teacher moonlighting for extra vacation money" type drivers have given way to lots of former actual taxi drivers who quit their taxi company and now work both uber/lyft.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#105

Post by eropple »

leereeves wrote: post #90
radcon wrote: post #59

This seems like it could also torpedo their Contractor vs. Employee argument. Contractors get to set rates, employees don't. So you can't say they're contractors AND accuse them of committing fraud when they try to set their own rates. Now if only someone would develop an app that does this for entire cities. The app could be their version of a union.

Under the theory that Uber/Lyft employees are contractors and allowed to set prices, wouldn't coordinating ("conspiring") to do so en masse be considered price fixing? Personally I think they should be considered employees, but a pro-management federal prosecutor could make some trouble for them.

That's an interesting question. I'm not a lawyer, but I'd be interested in the answer. From a technical perspective it seems that they'd need significantly more control over product liquidity generally, rather than locally, for it to apply; from a moral perspective it doesn't seem like a reasonable appellation at all and that the closest equivalent is labor organization--and it's worth noting that companies are not obligated to negotiate with labor organizations on behalf of contractors in the same way they are employees, but contractors are allowed to organize. Contractor labor, such as SAG, IATSE, etc. do it regularly.

Practically, the impact of a hundred airport drivers deciding to "strike" is so small that a non-mendacious prosecutor probably wouldn't even look at it. But there's a lot of mendacity around Washington, so who knows.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#106

Post by NotPaidToPost »

gdhbcc wrote: post #5

I dont see how Lyft gets off calling this fraudulent. Seems to me it's the system working as intended, and as it should. Drivers dont want to drive for under a certain value, so they simply inform the app who adjusts the value to fulfill demand. Seems like its what you want to happen.

This seems the very definition of fraud, though.

Edit:

Fraudulent: "intended to deceive someone in order to get money or property".

The collusion is intended to deceive Lyft (and in the end customers) for financial gains.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#107

Post by woah »

jfengel wrote: post #64
metalliqaz wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their hands may be a bit tied on addressing this issue, because if they start rejecting drivers based on when they choose to work, it's hard to call them contractors.

Isn't that exactly what you get to do with contractors? One of your criteria in picking a contractor is showing up. Kind of a problem, I'm told, with housing contractors. And as with housing contractors, the best way to get them to show up is to offer more money than their other offers.

Yea, the definition of contractor that often gets thrown around in these discussions seems to exclude most real world contractors. I’ve worked as a construction contractor and a software contractor, and I did not get to set my hours in either one. It seems like the legal system is out of touch with the world of business.

The real definition of a contractor may be “an employment relationship in which the worker does not want to assert employee rights”. In my case I did not want to be an employee because contractors got paid more for the same work, and I liked taking time off between gigs.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#108

Post by mikeash »

bena wrote: post #100
eropple wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Drivers are not ready and willing to drive. They are ready and willing to drive for a higher rate . Lyft and Uber provide that higher rate when there is sufficient demand and insufficient supply. Working as designed, yo. Multi-billion-dollar companies do not need you to cape up for them. Somehow, somehow , they will survive against those mendacious poor people who have found a way to represent their requirements to t…

Where did I say this was a good or bad thing? Nowhere. I described things that could happen if the practice becomes too exploitative. Also, I can see the argument that it violates the TOS for the drivers. The drivers agree to drive for the price determined by the service. They are then using exploits to manipulate that price. If they don't want to drive for X fare, then they shouldn't be in their car. And this is an…

When these services first introduced surge pricing, they told us that it was a good thing because it encourages more drivers to get on the road and take care of demand. It’s working exactly as designed.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#109

Post by mattkrause »

jfengel wrote: post #64
metalliqaz wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their hands may be a bit tied on addressing this issue, because if they start rejecting drivers based on when they choose to work, it's hard to call them contractors.

Isn't that exactly what you get to do with contractors? One of your criteria in picking a contractor is showing up. Kind of a problem, I'm told, with housing contractors. And as with housing contractors, the best way to get them to show up is to offer more money than their other offers.

There’s a subtle difference.

Contractors are supposed to be relatively independent. You give them the outcome (a new deck), a deadline (June 1st), and any stipulations (no work after 9pm) and they organize the work however they see fit. One guy could work steadily for two weeks, or a bunch of staff could show up and knock out the deck in two days.

Employees are supposed to take more direction. You can tell an employee that she must start at 8am each day. She will dig holes for the footings on the north and west sides first, then start cutting stringers while the other guy finishes the south and east sides.

Re: Uber, Lyft drivers manipulate fares at DCA causing artificial price surges

#110

Post by thebluehawk »

lr wrote: post #61
wlesieutre wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's probably a balance to be struck, because part of the ridesharing design's efficiency is that if demand drops they can drop their rates paid to drivers, and the drivers who don't want to drive at those prices will stop. So if Lyft starts to say "we always want X drivers available as a base load, and we'll open up to contractors to fill in the demand spikes" it might make the contractor role too unreliable for…

Can we please stop referring to these services as "sharing"? Lyft actually started as a company that coordinated the sharing of rides, i.e., no money was involved. But the "sharing" pretense has long since past for all of these companies.

Right? It's nonsense. A grocery store isn't "food sharing", and a barber isn't "hair cut sharing". It's one party paying another for a product/service. Uber/Lyft's killer feature is the app pairing those two parties. But no one is "sharing".
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