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Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

theguardian.com

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Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#141

Post by bumby »

tru3_power wrote: post #86
ericabiz wrote: post #51

My husband drives for Uber, and I’m glad the proposition passed as it is. He drives the way Uber was originally envisioned. He goes out some nights if there’s a surge, and in the morning on the way to work he points the app toward our stores and grabs a person (pre-pandemic) or a food delivery (today) on his way in. It pays for gas money, car maintenance, and then some. Some months he makes a few hundred dollars. Som…

Before Uber came along driving a cab was mostly a full time thing. My father was a cab driver for 30 years before Uber came onto the scene, and now he does Uber full time. A lot of Uber drivers I talk to are full time drivers.

Do you have insight into your father's perspective between the two? I've heard that cab driving, particularly in major metropolitan areas, was a racket in it's own sense (in terms of medallions being a form of indentured servitude) but I'd be curious if Uber has alleviated some of this or just caused people to leap from the frying pan into the fire.

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#142

Post by intricatedetail »

IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #135
ericabiz wrote: post #51

My husband drives for Uber, and I’m glad the proposition passed as it is. He drives the way Uber was originally envisioned. He goes out some nights if there’s a surge, and in the morning on the way to work he points the app toward our stores and grabs a person (pre-pandemic) or a food delivery (today) on his way in. It pays for gas money, car maintenance, and then some. Some months he makes a few hundred dollars. Som…

Just declaring "oh this is a transitory job" doesn't make it so. Yes, according to Boomer legend, fast food joints used to be exclusively staffed by high school students for whom $8.25 is more than enough for an adequate weed supply. But that's just not true anymore, is it? And yet, its used as argument to deny full protection (for Uber) or not raise minimum wage (my fast food example). At the very least, it should b…

So why people who don't want protections should be limited to 15 hours?

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#143

Post by ZoomerCretin »

mfDjB wrote: post #36

Anecdotally when I talk to Uber drivers about how they feel about laws like this, they are staunchly against it, in fact I haven't found one that is for it (sample size of maybe 20 or so). Does anyone have any data on whether these drivers actually want AB5 in effect? All I see from the pro side are cherry-picked examples.

Weren't Uber drivers bombarded with Pro-Prop 22 messaging every time they opened the app or picked up a passenger? It would make sense that they would support it if >95% of the messaging they got about Prop 22 was from their employer who stood to gain hundreds of millions from its passage.

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#144

Post by baq »

yohannparis wrote: post #19
NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #14

Alternative spin, same facts: "voters undo unpopular overreach by state government".

That's the point of a government. Every law is an overreach by the government.

You really wouldn’t want to live in a place without laws.

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#145

Post by fennecfoxen »

gentaro wrote: post #59
maxehmookau wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm detecting quite a lot of judgement in your comment. You've attacked the person rather than the argument. Do you disagree that a job should mean that someone is able to afford rent and pay your bills? Because that sounds entirely reasonable to me.

He has to attack the person because opposing the idea of people making a living wage makes you look like a callous idiot.

This says more about the label than the opposition.

The "living wage" bakes in a variety of assumptions. First of all is the assumption that people shouldn't work if they're not out to earn a full-time living from that work. This view is typical of posh Americans who went to nice universities, had snazzy internships, and are now happily working full time.

It gleefully ignores those who need to start lower, and get entry level experience. Indeed, it is actively hostile to entire classes of people working.

A retiree who wants a little extra money. A high school kid from some gang-afflicted neighborhood, one who isn't going to college, but could benefit some low-key job in a restaurant, one that would keep him out of trouble, and get him a start for when he graduates. An ex-convict who's just spent five years in prison under one of Biden's drug laws, who could use a steady job to show his next employer he's hard working and didn't steal from work. An immigrant with marginal English language skills. That one girl I knew in school whose entire family was afflicted by a serious case of lead poisoning.

Now there's sure to be some sort of whining to the effect that some of these people need to be supported directly, but suppose they are -- why would that deny them the right to work?

Of course the cynical part of the political apparatus has absolutely no use for these people, since they don't vote, they don't campaign, they compete with the labor unions, and they're not always interested in sitting around and doing nothing on the government dime. They're useless in the revolution.

Oh, and of course the other thing! is that it helps draw attention away from the other big problem: a broken housing policy that has produced sky-high rents in so many major cities. Why fix that problem when you can make a new set of problems instead? One is hard work, and the other earns you praise as compassionate.

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#146

Post by treeman79 »

piva00 wrote: post #73
treeman79 wrote: post #18

Got injured awhile back. Disability decided to play hardball. Gig jobs are all that kept family off the street while I recovered. Starting and stopping anytime as my body could tolerate. Or renting out rooms on Airbnb. Sometimes it took me 4 hours to change sheets and tidy up, but it made the difference. Not saying their good companies. But gigs was crazy valuable to me.

Gig companies shouldn't take the place of a functioning welfare in a rich society, I'm glad it helped you individually but it's symptom of a much larger issue that when patched that way just hides it away into the future...

In a welfare society I would still have to convince someone I couldn’t work. Get approval, etc.

Healthcare industry is currently a mess. I have excellent coverage. Even still I couldn’t get anyone to take me seriously.

Only when organ failure started up in earnest did doctors realize I wasn’t making it up.

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#147

Post by dannyw »

gowld wrote: post #130
ericabiz wrote: post #51

My husband drives for Uber, and I’m glad the proposition passed as it is. He drives the way Uber was originally envisioned. He goes out some nights if there’s a surge, and in the morning on the way to work he points the app toward our stores and grabs a person (pre-pandemic) or a food delivery (today) on his way in. It pays for gas money, car maintenance, and then some. Some months he makes a few hundred dollars. Som…

How would the AB5 law without 22 hurt him? What's wrong with part-time employment? Why is someone's beer money more important than someone else's full time subsistence?

I've done lots of things that deprive full time subsistences. For example, I used to repair people's phones and gadgets as a beer money gig; which deprive full-time repair shop employees.

Should it be illegal for me to offer that service?

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#148

Post by rtkwe »

dannyw wrote: post #114
Alex3917 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel strongly like this law was pushed by people who want Uber to be a full-time job. It’s not. Does the app give him the contact info for each of his passengers after every ride so that he can own the business relationship with them? If not then he's an employee, not an independent contractor. The number of hours worked per month is a complete red herring.

Should this binary classification, devised prior to this whole model of work was invented, still exist? It's like not updating your horse carriage road laws to accommodate automobiles; because everything is either a pedestrian or a horse carriage. If there's no horse, a car isn't a vehicle; it's a pedestrian. Makes no sense. If you think Uber drives deserve more than 120% of min wage, then you can argue that, but I d…

> P.S. Most Uber drivers, when independently polled, are for Prop 22. It's the unions that were pushing this, so they can collect union dues and grow their revenues.

I wonder if this would remain true if you weighted by the number of drives given, there certainly seems to be a distinction between part time and full time drivers. The former could be more numerous while Uber depends on the latter to provide the bulk of their supply.

Re: Gig economy companies spent more than $200M to bankroll Proposition 22

#149

Post by billjings »

ericabiz wrote: post #90
momokoko wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did he collect unemployment, which he does not pay into, during Covid? What is the max payout for his insurance as we’ll need to cover the rest since he is not covered by workers compensation? I could go on, but the point isn’t to protect him, the point is to protect us from picking up the bill for things he and Uber are not paying into.

I think you’re misreading our situation. We run phone and computer repair shops as our primary business. Uber is his part-time side gig. We do pay into unemployment, as we are both salaried workers of our own business. He did not take unemployment during Covid. Our stores were considered essential, so they stayed open. That is pretty much the point of part-time driving. You have a full-time job or business that pays…

I don't understand how part time employment requires him to be classified as a contractor, not an employee.
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