California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees • Hacker News Board

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#461

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 4:57 PM UTC

chongli wrote: post #400

whiddershins wrote: post #246

All these people making Uber money on the side ... the whole thing was possible in part due to the low friction in (and also complete disregard for) the regulatory environment. I’m in NYC and honestly can’t figure out how to legally hire a studio assistant for a few hours a week without being at risk for any of a number of lawsuit vectors. So I just coil my own cables. And I don’t mentor people who want to learn some…

The way to protect workers is to shift the burden of health care and other costly benefits onto the government, supported by taxes. Then there is no risk to hiring a new employee beyond the wages you pay them. The US public does not want this, though, and the war of words over universal health care has led to incredibly deep entrenchment on the side of those opposed. All this despite the mountain of evidence from oth…

> The US public does not want this

That's far from clear. Polling fairly consistently shows that the US public favors at least some degree of it (particularly shifting the healthcare burden from employers to government, other benefits have less political salience), though any particular plan for the detailed mechanism may have trouble gaining majority support.

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#462

Post by jher17 » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 4:58 PM UTC

poilcn wrote: post #423

chongli wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way to protect workers is to shift the burden of health care and other costly benefits onto the government, supported by taxes. Then there is no risk to hiring a new employee beyond the wages you pay them. The US public does not want this, though, and the war of words over universal health care has led to incredibly deep entrenchment on the side of those opposed. All this despite the mountain of evidence from oth…

When an individual creates an enterprise it's expected to fail in 2 years. It does not mean death of the individual, but often it makes 'em go broke. Only one company in a hundred is successful. Other are doomed. Government-run projects do not live in alternative dimension. It is affected by the same things any private organization is affected. It is expected that a country would exist longer than an individual compa…

Your already-flawed logic leaves out the fact that single-payer and other universal healthcare systems run by governments around the world work far better than the US system and don’t make the choice of who gets what care when to who has the most money like the US does but rather who has the most need given the resources available.

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#463

Post by maximente » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 4:59 PM UTC

poilcn wrote: post #423

chongli wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way to protect workers is to shift the burden of health care and other costly benefits onto the government, supported by taxes. Then there is no risk to hiring a new employee beyond the wages you pay them. The US public does not want this, though, and the war of words over universal health care has led to incredibly deep entrenchment on the side of those opposed. All this despite the mountain of evidence from oth…

When an individual creates an enterprise it's expected to fail in 2 years. It does not mean death of the individual, but often it makes 'em go broke. Only one company in a hundred is successful. Other are doomed. Government-run projects do not live in alternative dimension. It is affected by the same things any private organization is affected. It is expected that a country would exist longer than an individual compa…

- sovereign governments (which fund many government projects) can literally create money; individuals cannot

- government projects often have multi-year funding commitments legally bound by legislation; virtually no private enterprises have such guaranteed runways

- goals of government projects are often not "survive then maximize profit at all costs"; in fact, the idea behind infrastructure projects is for extreme long term payoffs, virtually impossible for from-scratch private projects due to lack of capital whereas .gov projects don't have the survival component

- because of things like infrastructure and overhead, there is evidence that public utilities with monopoly-like properties make more sense than rampant theoretical capitalism (imagine 100 sewer companies with 100 sets of pipes, ...)

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#464

Post by bonestamp2 » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 4:59 PM UTC

maximente wrote: post #456

chongli wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way to protect workers is to shift the burden of health care and other costly benefits onto the government, supported by taxes. Then there is no risk to hiring a new employee beyond the wages you pay them. The US public does not want this, though, and the war of words over universal health care has led to incredibly deep entrenchment on the side of those opposed. All this despite the mountain of evidence from oth…

> The US public does not want this, though evidence? from 2017 shows more support than not. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/62-percent-u-s-want-fede...

And I think a lot of the people who don't support it also don't fully understand it, or have a misconception about how it will negatively impact them based on a few anecdotes they've heard from countries that do have universal healthcare (some of which are true, and many of which are false).

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#465

Post by Vraxx » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 4:59 PM UTC

whiddershins wrote: post #246

All these people making Uber money on the side ... the whole thing was possible in part due to the low friction in (and also complete disregard for) the regulatory environment. I’m in NYC and honestly can’t figure out how to legally hire a studio assistant for a few hours a week without being at risk for any of a number of lawsuit vectors. So I just coil my own cables. And I don’t mentor people who want to learn some…

I feel as though that ire ought to be directed at the companies who knowingly walk in the gray areas to make profits where simpler laws might suffice for common sense. It's the same arms race that plays out in many other instances, if abuses didn't happen then we wouldn't need to codify into the law that those things are indeed abuses.

With every round of this game we play, it gets harder for smaller businesses to step around the collateral damage, but it's not as though the right answer is to give up on worker protections. The worst part of it all in my opinion is that after a gray area is ruled on after years of extracting profits, there's literally no consequences for a business forcing that gray area to get codified into law. Of course these vague in-between areas will be exploited and eventually refined into more and more meticulous law, there's a bounty on every one of these areas. The system we have will trend towards this unless we give up on worker protections (obviously not good) or reorganize this system so the winning move isn't to force more legislation

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#466

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 5:01 PM UTC

dodobirdlord wrote: post #410

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in California can they do that (non compete clauses are not enforceable in California).

I am aware, but I don't believe California's prohibition on non-competition clauses covers the scenario where you're still employed by the company.

It depends if they are exempt or not. If non exempt, then no.

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#467

Post by moate » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 5:01 PM UTC

miracle2k wrote: post #358

moate wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the trade off is always "more jobs" vs "better jobs". A company can hire 10 people at 10 dollars an hour or 20 people at 5 dollars an hour. Which situation is you believe is "better" depends on your end goal: Are you trying to make more small jobs, or are you trying to make jobs meaningful in their earning ability? Framed another way, the people you know driving for "a little extra cash" are chipping away at oppor…

> A company can hire 10 people at 10 dollars an hour or 20 people at 5 dollars an hour. No, it will probably exclude people who just want to work 2 hours some evenings whenever they have time to make some extra money, who'd make the full 10 dollars an hour like other drivers do in the time that they do work.

Frame it another way: You have 120 hours of shifts that you need covered at your job in a given week. You can hire 12 people who each work 10 hours, or 3 full-time employees.

The "better" choice again comes down to your goal: More jobs or "better", full time jobs.

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#468

Post by jher17 » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 5:03 PM UTC

HillaryBriss wrote: post #415

chongli wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way to protect workers is to shift the burden of health care and other costly benefits onto the government, supported by taxes. Then there is no risk to hiring a new employee beyond the wages you pay them. The US public does not want this, though, and the war of words over universal health care has led to incredibly deep entrenchment on the side of those opposed. All this despite the mountain of evidence from oth…

> Then there is no risk to hiring a new employee beyond the wages you pay them. but you must not forget the additional administrative/accounting overhead, the risk from the wide variety of lawsuits one is vulnerable to as an employer, the risks of employee injury on the job, and costs associated with the possibility of laying off employees in the future. surely there are more costs than just wages.

Sure. But this is the responsibility an employer must take on in order to hire someone’s labor.

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#469

Post by Spivak » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 5:03 PM UTC

woah wrote: post #451

This is an extremely heavy handed law which would be destructive to large parts of the economy by making many people’s livelihoods illegal. The drafters of the law knew this, which is why 90% of the text of the law is carve-outs for various professions. But forcing people to live their lives through loopholes never works well. For example, they have this carve out for high skilled professions: > (3) An individual who…

They're not carving out high-skill professions. You'll notice that doctors aren't on that list. They're carving out professions that are already under special regulatory regimes that affect how they're able to sell their work. In part because people/businesses are required by law to contract with people who hold these licenses. Like you cannot build a building without a licensed architect and civil engineer.

There would be an uproar if you couldn't renovate your office without hiring an architect an an employee.

Edit: Looks like the final version is way different than this quote. The final list of exemptions are:

- physicians and surgeons

- insurance brokers

- securities brokers

- direct sales under specific (previously existing) conditions.

So looks like they didn't really care about professional services after all but carved out industries where you look like an employee but operate a tiny little business inside another one.

Re: California passes bill that classifies gig economy workers as employees

#470

Post by unksdfnaajhfjk » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 5:05 PM UTC

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #426

djsumdog wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In America, you have to work until you die. The major thing the gig economy takes from people is health care. It's insanely expensive, and the Affordable Care Act is a terrible shamble of broken policy. I spent time outside of the US and came back to find health care worse than when I left it: https://fightthefuture.org/article/returning-to-america-and-... I have a friend who has been fighting brain cancer for over a…

This is why I don't understand why people take gig jobs. Think of the opportunity costs. First off, Uber drivers don't make that much. Then you have vehicle depreciation and maintenance costs. You need to carry an insurance rider that covers rideshare driving. You also need to pay for your own health care. When you add up all these expenses, plus the desire for a living wage, there is no way drivers can be making eno…

> This is why I don't understand why people take gig jobs.

Sometimes Compared to what? is the most important question.

I've been driving for a few years. Before this I was making minimum wage with no benefits. Before that I had a difficult stretch of unemployment. One of my least favorite questions passengers ask me is What did you do before this? because I don't really like to talk about it. It is a rough job - you take a lot of risk, have a lot of bad days, and you get little reward in return. But at least it's work.

Of course the bottom rungs of the ladder look terrible to people near the top, but for who have fallen off of it the bottom is the most important part. All of these "worker protections" define the bottom of the ladder as exploitation. Let me decide that, my labor is my own to sell for whatever price I can get somebody to pay for it.