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Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

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Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#491

Post by reidjs »

logicchains wrote: post #467
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) In Victorian Britain, child labour provided a great many public goods. 2) After it was outlawed, many of businesses that relied on it became unsustainable. I don't think it is sensible to justify exploitation with "but the public benefits from it' and 'without it the business might go under'. By that logic we'd still have Victorian workhouses, 12-hour workdays, and there'd be no health & safety.

>I don't think it is sensible to justify exploitation with "but the public benefits from it' and 'without it the business might go under'. It's absurd to compare providing a service that hooks drivers up with clients to child labour.

driving is one of the most dangerous things you can do nowadays. most Uber drivers have to support themselves and possibly others. Many drivers can’t afford private healthcare so in the case of an accident it would really suck for them and their family.

Maybe they’re not losing their fingers in factory machines like child laborers are but I think they deserve employer provided healthcare at the very least.

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#492

Post by crooked-v »

fastball wrote: post #350
crooked-v wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What about the California judge? Nothing about the ruling prevents Uber from having contractors. It prevents them from having employees (as determined by California law) that they label as contractors in order to skirt around legal requirements for employees.

So what changes (in your opinion) would allow Uber to reasonably classify drivers as contractors?

There's no "opinion" about it. There are fairly clear-cut rules that are applied under California law: https://www.californiaemploymentlawreport.com/2019/03/unders...

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#493

Post by Cakez0r »

Why doesn't Uber just let Californian drivers set their own rates? Would it really be such a huge deal to their business model if drivers could set their own price per mile, or similar? Uber still takes a percentage cut and I assume the free market cost would work out to be in the same ballpark as Uber's pricing model.

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#494

Post by momokoko »

ehsankia wrote: post #483
momokoko wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You realize there are tons of jobs with employees that allow employees to chose their own hours. There is nothing in this ruling that prevents Uber from allowing people to chose rides _exactly_ as they are doing it now. The changes are: 1. Uber needs to pay into unemployment insurance. 2. Uber needs to pay into workers compensation. 3. Uber needs to pay into social security. 4. Uber needs to collect payroll taxes in…

Can they 1. Work for the competitors 2. work as much or as little as they want 3. Take as much vacation time as they want 4. Leave with zero advance notice Also, should Twitch streamers and Youtube creators also become employees? What about Etsy/Ebay sellers or AirBnB hosts?

In the US, and more specifically California?

Absolutely they can. California, like almost all states in the US, is an “at-will” employment state.

None of these things are required under employment law at all. Can I ask where you found this wildly false information? Do you happen to live outside the US?

Nowhere in California labor law does it prevent people from taking vacations or anything else you mentioned if they are an employee.

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#495

Post by gocard »

quadrifoliate wrote: post #472
blisterpeanuts wrote: post #395

The judge does not understand what a "gig" is. Uber drivers can choose to drive one, twelve, or zero hours in any given day. They can suddenly stop working by simply not accepting any more ride requests. It's the ultimate remote, self-directed, self-managed job. An employee can't make such decisions; they do as they are told or they are fired. Uber drivers are private, self-owned businesses that rent out their time a…

> Uber drivers are private, self-owned businesses that rent out their time and equipment to a corporation on a completely arbitrary basis. As far I know, this is not true. Uber dictates the prices that drivers can charge, they cannot set an arbitrary price for their own labor. Is that not the case?

Is the driver charging the passenger? Or is Uber charging the passenger, and putting forth a contract at a set rate which individual drivers can accept or decline?

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#496

Post by blisterpeanuts »

quadrifoliate wrote: post #472
blisterpeanuts wrote: post #395

The judge does not understand what a "gig" is. Uber drivers can choose to drive one, twelve, or zero hours in any given day. They can suddenly stop working by simply not accepting any more ride requests. It's the ultimate remote, self-directed, self-managed job. An employee can't make such decisions; they do as they are told or they are fired. Uber drivers are private, self-owned businesses that rent out their time a…

> Uber drivers are private, self-owned businesses that rent out their time and equipment to a corporation on a completely arbitrary basis. As far I know, this is not true. Uber dictates the prices that drivers can charge, they cannot set an arbitrary price for their own labor. Is that not the case?

True, Uber sets the prices and also acts as the broker/middleman. Kind of a super-broker.

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#497

Post by momokoko »

rockinghigh wrote: post #460
momokoko wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You realize there are tons of jobs with employees that allow employees to chose their own hours. There is nothing in this ruling that prevents Uber from allowing people to chose rides _exactly_ as they are doing it now. The changes are: 1. Uber needs to pay into unemployment insurance. 2. Uber needs to pay into workers compensation. 3. Uber needs to pay into social security. 4. Uber needs to collect payroll taxes in…

Do you have examples of jobs where employees choose their own hours and can work for competitors?

Do you have a link to the California law that states that an employee is not allowed to work for any other company? If anything California has specific non-compete laws and moonlighting laws that forbid a company from preventing their employees from working for another company.

Hilariously, you are so far off that you don’t realize that the only legal way Uber could prevent their drivers from working for Lyft in California was if they were contractors and not employees

Where did you get this information?

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#498

Post by tehjoker »

Bear in mind that these ridesharing companies are basing their entire business model vs taxis not on some dumb app, every taxi company tries to get you to install its app. Instead its innovation, is reducing labor and capital costs in order to offer cheaper rides than taxis to corner the market. In order to reduce capital costs, they have workers bring the cars. To reduce labor costs, they pay less. Uber is a cash inferno and they have been fighting against employee status because for various reasons the workers get paid more overall.

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#499

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

shrimpx wrote: post #422
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can imagine Uber offering jobs v.s. contractor positions with differing levels of support, remuneration, and expectations. Legally, in California, they can't do that. As outlined in the article, the 'ABC test' is the legal test for determining whether someone is an employee or a contractor. The 'B' part of that test is "The worker performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity's business." If…

> argued that they were basically doing the same work as employees I think that's case by case though. Contractors usually do finite focused projects and don't want to be employees. I myself was self-employed for 5 years doing specific contracts as a software engineer. I was "writing code" which is "the same work" as employees. Were all those companies breaking the law? > Legally, in California, they can't do that. D…

> Were all those companies breaking the law?

This is actually a really good thread, because most people are surprised to discover that yes, those companies probably were "breaking the law".

As other posters pointed out, AB5 is relatively new, so the test is relatively stricter now, and only relevant in California.

More importantly though, employment classification is only challenged when a plaintiff files a lawsuit. Thus, even if someone is technically misclassified, if the relationship is mutually beneficial, nobody is going to complain. This goes on all the time, which is why most people are surprised to find out they were technically misclassified.

Case in point: I worked at a company (in a state much more permissible regarding employment law than CA, and pre AB5) that forbid using the term "contract-to-hire", even though that happened pretty frequently. Reason being that technically contract-to-hire is not legal unless there is a substantial difference in the work and relationship when the person is a contractor. Now, many times there is, but that phrase alone can make it seem like the work contractors do is too similar to the work employees do, which is why our legal department banned the phrase.

Re: Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees

#500

Post by p1necone »

lackbeard wrote: post #364
Gunax wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber is in a legal grey area. They are independent contractors in the sense that they can choose how much and when to work. They are employees in that they cannot negotiate rates. I don't think it's so clear cut.

> They are employees in that they cannot negotiate rates. Hmm... How is an Uber driver different from a plumber here? Let's say Google needs some pipes fixed at one of its offices and they tell me how much they'll pay, refusing to budge from that figure. That doesn't make me Google's employee. I can choose to do the work for that price, or I can go fix Apple's pipes instead. What am I missing?

Your analogy doesn't map to this situation. Google and Apple would be the people you're driving around, not Uber. The company that employs you as a plumber maps to Uber, which of course would just be you if you were self employed.
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