Uber and Lyft ordered by California judge to classify drivers as employees • Hacker News Board

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

#621

Post by DanBC » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:07 AM UTC

tasubotadas wrote: post #619

piva00 wrote: post #609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slavery doesn't come only through the form of physical subjugation, if so there wouldn't be classifications of work analogous to slavery. Don't be so shallow minded...

>Slavery doesn't come only through the form of physical subjugation from dictionary: slavery - the state of being a slave. slave - a person who is _the legal property of another_ and is forced to obey them. The fact that you use "slavery" as a synonim to hard work and/or high dependance, doesn't make "doesn't come only through the form of physical subjugation" true.

Use a better dictionary.

slavery, n. (ˈsleɪvərɪ)Forms: 6-7 slauerie, 6-8 slaverie, 7 slauery, 7- slavery.[f. slave n. 1 + -ery. Cf. MDu. slaverie (Du. slavernij), LG. slaverei (Da. slaveri, Sw. slafveri), G. scl-, sklaverei (skl-, schlaverey).]

slavery, n.

1. Severe toil like that of a slave; heavy labour, hard work, drudgery.

1551: Robinson More's Utopia ii. v. (1895) 161 “In this hal, all vyle seruice, all slauerie,..is done by bondemen.”

1603: Owen Pembrokeshire (1891) 43 “Digginge of Coles, and other slaueryes and extreame toyles.”

1698: Fryer Acc. E. India & P. 34 “Asses which they use..to carry Packs,..and any other Slavery.”

1712: J. James tr. Le Blond's Gardening 65 “To give them continual Waterings..is a very great Slavery and Expence.”

1897: Daily News 13 Sept. 6/7 “Such people..ought never to keep servants, but do their own slavery.”

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

#622

Post by tasubotadas » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:07 AM UTC

dustinmoris wrote: post #577

Lots of HN comments are here like "I know people who prefer to be contractors", "My sister's neighbours little brother actually doesn't want to be treated with respect by Uber", blah This is utter nonsense. Being a contractor means being self employed. You don't get paid leave or sick pay. It's a risk taking and doesn't make any sense in the gig economy where the wages are close to minimum rates. If you are truly sel…

That's like your opinion... vs the needs of the drivers. They are free not to work there. The fact that plenty of people still work there, means that it works OK.

I mean, they (unqualified workers) can always go to work to MacDonalds or something like that but they stick with Uber.

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

#623

Post by kikokikokiko » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:09 AM UTC

jquery wrote: post #592

dustinmoris wrote: post #577

Lots of HN comments are here like "I know people who prefer to be contractors", "My sister's neighbours little brother actually doesn't want to be treated with respect by Uber", blah This is utter nonsense. Being a contractor means being self employed. You don't get paid leave or sick pay. It's a risk taking and doesn't make any sense in the gig economy where the wages are close to minimum rates. If you are truly sel…

Slaves, mmm.... yes I remember the first day that jackbooted thugs from Uber forced me to drive for the company. Every day that I felt like driving instead of doing literally anything else, these Uber slavemasters would show up with their chains and their whips. The horror... I hope Uber goes out of business so I can finally go back to my old life...

As a non US citizen that does not live in America and just looks from the outside, I'm always amazed at the rapid transformation going on in the last decade. If hackernews is a sample of the general american population, you guys are becoming communist. And it won't end well.

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

#624

Post by tasubotadas » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:11 AM UTC

kikokikokiko wrote: post #623

jquery wrote: post #592

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slaves, mmm.... yes I remember the first day that jackbooted thugs from Uber forced me to drive for the company. Every day that I felt like driving instead of doing literally anything else, these Uber slavemasters would show up with their chains and their whips. The horror... I hope Uber goes out of business so I can finally go back to my old life...

As a non US citizen that does not live in America and just looks from the outside, I'm always amazed at the rapid transformation going on in the last decade. If hackernews is a sample of the general american population, you guys are becoming communist. And it won't end well.

That's probably mostly California but yeah - it's amazing (also as an European but from a post-soviet country).

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

#625

Post by jasode » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:14 AM UTC

mercer wrote: post #595

jasode wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>All gig workers are slaves and we should treat each other with more dignity and upgrade them to employees. It's our bloody duty as a decent human being. Lyft/Uber can upgrade them to employees but the arithmetic of bottom-up economics means Uber has to raise prices to cover full employment benefits. The raised fares conflict with what passengers are willing to pay . E.g. even though yellow medallion taxis often cost…

> I believe what this really comes down to is that society is not willing to pay the higher prices for drivers to be treated as employees. Same situation as not willing to paying higher prices at hair salons so hair stylists are full employees (instead of being contractors) with healthcare. It does seem like constantly blaming Uber for mis-categorizing employees conveniently shifts the blame from the society/customer…

>There seems to be a trend to have 'flex-workers' (contractors) where in practice they all quack like employee ducks, without many of the benefits and guarantees. It mostly feels like a loop-hole and /of course/ the average consumer will go for cheap and convenient when they can. doesn't mean it's a good thing for society (and in particular the workers).

Well, instead of abstract descriptions about trends of mis-classified flex-workers and abused loopholes such that nobody can argue about it... I was trying to steer the conversation towards concrete cause & effect.

Let's look at another worker-owned driver rideshare -- Local Driver Co-op: https://localdriver.co/

It costs members/drivers $100 to join. They are trying to undercut Uber and excerpt of verbiage from their webpage: "Riders save up to 20% versus competition -- Enjoy unbeatable rates, guaranteeing your money supports the drivers and their families."

Some questions of morals and decency:

- Should a judge (or new legislation) force LDC to treat drivers as employees with minimum hourly wage and unpaid time off? Since LDC contractors are trying to undercut Uber, a proposal to force LDC re-classification to "employees" would cause some drivers to protest this. So bottom line is... should drivers even be allowed to declare themselves as independent contractors and form a platform to chase after passengers?

- If LDC drivers don't get decent pay -- and we can predict they won't because history shows that taxi drivers and rideshare drivers in every country don't get enough dignified pay to put kids through college and save for retirement and cover the wear&tear on their car -- who is to blame for "abusing* them? LDC? (That would mean the drivers are abusing themselves.) Or the customers/passengers?

- Should LDC be completely shut down and that business "should not exist" (as some commenters put it) because it pays too poorly?

Let's talk in concrete terms of how "driver protection" laws would realistically affect outcomes. Let's talk about game theory of economics where customers may not willingly play along with the intentions of well-meaning laws and will just avoid paying higher prices. Some drivers themselves may not want to play along with "drivers must be employees with minimum wage". These are the aspects we don't discuss enough.

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

#626

Post by MartijnBraam » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:14 AM UTC

mercer wrote: post #590

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.…

This is fascinating, although I still feel there's too much disagreement for me to have a clear picture of how this works in California. I'll give a Dutch perspective (which perhaps applies to some degree to other parts of Europe): Until 2016, clients had to proactively ask for a 'Verklaring Arbeidsrelatie (VAR)'. An 'explanation of the work relationship'. If I understand correctly, the contractor/freelancer had to p…

Outside of the VAR thing there already was laws that contractors can't make more than x% of their income from a single customer. If they do the customer would have to treat you as an employee.

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

#627

Post by linschn » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:24 AM UTC

kikokikokiko wrote: post #623

jquery wrote: post #592

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slaves, mmm.... yes I remember the first day that jackbooted thugs from Uber forced me to drive for the company. Every day that I felt like driving instead of doing literally anything else, these Uber slavemasters would show up with their chains and their whips. The horror... I hope Uber goes out of business so I can finally go back to my old life...

As a non US citizen that does not live in America and just looks from the outside, I'm always amazed at the rapid transformation going on in the last decade. If hackernews is a sample of the general american population, you guys are becoming communist. And it won't end well.

Because from Reagan on, America has been doing quite well of course...

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

#628

Post by dnlbtlr » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:29 AM UTC

jasode wrote: post #589

dustinmoris wrote: post #577

Lots of HN comments are here like "I know people who prefer to be contractors", "My sister's neighbours little brother actually doesn't want to be treated with respect by Uber", blah This is utter nonsense. Being a contractor means being self employed. You don't get paid leave or sick pay. It's a risk taking and doesn't make any sense in the gig economy where the wages are close to minimum rates. If you are truly sel…

>All gig workers are slaves and we should treat each other with more dignity and upgrade them to employees. It's our bloody duty as a decent human being. Lyft/Uber can upgrade them to employees but the arithmetic of bottom-up economics means Uber has to raise prices to cover full employment benefits. The raised fares conflict with what passengers are willing to pay . E.g. even though yellow medallion taxis often cost…

“ Uber has to raise prices to cover full employment benefits. ”

The question is how much would this be per ride(a few cents?) and do they really? Uber and Lyft are raking in cash.

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

#629

Post by pseudalopex » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:30 AM UTC

ehsankia wrote: post #566

momokoko wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> Can I ask where you found this wildly false information? Do you happen to live outside the US? I worked in California for a few years but I'm not longer there. And those were questions, they weren't meant to be stated as facts. > Nowhere in California labor law does it prevent people from taking vacations Hmm, maybe I understood my rights wrong, but from my understanding I wasn't free to take an arbitrary number of…

Employers are allowed to limit vacation and prohibit working for competitors. California doesn't force them to.

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

#630

Post by wccrawford » Tue, Aug 11, 2020, 10:32 AM UTC

dustinmoris wrote: post #577

Lots of HN comments are here like "I know people who prefer to be contractors", "My sister's neighbours little brother actually doesn't want to be treated with respect by Uber", blah This is utter nonsense. Being a contractor means being self employed. You don't get paid leave or sick pay. It's a risk taking and doesn't make any sense in the gig economy where the wages are close to minimum rates. If you are truly sel…

While I agree with your overall message, I have met an Uber driver that was handing out cards. They really did suggest I call them back directly at any time during our stay in San Francisco. He had an actual mini-bus, not just a car or mini-van. So that guy, at least, was self-employed.

But for the vast majority of Uber's drivers, I think you're correct.