71–80 of 107 posts
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Contractors get to negotiate how much they are paid.
Gig workers do too. Isn’t the idea behind surge pricing is that people decide whether it is worth them working or not?
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> why do we pretend that gig workers don't deserve the same benefits and protections that proper employees do? Because some—in some cases, many—of them don’t. And in many cases, e.g. healthcare, it’s unclear why we’re still bundling something into employment that properly should be separate. Extending employment protection to gig workers is a simple solution. But it probably leaves many of them worse off than they ar…
> And in many cases, e.g. healthcare, it’s unclear why we’re still bundling something into employment that properly should be separate. This, one million times over. I read an account describing how things came to be as they are. Apparently, it all started during WW2. The Government controlled wages, and so some wages were too high and some too low, and for those set too low, it became difficult to get staff. To make…
About the Health Insurance angle: The article is about YoungOnes - which claims to only operate in the UK and Netherlands. Both of which counties have national health systems. (And the article is so UK-centric that I see no mention at all of the Netherlands.)
> We’re deeply concerned that companies will try to get around the law and continue to exploit vulnerable workers by pretending they are self-employed when they should enjoy the full protection of the law. This is really the crux of the issue: why do we pretend that gig workers don't deserve the same benefits and protections that proper employees do? Even referring to it as a "gig" makes it sound more like a hobby th…
We gave less rights to part-time workers so companies just started making as many part-time as possible. If you create a loop-hole it will be exploited.
We should have just expanded medicare to cover everyone, but no, that'd give too much power to the workers.
> Enough demand that it can generate revenue, not enough revenue that it creates incentives for high-loyalty structure -–which is what you do when you care about your employees and want to keep them working for you.
If Uber loses one driver, there is a thousand that would gladly replace them and get paid same day, in cash, pre-tax at a higher hourly rate than they can get in the job market (Amazon warehouse, Fast Food, etc...), with a lot more control of their time.
How do you compete? The companies know and have no incentive to hire.
Meanwhile, if legislation is passed to force them to do it, they're likely to dramatically cut driver headcount to keep their already shitty P&L healthy and will cause 100s of thousands to lose their main income source and a 1000x increase in costs for consumers. (Bad outcome for all parties involved)
As it stands the economics of that business model are too messed up for a good path forward to exist.
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yeah basically the only reason we have the current system is due to tax preferencing and any attempt at reform (like Obama’s cadillac tax) is opposed by broad interests
> only reason we have the current system is due to tax referencing What is tax referencing?
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> why do we pretend that gig workers don't deserve the same benefits and protections that proper employees do? Because some—in some cases, many—of them don’t. And in many cases, e.g. healthcare, it’s unclear why we’re still bundling something into employment that properly should be separate. Extending employment protection to gig workers is a simple solution. But it probably leaves many of them worse off than they ar…
This story is from the UK where we healthcare is not bundled up with being employed, so it's even more of an outlier.
The wheels move slowly but once they grind nothing can stop it. The self employed are being reintegrated into the Borg collective.
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What is the difference between a “gig worker” and an independent contractor? Jason Snell, the former editor of Macworld went independent after getting laid off from MacWorld. He purposefully put together streams of income consisting of podcasting, writing articles for different magazines - including MacWorld, writing for his own blog and writing technical books. He said out of those, because of the initial laws passe…
Contractors get to negotiate how much they are paid.
I've worked on several projects were I was promised an FTE conversion after performing really well during a project. My manager said the company wanted to keep me around and convert me to an FTE spot. Within weeks of my project being released, they dangled the conversion out in front of me while reducing my hours to 20-25 a week. I fell for it for a few weeks and then decided they had no intention of converting me, it was just to keep me around for various other shit work their devs didn't want to do so I moved on - another perk of being a contractor/part-time/"gig" employee.
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> And in many cases, e.g. healthcare, it’s unclear why we’re still bundling something into employment that properly should be separate. This, one million times over. I read an account describing how things came to be as they are. Apparently, it all started during WW2. The Government controlled wages, and so some wages were too high and some too low, and for those set too low, it became difficult to get staff. To make…
Pretty much, but what was left off is the union demands for healthcare as an employment benefit that truly entrenched the practice in the US.
Source?
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Out of touch. Imagine trying to tell your landlord or the grocery store they'll get their money in 30 days, and by the way thanks for the food!
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