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posted by janrinok on Wednesday January 01 2020, @03:21AM   Printer-friendly
from the goes-for-popcorn dept.

Uber sues California to block gig-worker law going into effect this week:

Ride-hailing service Uber filed a lawsuit Monday against the state of California, alleging a landmark gig-worker law set to go into effect is unconstitutional. The lawsuit seeks to block AB 5, which has the potential to upend gig economy companies such as Uber and Lyft.

The complaint, which also lists Postmates as a plaintiff, argues that the law unfairly targets workers and companies in the on-demand economy, treating them differently than traditional employees and threatening their flexibility.

In September, California became the first state to pass a law aimed at protecting gig worker rights, which forces Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Postmates and other gig economy companies reclassify their workers as employees. Using independent contractors allows the companies to shift many costs to the workers.

The lawsuit says the law arbitrarily exempts dozens of occupations, including direct salespeople, travel agents, grant writers, commercial fishermen and construction truck drivers, among others.

"There is no rhyme or reason to these nonsensical exemptions, and some are so ill-defined or entirely undefined that it is impossible to discern what they include or exclude," says the complaint (see below), which was filed in a Los Angeles federal court.

Postmates and Uber v State of California on Scribd


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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 01 2020, @02:52PM (7 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 01 2020, @02:52PM (#938212)

    This law fixes the exploitation of drivers. If you total up all the expenses of driving for these companies and subtract that from what they're paying, you're talking about making only a few dollars an hour, at best. When they started out, they didn't even have insurance, meaning that if something happened, your insurance would be the only one covering bills and even then only if they felt like it as it wasn't necessarily their responsibility.

    The fact that you don't understand how the real world works, doesn't change the fact that Uber and the other "ride sharing" companies are exploiting people that don't know any better and driving down the prices of legitimate taxi drivers. These are people who often times work weird hours and are doing it for an actual living. People whine about the cost of taking a cab, but that's largely what it costs to provide the service. It's expensive to have drivers on call when they can't be working and that shows up in the rates along with things like insurance and upkeep on the vehicles.

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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday January 01 2020, @03:49PM (6 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday January 01 2020, @03:49PM (#938236) Journal

    This law fixes the exploitation of drivers.

    But the drivers wanted to be exploited. Why shouldn't their choices be respected?

    If you total up all the expenses of driving for these companies and subtract that from what they're paying, you're talking about making only a few dollars an hour, at best.

    Given you aren't really totaling up anything, what's the point of your observation?

    But let's suppose hypothetically, that you are right. We're still left with the fact that these people are choosing to be Uber drivers for that money. I'm quite comfortable with respecting that.

    The fact that you don't understand how the real world works, doesn't change the fact that Uber and the other "ride sharing" companies are exploiting people that don't know any better and driving down the prices of legitimate taxi drivers.

    What's supposed to be the problem with driving down the prices of "legitimate" taxi drivers? Sounds like a good side effect of the internet-based ride hailing thing. I find it remarkable how someone can lecture me on my alleged ignorance of the real world, and then immediately come up with a poor idea like this. I think it's a profoundly bad idea to protect the taxi cartels. Uber and company wouldn't have been this successful in the first place, if taxis were providing an honest service.

    Finally, this sort of law merely protects bad business models (the taxi and other equivalents of the *IAA). Sweep that ideological fog away and that's what's happening.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 01 2020, @05:58PM (5 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 01 2020, @05:58PM (#938299)

      Did they really? They wanted money for providing a service, I doubt very much that they'd stop just because they were forced to accept more money for services rendered.

      The point of the observation, is that the money being paid to them is significantly below minimum wage even before providing riders with perks like bottled water. There are any number of youtubers and the like that have totaled it up. The numbers I've seen come out to less than the federal minimum wage and in some areas it's less than half of the minimum when you factor in the expenses related to the car.

      The problem with driving down prices, is that the service costs money to run. The prices are what they are, because Uber is engaged in illegal dumping. They're losing huge sums of money, failing to pay the drivers sufficiently well and it's artificially depressing the wages and fees that legitimate taxi companies can charge. That's not a good thing at all. This is the race to the bottom that has all but destroyed the middle class and it's just so that billionaires can pad their winnings with some extra zeros.

      The Taxi industry was functioning just fine. It's expensive to have people that spend all those hours in taxis driving people around. This isn't even remotely like the *IAA and you should be ashamed of yourself for suggesting that it is. Taxi service is expensive to provide. There's one driver per car and that car is often times just sitting there empty or driving to pick somebody up. Whether there's somebody in it or not, it costs roughly the same amount to drive. The end result is that it's a relatively expensive service to run. Contrast that to Uber where they make the driver pay for most of the costs, fails to ensure the driver is making a living and yes, it's going to be cheaper.

      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday January 02 2020, @12:22AM (4 children)

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday January 02 2020, @12:22AM (#938424) Journal

        Did they really? They wanted money for providing a service, I doubt very much that they'd stop just because they were forced to accept more money for services rendered.

        Ok, so what other reason could there be for being an Uber driver that doesn't ultimately involve at least partially monetary reward?

        The point of the observation, is that the money being paid to them is significantly below minimum wage even before providing riders with perks like bottled water. There are any number of youtubers and the like that have totaled it up. The numbers I've seen come out to less than the federal minimum wage and in some areas it's less than half of the minimum when you factor in the expenses related to the car.

        So what? Sorry, but I think a better solution here is to get rid of federal minimum wage.

        The problem with driving down prices, is that the service costs money to run. The prices are what they are, because Uber is engaged in illegal dumping. They're losing huge sums of money, failing to pay the drivers sufficiently well and it's artificially depressing the wages and fees that legitimate taxi companies can charge. That's not a good thing at all. This is the race to the bottom that has all but destroyed the middle class and it's just so that billionaires can pad their winnings with some extra zeros.

        If Uber can keep up this "illegal dumping" forever, then that's fine with me. Funny how the "race to the bottom" involves making critical services like transportation cheaper.

        The Taxi industry was functioning just fine. It's expensive to have people that spend all those hours in taxis driving people around. This isn't even remotely like the *IAA and you should be ashamed of yourself for suggesting that it is. Taxi service is expensive to provide. There's one driver per car and that car is often times just sitting there empty or driving to pick somebody up. Whether there's somebody in it or not, it costs roughly the same amount to drive. The end result is that it's a relatively expensive service to run. Contrast that to Uber where they make the driver pay for most of the costs, fails to ensure the driver is making a living and yes, it's going to be cheaper.

        And now some apologism for the taxi cartels. It was fine for the taxi industry, not so fine for the people getting robbed by the taxi industry. Apparently, Uber and company are showing that taxi service isn't as expensive to provide as you claim.

        The thing missing here is that jobs aren't magic. You need to provide something of value in order to be paid by employers and customers. The more obstacles that are provided to employing people, the lower quality the jobs that will be available. Something like Uber helps a huge category of poor people and provides a considerable value to people who use those ride hailing services.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 02 2020, @07:59PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 02 2020, @07:59PM (#938774)

          Oh my, abolish the federal minimum wage so we can go back to company towns and unabashed wage slavery?

          You're such a fuckwit, you base your entire view of reality on baseless assumptions about some ideal version of capitalism. I pity you, though it is tempered by the damage your worldviews do unto others.

          • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday January 03 2020, @05:53AM

            by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday January 03 2020, @05:53AM (#938982) Journal

            Oh my, abolish the federal minimum wage so we can go back to company towns and unabashed wage slavery?

            Because if your government masters aren't holding your hand, you'll work for peanuts?

            on baseless assumptions about some ideal version of capitalism

            Which happens to be the real world, let us note. Nothing ideal about it.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 02 2020, @08:14PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 02 2020, @08:14PM (#938786)

          > Apparently, Uber and company are showing that taxi service isn't as expensive to provide as you claim.

          From what I've read, Uber has poured (is still pouring?) their huge pile of venture capital into unsustainable fares. This is a traditional monopolist play--kill the competition by undercutting it. Once the competition has folded (as have many local taxi companies around the USA) those low rates will be ancient history. At that point there won't be any competition left to "let capitalism work its magic" and the fat cats will have the taxi market to themselves.

          Thus regulation is needed to maintain some kind of "free market".

          • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday January 03 2020, @05:50AM

            by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday January 03 2020, @05:50AM (#938981) Journal

            From what I've read, Uber has poured (is still pouring?) their huge pile of venture capital into unsustainable fares.

            And when the unsustainable goes on long enough Uber goes out of business. Sorry, I don't buy that they'll last long enough to become a "monopoly".

            Thus regulation is needed to maintain some kind of "free market".

            Funny how "regulation" is about keeping the taxi cartels.