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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
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 01 2020, @06:09PM (1 child)
Why do you hate poor people so much? These lies really aren't helping anybody. While we're at it, why don't we just bring back slave labor as clearly the slaves were happier having the work than being beaten to death. Oh wait, it's only humane to starve people to death or die of exposure because they didn't earn enough money to afford food and shelter.
People like you are sick and need to be treated. Yes, there will be some job losses, but you'll also have an increased number of jobs that pay a decent wage, the taxi companies won't have to compete with what is barely better than slave labor and the economy will benefit from additional workers that can afford to pay for the basic necessities of life.
It never ceases to amaze me how much mental gymnastics you'll go through in order to rationalize why corporations should be entitled to rob and exploit the people, just so that the government doesn't have any control. Fascism is a terrible system to live under, even worse than actual communism.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday January 02 2020, @01:02AM
I suggest we start my treatment with a huge heaping of clue for you. Blowing off continued job loss as "there will be some" ignores that the "increased number" will woefully inadequate and that sectors of the economy do more important things than merely have jobs at a decent wage. You're harming anyone who needs ride hailing to get somewhere.
As to the "barely better than slave labor", as an Uber/Lyft you can choose when to start and stop working instantly. No genuine slavery would allow you to just drop things, perhaps permanently, whenever you felt like it.
Further, I noticed this Freudian slip where you started talking about taxi companies not competing rather than taxi drivers not competing. A stagnant cartel is a shitty end state and you really can do better than to be some dim-witted pawn for their propaganda.