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posted by janrinok on Sunday February 11 2018, @05:24PM   Printer-friendly
from the losing-track-of-these-company-names dept.

In what is believed to be the first gig economy case to be fully decided on the merits, Grubhub has beaten back a labor lawsuit filed by one of its former drivers.

In a court opinion released Thursday by US Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley, "the Court finds that Grubhub has satisfied its burden of showing that Mr. Lawson was properly classified as an independent contractor."

Both sides had agreed that Judge Corley, rather than a jury, would decide the case in her San Francisco federal courtroom. She heard closing arguments in late October 2017.

[...] Part of what may have doomed Lawson's own case was that, in Judge Corley's estimation, in addition to working for other gig economy companies while simultaneously working for Grubhub, he was fundamentally "not credible."

[...] Lawson, by his own admission, "gamed the app" by scheduling himself for a work shift (a "block" in company parlance) but received few, if any, actual delivery orders by putting his phone in airplane mode, among other tactics.

"Mr. Lawson's claimed ignorance of his dishonest conduct is not credible," Judge Corley wrote. "Mr. Lawson would remember if after he filed this lawsuit against Grubhub he cheated Grubhub. If he had not moved his smart phone to airplane mode, intentionally toggled available late, or deliberately engaged in other conduct to get paid for doing nothing he would have denied doing so at trial. But he did not."

[...] Michael LeRoy, a professor of labor law at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, told Ars that the case has "limited precedential value."

"Going forward," he emailed, "lawyers who bring these types of lawsuits should have reservations about pushing too far or long with a plaintiff who can be shown to cheat and who gives sworn deposition or trial testimony that is not credible."

Ars Technica


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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by TheRaven on Monday February 12 2018, @11:38AM (2 children)

    by TheRaven (270) on Monday February 12 2018, @11:38AM (#636640) Journal

    Their government is bankrupt, and constantly getting bailouts from everyone else.

    You remember the article a couple of days ago about people on the right being more likely to repeat fake news without engaging in any critical thinking? Thanks for providing a case study.

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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Entropy on Monday February 12 2018, @11:08PM (1 child)

    by Entropy (4228) on Monday February 12 2018, @11:08PM (#636866)

    I'm sorry. I thought it was common knowledge that the California government is both bankrupt, and regularly receives bailouts from the federal government. is it not? If I say California has amazing weather, would I need a citation for that too?

    Here are a couple very easy to find citations. Which point were you saying I was not applying critical thinking to? That they are broke, that they are receiving outside money bailouts because they are broke, or both?

    California government bankrupt:
    https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/08/the-biggest-reason-why-california-is-bankrupt/261524/ [theatlantic.com]
    http://www.weeklystandard.com/give-states-a-way-to-go-bankrupt/article/518378 [weeklystandard.com]
      ($7 billion bailout by the feds..)

    California government receiving bailout:
    https://www.cagw.org/thewastewatcher/california%e2%80%99s-7-billion-bailout [cagw.org]
      "Indeed, California’s lackadaisical use of federal funds is one reason for its current situation."
    https://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/06/27/the-silent-bailout-of-the-states-the-greatest-threat-to-our-economic-freedom/#36e26f6d626c [forbes.com]
      "In contrast profligate states, such as California and Illinois, have failed to reduce the growth in their own spending and continue to face sizeable deficits and accumulate debt."
    https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/09/california-needs-multi-bi_n_417318.html [huffingtonpost.com]
      "asked for $6.9 billion in federal funds in his state-budget proposal Friday and warned that state health and welfare programs would be threatened without the emergency help."

    • (Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday February 13 2018, @10:01AM

      by TheRaven (270) on Tuesday February 13 2018, @10:01AM (#637055) Journal

      I'm sorry. I thought it was common knowledge that the California government is both bankrupt, and regularly receives bailouts from the federal government. is it not?

      No, it's often repeated but not actually supported up by evidence when you look at which states are net contributors to the Federal budget.

      California government bankrupt: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/08/the-biggest-reason-why-california-is-bankrupt/261524/ [theatlantic.com] [theatlantic.com] http://www.weeklystandard.com/give-states-a-way-to-go-bankrupt/article/518378 [weeklystandard.com] [weeklystandard.com] ($7 billion bailout by the feds..)

      An article from 8 years ago and most of your other citations are in relation to the same issue, so let's look at the balance of payments. I can't find the 2010 numbers, but in the preceding year, California was one of the top net contributors to the Federal budget [blogspot.co.uk]. They received back $0.78 for every $1 they paid in. To put those in absolute terms, in 2002, California had paid $58bn more to the Federal government than it received back and had been a net contributor for every year since 1987 [calinst.org]. I couldn't find more recent numbers for the absolute amount, but that was a sharp increase from preceding years and even if it had stayed constant and not increased even in line with inflation, then a $7bn 'bailout' would be around 10% of the the net contribution of California to the Federal budget. To put that in perspective, California would have gone from getting back about $0.78 for every $1 it paid into the Federal budget to getting back about $0.81 for every $1. Even with this bailout, California would still have been in the top ten contributors to the Federal budget.

      The budget deficit in California from your articles was around $25bn, or less than half of the net that California pays into the Federal budget. If California dropped their contribution to the Federal budget to the middle of the pack, where it received about the same back as it paid in, then it would be running with a budget surplus of around $35bn annually.

      Oh, and in case you don't want to click on the links, the states that rely the most on Federal handouts are (dollar amounts are the amount that they receive back for every dollar paid into the Federal budget):

      1. New Mexico $2.03
      2. Mississippi $2.02
      3. Alaska $1.84
      4. Louisiana $1.78
      5. West Virginia $1.76
      6. North Dakota $1.68
      7. Alabama $1.66
      8. South Dakota $1.53
      9. Kentucky $1.51
      10. Virginia $1.51

      Not exactly a list of the most liberal states in the US, is it?

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