The trouble with your legalistic approach to everything is that you tend to shove complicated situations into neat narrow solutions. What you're basically saying is the entire gig-E is in violation if they do not formally employee all their members. If you are driving for both uber and lyft, you do qualify for #2. #3 is a bit messy. Nobody gave a **** about this topic until the government started handing out money to gig-e workers for COVID and had no means to recoup the money. Deal with the problem at hand, dont kill the market.
That is a silly argument. The business can determine the confines of the contract. Thats like saying a plumber or electrician can't be a contractor since they can't do whatever they want because they are held to building codes. Every contractor is held to a contract, they dont just get to pick and choose whatever they want.
Its more complicated than that. And yes, companies do abuse the contract structure. But yes, I agree that tends to be the line. Can you fairly decline a contract w/out facing repercussions for future contracts.
I know you're not arguing and it may not be this simple but that's the entire angle from the driver's pov. I can use my asset to make money in my spare time. That being said the companies have started advertising driving as a job. So they can't complain too much
Bringing the facts as all ways, had no idea those were the terms of contractors and those ride sharing companies certainly don't fit.
Companies can only demand those things of their employees - what rules you can set are part of the key distinction between employees and contractors. If this was really just Uber providing technology to an independent PGAb Tax Services, they couldn't set your pricing, your standards, etc. Think of something like Thumbtack for what a true independent contractor / technology company relationship looks like. Lots of companies scam employees by calling them contractors. Ordinarily, you'd have to sue individually which is never worth the hassle and cost, so companies get away with it. California's law allowed the state to sue on behalf of groups of employees/contractors, so that's why companies' are now having their feet held to the fire. It also affects how state taxes are handled, who gets health insurance, etc. It goes towards state policy in a lot of ways.
These companies have always known they were flagrantly violating the law. Their entire business model is built on not having to follow the rules that everyone else does. Uber/Lyft are pulling these stunts worldwide in different ways - in Texas, it was about background checks, but it's all the same principle. They just do whatever they want to do despite them knowingly violating city/state regulations, and then threaten to leave and complain about how unfair it is after the fact. They've run into similar problems in cities and countries all over the world. This has been a fight that's been going on for years - it has nothing to do with Covid, and nothing to do with unemployment insurance. The law specifically dealing with this passed in 2019. Uber and Lyft could simply not ignore laws if they don't want their business model to risk being killed.
Of course they can - but that's different than the argument that was being made that Uber just "puts people together and shares in the fee", which is basically also the argument Uber is trying to make about what they do as a company. They claim that they are *not* in the business of ride-sharing, but simply in the business of just providing technology services to independent drivers. That way, drivers are providing work that is NOT "in the ordinary course of Uber's business" (one of the key tests). But if Uber is only providing technology and not involved in ride-sharing, then they can't be setting prices for their drivers, etc. They wouldn't be involved in deciding how much SpaceGhost Taxi Service can charge to drive someone from Point A to Point B in that type of relationship.
Im not necessarily arguing however in the sense the drivers don't do a lot of those things they aren't normal contractors. Uber is providing everything. They aren't taking advantage of the drivers, the drivers wouldn't be ride share drivers otherwise. Its not their expertise to do any of these things. That still doesn't make them employees. Its simply not that type of relationship
I'd make the argument. They drive their own car. They work under multiple companies. They decide their own hours. They have the ability to accept rides or not. Tons of companies misclassify employees, but for me I think they should qualify as contractors.
I notice everyone here forgot the customers It takes two To tango I know you idiots like to dance with the dude in the mirror but that’s not two
Confused..... Is the people who working for Uber/Lyft Complaining or just some group of people who "think" its not fair for the group of people who are not complaining? Just cancel it all and you can thank which ever group of people who wanted this. When i was working busboy and making $5 dollar an hour...nobody stood up for me, they told me to work faster to make more money....WTF
good news, california decided to piss everyone off, below the update is the reasoning (basically california wanted the drivers to be turned into full time employees with benefits, which is not the model they are using). drivers are contractors and that allows them to work for both companies. the contractor job was meant as extra income not a full time job, make extra money on the side driving people around. https://www.lyft.com/blog/posts/ca-operations-update UPDATE: Rideshare is ON. The California court has granted our request for a further stay, so our rideshare operations can continue uninterrupted, for now. Thanks to the tens of thousands of drivers, riders, and public officials who urged California to keep rideshare available for so many people who depend on it. Rideshare operations are being suspended in California At 11:59PM PT today our rideshare operations in California will be suspended. This is not something we wanted to do, as we know millions of Californians depend on Lyft for daily, essential trips. We’re personally reaching out to riders and drivers to share more about why this is happening, what you can do about it, and to provide some transportation alternatives. Why this is happening For multiple years, we’ve been advocating for a path to offer benefits to drivers who use the Lyft platform — including a minimum earnings guarantee and a healthcare subsidy — while maintaining the flexibility and control that independent contractors enjoy. This is something drivers have told us over and over again that they want. Instead, what Sacramento politicians are pushing is an employment model that 4 out of 5 drivers don’t support. This change would also necessitate an overhaul of the entire business model — it’s not a switch that can be flipped overnight. In this new model that politicians are pushing: Passengers would experience reduced service, especially in suburban and rural areas 80% of drivers would lose work and the rest would have scheduled shifts, and capped hourly earnings. Lower-income riders trying to make it to essential jobs and medical appointments would be faced with unaffordable prices (38% of Lyft rides in California begin or end in low-income areas that have few transit options already). What we’re doing We don’t want to suspend operations. We are going to keep up the fight for a benefits model that works for all drivers and our riders. We’ve spent hundreds of hours meeting with policymakers and labor leaders to craft an alternative proposal for drivers that includes a minimum earnings guarantee, mileage reimbursement, a health care subsidy, and occupational accident insurance, without the negative consequences.
This notion of subverting laws as business practice is certainly going to involve air b&b soon enough. The laws are not keeping up with the speed of business innovation driven by tech.
