Uber Appeals Against Ruling that Its UK Drivers Are Workers (theguardian.com) 178
Uber has launched an appeal against a landmark employment tribunal ruling that its minicab drivers should be classed as workers with access to the minimum wage, sick pay and paid holidays. From a report on The Guardian: The taxi-app company filed papers with the appeal tribunal on Tuesday in an attempt to overturn the October judgment that, if it stands, could affect tens of thousands of workers in the gig economy. The move came as several dozen Uber drivers picketed City Hall on Wednesday holding placards demanding Transport for London, which licences Uber as a private hire operator in the capital, "end sweated labour now." It also mounted a protest at the City of London offices of Salesforce, a US computing company that is a major Uber client. Two Uber drivers, James Farrar and Yaseen Aslam, took Uber to court on behalf of a group 19 others who argued that they were employed by the San Francisco-based company, rather than working for themselves. Uber's business model has been based on treating drivers who log on to its app as self-employed contractors and taking a cut of their fares, which Uber dictates.
In Other News (Score:4, Insightful)
In other news, brat has tantrum.
Film at 11.
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There needs to be a fight to preserve the rights to BE and USE independent contractors.
No one holds a gun to anyones' head to drive for Uber. If you want to work this model..do it...if not, don't work it but don't cut the ability to work in this model for others that WANT to....geez!!
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Independent contractors should able to set independent rates.
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Just here to remind everyone not to feed 1100100100 - he is a troll and his post is bait.
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Just here to remind everyone not to feed 110010001000 - he is a troll and his post is bait.
FTFY. You missed a couple of zeros in his username.
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I don't even dignify him with a copypasta of whatever his string is anymore. I just know it's 11...10...10.
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Here is the thing: just because someone says something you don't think is right, or you disagree with, THEY ARE NOT A TROLL. Please show me that the definition of a contractor is the ability to set your own rate, you troll!
Let me google this for you: https://www.gov.uk/employment-... [www.gov.uk]
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That is some dubious logic. So governmental contractors who take a contract that pays X are employees? Doesn't work that way.
A lot of civil service contractors started getting paid as employees after IR35 came in to force. So, pretty much yeah.
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I just looked up this IR35 thing....a UK rule.
Ouch..that sucks.
I'm glad we don't have that in the US so far.
I just don't get it...WHY are governments so fucking afraid to let people make up their own minds how they want to be employed, what jobs to take and HOW they are compensated for it?
I personally LOVE the 1099 contracting method. Sure it takes a bit more paperwork, but I set my ow
Re: In Other News (Score:3)
IR35 was introduced because contractors often pay less income tax than employees (by using dividends from their one-man limited company, and by deferring income to maximise use of allowances). So the government is out money.
It seems they're fine being out this money if it's genuinely a business-to-business kind of deal. But not if it is disguised employment.
The only time I was ever asked to fill out IR35 paperwork I pointed out that I was contracting as an individual, rather than through a limited company,
Re: In Other News (Score:3, Insightful)
In short, for much the same reason that you can't decide to become a slave, even if you want to be. Minimum standards that prevent a race to the bottom need to be enforced for the benefit of society as a whole, not for the individual. Another way to look at it is that neoliberal sociopathy hasn't quite infected everything yet. The reasoning should be quite easy to follow, it's very frightening how many comments we see on here that don't seem to get it.
Re:In Other News (Score:5, Interesting)
I just looked up this IR35 thing....a UK rule.
Yep.
I just don't get it...WHY are governments so fucking afraid to let people make up their own minds how they want to be employed, what jobs to take and HOW they are compensated for it?
I've done a fair bit of contracting and I'm in favour if IR35.
These laws don't come from nowhere. There's not a panel of MPs sitting round figuring how to screw you just for the hell of it (unless you're poor and the Tories are in power).
Most of the "contracting" was just a tax dodge. If the money is paid to a company, that company can pay dividends (lower tax rate) and there's no national insurance (basically a form of income tax) for the employer to make their contribution too. Additionally, the money can be moved off without taxes since it's just regular business to business stuff.
IOW it's a massive tax dodge most of the time.
The other thing is that employees used to have far fewer rights. We know how it plays out and it turns out those rights are a good thing. And if you want that protection of a company it comes with responsibilities to your employees because the country works better that way. And ultimately since we have a welfare state willing to step in when the proverbial hits the fan so if companies go screwing over employees every other taxpayer ends up on the hook. So wanting to have regular employees but none of the responsibilities is yet more freeloading.
And companies started doing that a lot. Not all, but enough that it became a problem. So the government passed a law that you can't skimp on obligations by playing word games. I think that's reasonable.
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Um bullshit. Companies hire contractors at their own set rates. The ability to set your own rate has nothing to do with being a contractor.
This is an obvious fallacy as the contractors can always negotiate the rates and terms, regardless of how "set" a company says they are when going into the negotiations.
With Uber, you cannot negotiate the rates. There is literally no mechanism for such a contract to be negotiated.
You know this and you intentionally made that post with that ridiculous fallacy. Your post is bait.
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I"ve taken many a contracting job where they said the bill rate is $x/hr.....there was no negotiating, you take it or leave it.
That's pretty common with 1099 work I find.
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It's a "pray I don't alter it any further" situation where the employees are expected to take whatever is decided by Uber management.
Re: In Other News (Score:4, Informative)
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Sorry I don't go along with the "groupthink" here, but the fact is that Ubers owners are very rich because they know that their drivers are contractors, not employees.
Actually, Uber has money because it found investors who paid in billions of dollars. They are not actually money right now.
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As a contractor I always negotiate with my clients.
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Of course a contractor has the right to negotiate a rate. He doesn't have the right to dictate it, because the other party also has the right to negotiate it. If they can't get an overlap, they both walk way - no deal.
Protip: use the right word for the right meaning. It makes you look less retarded.
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"You guys are the ones "retarded"."
Or is it Mr 110010001000 the retarded one?
"The legal definition of a contractor"
What you think the legal definition of a contractor given USA laws has nothing to do with whatever the UK definition is -which is relevant since this is about a UK case.
"Uber drivers are contractors."
Sure. That's why Uber lost the case and the tribunal told they are *not* contractors. So much for you comprehension of what "legal" means.
Now, I think we all know who the retarded one is.
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Um bullshit. Companies hire contractors at their own set rates. The ability to set your own rate has nothing to do with being a contractor.
Well except that many of those actually got clobbered by the IR35 legislation and were told that their contractors were in fact employees, so no they couldn't dodge a whole bunch of tax by calling employees something else.
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Um bullshit. Companies hire contractors at their own set rates. The ability to set your own rate has nothing to do with being a contractor.
You might want to stop talking out of your ass. All it does is make you look like a fool.
As a contractor, only I set my rates. Companies usually have a budget for a project, but I've never seen one that "only hires contractors for $45 an hour".
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Independent contractors should able to set independent rates.
They can. If it is a rate that Uber agrees with, Uber will award a contract. If not, they will use another contractor.
Where Uber is going wrong is forbidding drivers (contractors) supplying services to other service operators. THIS is what truly prevents a contractor from setting their own rate.
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What are you talking about? They aren't forbidden. Lots of drivers work for Lyft AND Uber.
Not [news.com.au] independent [therideshareguy.com]
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No one holds a gun to anyone's head to work for any company. That doesn't change the fact that if part of the contract of working there is fixed hours, fixed pay, fixed requirements for how you behave, then you're employed by them, not a contractor.
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I would posit, that if you are trying to make a living by driving Uber, then my friend YOU have made some serious vocational errors along your life so far...
NOT every job is meant to be a living wage job, plain and simple. This thought that it is, is a pretty new and puzzling philosophy to me.
Uber is a side job, to earn a bit of extra money.
The best generic answer is, if you are needing to make a living, and your current job doesn't p
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How do I get a different job? Pull it out of a hat?
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Sounds like a silly question, but I'll bite....
How did you get your CURRENT job?
Want ads?
Your list of contacts you have made through life (personal and professional)?
Friends?
I mean seriously, it isn't that difficult to look for and find work my friend.
If you are currently employed, or have EVER been employed before, you know what to do.
If not, i"m guessing you're a young teen looking for his first job?
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Your situation is the unusual one.
Also kids today have it tougher since the shit menial jobs you or I could always find eventually if there was nothing in our field are going to undocumented workers being paid under the table.
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I agree that there's some weirdness here. Uber drivers aren't quite the same as completely independent contractors. But they are also clearly pretty different from traditional employees. They have complete freedom in what hours they drive and what areas they drive in. They can work 200 hours one month and none the next. They can drive for Lyft tomorrow if it has better rates.
Trying to force them into the mold of traditional employees is wrong. It defeats a lot of
Piece-work (Score:2)
You just haven't noticed because it's taxi trips and not shirts.
Re:In Other News (Score:5, Insightful)
The best generic answer is, if you are needing to make a living, and your current job doesn't pay you enough, then use common sense and GET DIFFERENT JOB....
That's excellent advice! I'll share it with my brother, who was laid off when his company moved their infrastructure to some managed cloud thing from Tata, and whose wife lost her job when her hospital outsourced its nursing staff. She put in an application with the contractor hoping to get her job back at about 3/4 of her previous pay, but no dice. I wonder why they didn't just get better paying jobs before they went through foreclosure, moved into a shitty apartment complex where several people have been murdered this year, and he started stocking shelves at Home Depot during the day and driving for Uber at night (leaving him zero time to learn a new skill set, mind you), while my sister-in-law with her ADN/RN waits tables at Outback Steakhouse?
Such idiots they were for not just getting another job!
My brother's gonna be thrilled when I pass along your "One Neat Trick to Financial Stability!" Who knew it could be so easy?
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And you got into an industry that's largely immune to competition by the sheer force of your genius, and not even slightly due to luck?
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Obviously I'm a bit older than you.
But seriously, growing up, no one ever had the thought that EVERY job out there, must be one that pays a wage that you could make a living on. This is a VERY RECENT trend in thinking.
I mean, you don't consider kids mowing lawns or babysitting or other jobs as requiring one to earn enough to make a living, with full food and shelter in there. This was also extended to very low end W2 jobs like burger flipper, dish washer in a restaurant, etc.
There were always jobs
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But if drivers rely on Uber to make a living ...
Most drivers do NOT rely on Uber to make a living. The majority do it part time, and it is not the main source of income for their household.
... minimum wage, sick pay and paid holidays.
Uber drivers, on average, make about $19/hour in America. That is more than double the minimum wage. They can take a day off any time they like. Those days are unpaid, of course, but "sick days" and vacation are not free in a regular job either: the cost of benefits is just incorporated into lower pay spread over the year.
traditional taxi drivers have these rights.
TFA is about the UK, but at least in Americ
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Uber is just taxi over-the-internet and traditional taxi drivers have these rights.
The self-employed do not have those rights because there is no employer, only customers and suppliers.
Of course employers would love to do an end-run arround employment law by claiming the people who work for them are self-employed. So the legal system has to make a determination of whether someone is truely self-employed or not.
Many taxi drivers in the UK are self-employed. Hackney carriage drivers can operate entirely independently if they want though many of them sign up with an operator to get extra job
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What the fuck does that have to do with the UK?
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It's coming. That nice Mrs May went to India recently and one of the items on the agenda was opening up India's financial services market for her city chums. There'll be a quid pro quo for that, and I have my suspicions what it'll be.
Mind you, I think Gordon Brown did something similar when contractors complained about IR35 and a lot of them fucked off abroad? Full fruit of their labours my arse.
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It has fuck all to do with the UK, that's what.
However, we seem to follow the same downward spiral and however your workers get fucked ours will (or have already been) too.
How hard is it to understand? (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course they're operating an unlicensed taxi service in violation of passenger livery laws too, so I guess following the law is not something they're especially good at.
Re:How hard is it to understand? (Score:5, Interesting)
Specific working conditions define whether a worker is an employee or is a contractor, and the laws governing such are generally pretty straightforward.
Sadly, in the UK the law in this area is anything but straightforward. This has been a controversial issue, the ambiguity has been a significant problem for genuine contractors, freelancers and sometimes small family businesses for a long time now, and the loss of tax revenue to disguised employees is a problem for the government as well.
However, in this case, Uber seems to be on the wrong side of so many of the usual indicators that it's hard to see how it stands any chance at all of victory here unless some sort of dubious legal shenanigans are possible.
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Sadly, in the UK the law in this area is anything but straightforward.
In America, the IRS publishes a list of criteria, but none of them are specifically necessary or sufficient to determine if someone is an employee or a contractor. The determination is usually ad hoc, with a lot of discretion left to employers, IRS agents, and judges. Anyone claiming that contractor law is "straightforward" has no idea what they are talking about.
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The Land Transport Safety Authority are having none of it though, and Uber drivers are being fined if they are caught operating without the right license.
Uber will be gone in a couple of years (here at least), as in most major markets there is an over supply of taxis, so Uber has no edge.
According to this [nzherald.co.nz] Uber
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The problem is that Uber is trying to claim that they're enabling drivers to share the cost of rides when the driver is already going a certain way, but that's not how it's actually used.
Yeah, good luck with that (Score:3)
I don't fancy Uber's chances here at all. Disguised employment is a big deal for the government in the UK, including for tax reasons. Even if Uber wins the appeal, it's not unlikely that full legislation would follow to close whatever loophole it relied on.
Gig economy = social toxic waste dumping (Score:5, Insightful)
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But that's the modern way of doing business! It's a great business model.
1. Start a _____ company.
2. Ignore all laws and regulations that _____ companies are required to follow.
3. Profit!!!
You can fill in the blank with any kind of company you want. They call it "disruptive innovation". I guess because ignoring laws is so innovative.
"...who argued that they were employed..." (Score:3)
"...who argued that they were employed..."
That's easy: "You're fired. Anyone else think they are an employee?"
The only thing that would make it better is if all the taxi drivers in London had to dress like Bruce Willis in "The 5th Element".
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The thing is, if they are employees, then under UK employment law you can't just fire them like that. This is one of the major protections that employees enjoy but independents typically do not, and it's a good example of why the distinction is so important in a situation like this.
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That's easy: "You're fired. Anyone else think they are an employee?"
UK doesn't have at-will employment. The US does. Try again.
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That's easy: "You're fired. Anyone else think they are an employee?"
UK doesn't have at-will employment. The US does. Try again.
US at-will employees are still protected by federal and state laws (e.g., discrimination, harassment, whistle-blowing.) An employer can terminate without cause, but not in a way that is illegal.
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You can't claim unfair dismissal until you've been working for the employer for two years. So until then it's as close to it as makes any difference.
https://www.gov.uk/dismiss-sta... [www.gov.uk]
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Ooh, a wrongful termination suit! Thank you!
And yes, if you say I'm fired that's acknowledgement that I WAS an employee, otherwise you couldn't fire me in the first place.
Mixed Feelings (Score:3, Insightful)
I have such mixed feelings about this issue. On the one hand, worker rights are crucial essential. I don't want any business to be able to operate as a loophole to get around them. On the other, this is a new business model that is still developing, and it's wrong to just shut it down. Uber and its competitors have really revolutionized transportation. Before, I *never* would have taken a taxi in a first world country, as they have always been obscenely expensive. Now I can actually get around when public transportation fails me or is inconvenient.
The burst pricing model is actually quite brilliant, but I do think that Uber dictating the price drivers can charge does really push the argument in the drivers' favour, though. If it were literally just a SAAS app that independent contractors used to find customers, they would have complete control to set their own prices, etc. Maybe this is a change that needs to happen. I'm not sure. What I do know is, we can't deny people the opportunity to work part-time, or however they want, simply because it would require the company to provide them with expensive benefits. That doesn't make sense.
Perhaps a new model of benefits needs to be created for this type of employment. If you argue that a traditional worker should be entitled to 4 weeks of paid holiday per year, then that's 1 hour of holiday per hour worked, right? So, once a person reaches, say, 96 hours (of actual drive time with a customer, on the clock), they would be eligible to receive a bonus of 8 hours (times the minimum wage, I guess?) on their next pay cheque. I'm just brainstorming, and this idea is sounding worse the more I write, so I'll stop. I just think some other kind of ideology needs to be developed.
Re:Mixed Feelings (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Mixed Feelings (Score:4, Informative)
There are already plenty of viable ways to work independently in the UK. Well over a million of us do so all the time, through freelancing, contract work, partnerships, and other arrangements. We knowingly and willingly make different trade-offs to employees in terms of protections, compensation, flexibility and other factors, and if you get it right, this can bring advantages to both the professional and their customer/client.
However, what you're not allowed to do under UK law is put someone in a position where they're being treated like an independent in respects like employment rights and taxation, yet still required to give up the practical independence and flexibility that non-employees normally enjoy in return.
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If you argue that a traditional worker should be entitled to 4 weeks of paid holiday per year, then that's 1 hour of holiday per hour worked, right?
1 hour of holiday per hour worked?? No. Assuming a 40-hour week, 4 weeks of holiday per year is 3.07 hours of holiday accrual per week, or 0.077 hours per hour. 96 drive time hours would get you 7.38 holiday hours, which is pretty close to the 8 hours you stated.
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Damn, no mod points today so please so someone mod up this insightful post that for once is neither an Uber-froth-fanboy ass-kissing, nor the reverse
If drivers could set their own prices (Score:2)
Re:Mixed Feelings (Score:4, Insightful)
New? It's 19th century piece-work disguised by lies.
"Ride Sharing?" As if the driver is going to drive to your destination whether you are in the car or not.
First Reaction (Score:2)
My first reaction to this was, "You knew the job was dangerous when you took it." Sort of like people moving into houses next to an airport, then complaining about the noise from aircraft taking off and landing.
Don't know what the final ruling might be on this, but it seems like if being an Uber driver is a job in the normal sense, then it would lose most of the flexibility that makes it attractive to people who do it at their convenience. I'm wondering what sort of benefits part-time workers in the UK are
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I'm wondering what sort of benefits part-time workers in the UK are entitled to.
People keep using the word "worker" in this discussion, from the title onwards, but what we're talking about from a legal and tax perspective is being an employee.
In the UK, employees enjoy broadly similar employment rights and protections whether they are part time or full time. There are some controversial areas, like the zero-hours contracts that are popular with certain businesses right now, and internships. There are also certain aspects that affect some groups, such as people working in very seasonal
Re: First Reaction (Score:2)
The ruling actually gave 'worker' status, not 'employee'. The former carries only some of the obligations of the latter and is a sort of half way house between ongoing employment and being in business on your own account.
Critically, it does cone with rights to the minimum wage and holiday pay, though.
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My apologies, you're right and I was wrong. Apparently I'd confused the case being described here with one of the other complaints I'd seen about Uber's business practices recently.
I think most of my previous post remains true either way, though. We're still talking about a determination by an employment tribunal, and the rights and benefits concerned still typically apply proportionately for part-time workers where that makes sense.
Uber Driivers = Independent Contractors (Score:2)
There was a reason it was so cheap (Score:3, Insightful)
Taxi companies take on the burden of vetting, licensing, requiring education on street locations, and the like for their workers.
To avoid flooding the market, they ensure that only a limited number of drivers are able to be licensed.
They buy expensive insurance and work with law enforcement.
Uber is succeeding not because it is disruptive, but because is new and therefore has not been battered by misfortunes over time into adopting a similar model.
It is cheap because it passes all of these costs onto you, and onto its insurance companies, who have not yet figured out the full scope of the risk involved, mainly because they will make a tidy profit selling what should be expensive insurance cheaply because Uber is expanding.
Those who have any brains at Uber intend to build up the business and sell out because they know their fortune cannot last.
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I wish that were the case, but from my understanding, Uber is just trying to establish dominance in ride-sharing before automated cars get major approval. Then they can dispense with all these drivers and keep all the money.
Create An OSS App! (Score:2)
Just create an open source free downloadable app that lets drivers and riders hook up with no central business at all. Have a rating system that allows riders to rate the drivers. Allow the rider and driver to negotiate their own rates. And run it heavily encrypted and/or connected through TOR to prevent snooping.
"The first rule of Ride-Share Club is; Don't talk about Ride-Share Club!" Cut out the ability for anyone, like the government, to know who you deal with or if or how much money changed hands in the
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One side-effect of this cracking-down on working by 'gig' by the various governments, is how it may affect your average gigging musician/band playing the local bar/club. If local bars/clubs have to treat bands/musicians as employees,
I think that it only extends to a musician if the musician band ONLY works for one club owner.
Or the musician works for multiple club owners, but all their contracts are through one booking agent and the booking agent sets the prices/compensation.
I think that most musicians play
Who is your employer? (Score:3)
We covered this in college in our Manufacturing Management course. The law in the UK has a lot of grey areas concerning what constitutes and employer/employee relationship, and it's not as simple as who's cutting the paycheque. Who do you report to? Who's controlling the method of work? Who determines your hours? There's a multitude of factors that have to be taken into consideration and weighed up collectively on a case-by-case basis. The word "reasonable" shows up a lot in these laws, and that's wide open to interpretation. The precedent that this sets is going to be interesting.
Uber can't PR their way to victory on this one. (Score:2)
Given that contract classification abuse (if not outright fraud) is something well known across the world, Uber can't PR themselves out of this one.
Re:Fuck the "gig economy" (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the future - make everyone a contractor. you're only paid when you work. benefits? You're on your own.
Days off? Sure, you don't get paid - AND someone else takes your (route, hours, work, etc...) and good luck getting it back when you come back from vacation, sick leave, etc ...
Oh, and good luck being compensated for the business risk and expenses that companies are pushing on to the worker - er, I mean "contractor". No business, well you don't work and get paid - but we're still gonna pay you like you were an employee. Oh yeah, and it's up to you to keep up your tools and equipment, insurance and everything.
They try to sell it like you're being an "entrepreneur" and "in business for yourself" and "calling your own shots" but the fact of the matter is that your tax status changed - nothing else.
Uber and Lyft and the gig economy is for suckers. But it's gonna be forced on us because too many stupid people fall for it.
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Agreed. Came here to post this.
If Uber can't fire them, and has no control over their operations, and doesn't pay them a salary, how are they employees? If this holds, then isn't everyone who published an iPhone app is an employee of Apple? They are programmers who set their own hours, and used Apple's app to publish a product, and apple gets a cut of it.
Re: Please explain this to me (Score:2)
It can fire them, by removing them from their system. And they are paid wages - on a piecework basis rather than per hour, but at the employers' rates. This used to be very common in the UK before the trade union movement was strong.
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It can fire them, by removing them from their system.
Apple can "fire" someone by removing them and their app from the system too. By that measure, Facebook can "fire" me as well.
And they are paid wages - on a piecework basis rather than per hour, but at the employers' rates.
I don't understand what that means. I'll have to look it up I guess. I thought they just got a commission after they completed the fare.
Re: Please explain this to me (Score:4, Interesting)
That's the problem with many of the commenters on this article. Acting as if everything that is not a 9-5 office job is contracting is somewhat naive.
In the 1990s I was a contractor, which was fine, until I started getting more than 90% of my work from one client upon which I had tax hassles because I was then considered an employee. The people who only work for Uber would not be considered contractors in most of the world.
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This seems like Uber is an information company connecting two market participants.
They sure take a big cut, just for that. Plus, they set the rate, set their cut, which you cannot negotiate, so the driver half of the 'market' have exactly zero power.
What is the benefit to society as a whole?
Having worker's rights upheld has enormous societal benefits.
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I mean, if you sit down with a company and say "I would like to work for you" and they say "OK we'll pay you $X for Y-work-done, but you get no benefits, etc" nobody's FORCING you to take that job, are they?
If you don't like it, decline the job and look elsewhere.
If you're desperate for work, then perhaps you HAVE to accept a shitty deal to get a job? Or, you should improve yourself and your skills to make yourself a more attractive candidate for a better position?
I don't really understand why there's this presumption that every job MUST be the perfect life-affirming career with 20 weeks child-leave, infinite sick days, and a complete package of benefits?
Because human beings are human beings with needs and with rights. If you work 40 hours a week you should be able to keep a roof over your head and support your family, and you shouldn't be living in poverty. If you're a woman then you should be able to reproduce and not be expected to return to work the next day if you don't have enough vacation time accrued. It doesn't matter if you're driving a taxi, flipping burgers or running a $20 million company. If you're running a business and can't afford to pay y
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If you work 40 hours a week
But there are a lot of part time jobs that manage to slip under the threshold for many benefits. Some by design of the employer, some by the availability of the worker (gig work, etc.).
If you're running a business and can't afford to pay your workers enough money to get by on
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If you work 40 hours a week you should be able to keep a roof over your head and support your family, and you shouldn't be living in poverty.
Um, no. No, you shouldn't be able to do that. Some people are really unproductive. All you do by forcing wages higher is make them unemployable (in the long run, if not in the short run). Negative income taxes like the EITC are a very elegant response to this. Perfect? No, but no human system is.
Yes you should. And don't give me this "higher wages hurt the economy" BS. Even as far back as the time of Henry Ford people understood that workers were also consumers. Why you'd want to impoverish the people who drive economic growth is beyond me.
See my post (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
There's a bit of state level meta-gaming going on with employment law.
There certainly is. States are trying to hand out unearned benefits and get someone else to pay for them. And if someone tries to step around the employer/employee model that they use to do this, they get upset. I'd rather take $X per hour for the hours that I work, or negotiate a pay for performance contract and go buy my benefits on my own. Others would like the security of state mandated benefits packages. That's fine. There should be opportunities for each.
There exists a market for people who want to d
Why should workers live in constant fear (Score:3)