Will Uber be leaving California?
Did their drivers just kill their jobs?
....................................................................................................................................................................
- At the behest of a group of Uber drivers, the California Supreme Court has ruled that Uber drivers are Uber employees, not independent contractors, under California law:
..................................
They wanted a wage.
They rather be a wage-slave than a free agent contractor.
Perhaps they'll be happy with the way it turns out. I suspect not. I wonder if the taxi drivers union had anything to do with this?
Oh. Well. Californicators driving business away again. They must take lessons from Seattle.
The author of the article says..
- If I were the leader of Uber, I would announce today that we are exiting California. This is an existential issue and the only way to fight it is right now on your home turf. Any attempt to try to muddle through this is going to lead to Uber's death, and would thus be a disservice to its shareholders. Whether this happens will be interesting. Uber is owned by a bunch of California VC's who generally support exactly this sort of government authoritarian interventionism. It will be interesting to see if a bunch of California progressives let $50 billion in equity go down the drain just to avoid offending the sensibilities of their fellow California progressives.
Short sighted I my opinion. I would think the Uber drivers would be upset, losing the independance of being free agent contractors. I suppose they believe it guarantees a wage that will be more, or some other misrepresented bonus. Let's see how this unfolds.
Hive
Vote.
The only independence they are losing is the independence to make less than minimum wage.
and a company to work for.
That only matters if they are employees, independent contractors don't just work at one place all the time.
If they go through with it and place them on a way, it'll be the end of Uber
nah, Uber is going to fire all their drivers sooner or later anyhow, the drivers were just an means to an end, Uber already bought 100,000 self driving cars.
right...so the end result is that the drivers get fired sooner than later.
such a WIN!
Fired? you would have to be hired first and be an employee, only employees can be fired. Yup, both now and in the future Uber is all about screwing their drivers, you don't watch TV but if you did you would see that Uber never ever advertises its service, all of its ads are to recruit drivers, it's basically a scam.
Do you know any Uber drivers personally?
I do.
He seems to like it.
I can't say that I do, what sort of grades did he get in Math class?
he was an electronics engineer for motorola..he designed integrated circuits...after that he worked for the state. he was the manager in charge of the department in that tested stuff( does this sample have arsenic init...how pure is this water.......(I don't know the official name)...
he'd drive for Uber when he wanted to, if he wanted to, where he wanted to...pretty much just to get out of the house.
what you hear on the news is a lie.
I am not sure where the news comes into play. Uber advertises a lot over many platforms, strictly advertising to recruit new drivers, never ever advertising their service. The only reason I can think of for that is a lot of turnover caused by people realizing how little money they are making after all of the expenses. That and Uber drivers are constantly getting assaulted and ripped off. Getting out of the house is priceless, does not sound like his is in it for the money.
The state of california declared that they were actually employees.
exactly, you can call someone an independent contractor but if they fit the law's definition of a employee then they get all the rights and privileges state law grants to employees, a lot of places try to skirt that by improperly categorizing people.
It's good they are cracking down on this, besides paying most people less than minimum wage the place I worked at was using a lot of illegal aliens because their "independent contractors" were allowed to subcontract and there was no oversight over that. When your Amazon package comes a day late in a sketchy rented van driven by a lost guy who doesn't speak English from Lazership that's usually what's happening.
do you know what the definition of a contractor is or do you just go by what they say on the news?
For example...who owns the car..who pays for the gas...who pays for all other expenses? Who sets the hours...who determines the route...
The definition of a contractor is irrelevant to this case, what matters is the definition of an employee in California, and no I don't know the definition of that there, I assume it is fairly similar to the one in MA though. If someone meets the definition of an employee then they are one and if you try to call them an independent contractor to try to get around wage or labor laws then you will have to pay them damages. They may be calling them independent contractors but apparently the courts think they are de facto employees.
It does not take much to be an employee, in my case one of the factors that caused the company to lose was that they made people wear shirts with a company logo, you can't really deliver a package for another company while wearing their shirt so then you are not an independent contractor.
I think so too.
does not compute! does not compute! does not compute!
free agent contractors often make less than minimum wage
I'd prefer to be 'free agent' earning less, than someone else's
bitchemployee - just the way i'm built. Always have been.That's the thing in these cases, they are not really independent contractors, in everything but name they are employees, the company is just calling them independent contractors to avoid wage and hour laws and often immigration laws. Would you like to be called an independent contractor but be for all intents and purposes a bitch employee and then make less than minimum wage?
I don't understand the way uber works, then - I thought you were self employed, logged in when you wanted, log off when you want.
(similar to the 'used to be' minicab drivers, in the UK. I think uber rule in the UK, now not been there for years..)
Do I have that wrong?
I haven't read the arguments in this case. I was a party to a similar mass tort by the same lawyer for the same thing. There must be something about how they are operating that causes their drivers to fit the definition of an employee in California. It could be something as simple as there being a group of drivers who only work for Uber and do so full time. If someone is working 40 hours a week for you and no one else and you make various rules for them then they are not really independent contractors. It could be that Uber sign they make them put up. One of the reasons my company lost its suit is they made people put signs on their vehicles.
Who wouldn't rather make at least minimum wage instead of less than minimum wage? The courts ruled the employees are employees because they are and they were only categorized as independent contractors so Uber could ignore labor laws and mistreat its workers.
What the taxi drivers union (if they have one) and/or a class action suit by taxi drivers has to do with this is that it is exactly the same laws that the cab companies were violating in order to underpay their workers as well.
I am sure they have the same lawyer because there is one lawyer who does all of these cases. When she represented me as part of a class action she got me a few grand from the employer who was also violating the laws by illegally claiming people were independent contractors who are actually employees. Shannon is awesome.
How long do you think Uber will survive...?
They'll be fine, they already bought a bunch of self driving cars, they will just have to pay the difference between what they paid people and what they would make on minimum wage. That sort of thing.
Contractors have the right to say "NO".
Employees do not.
Exactly, did they have a choice about putting that little Uber sign in their window? If not they are employees.
Saludos. Es que con su salario garantizarian ellos otros beneficios colectivos pero trae con ellos vicios y retrazos en rendimiento laboral. Sencillamente cada quien jala por su lado.
you do and you'll clean it up.
there are rules of behavior to be observed.
Eso es correcto lider..
bless you.
Meh history has proven that Uber doesn’t care about laws. They’ve been getting around taxi unions and airport laws this long I’m sure they will survive they are making too much money. I’d love to get paid more though
why are they 'making so much money'?
The lawyer representing them pretty much always wins, she does these cases exclusively.
ok..she won.
She destroyed Uber's business model in California by doing so.
now what?
If that happens then a company whose business model does not depend on violating labor laws and on people being bad at math and not realizing they are making less than minimum wage will probably become dominant. I guess they will need a business model that allows them to profit within the bounds of the law like everyone else.