Uber Class-Action Case May Hinge On What the Drivers Want

New submitter shanemccarthy writes with a story at Forbes that lays out a non-intuitive factor in the ongoing class-action suit over alleged labor law violations filed in the name of Uber drivers. Namely: how Uber drivers see themselves in relation to the company. While some drivers consider themselves, or would like to be considered, employees, and accrue the conventional benefits of employee status at a large company (and Uber, for all its crowd-sourcing, disintermediating origin story, is large enough to garner a valuation in the billions), a considerable number of the drivers do not want to give up their status as independent contractors. The rules of class action lawsuits, though, mean that if Uber's drivers are classed as employees, those who would like to remain independent won't have that option -- so the company is lining up examples of drivers who would seem by no one's definition to be employees, and who want to keep it that way. See also this earlier story about workplace classification for these drivers and others in non-traditional work arrangements.

Comments

Actor's agent is also an employer?

[willworkforbeer]

The agent lines up work options, the actor decides to take it or not.

- Actor pays her own expenses
- Actor works whenever she chooses (or not)
- Actor gives a percentage of her earnings to the agent for successful gigs.

Is the agent her employer?

Re:Actor's agent is also an employer?

[kamapuaa]

Drivers don't really have the option not to take rides...they have to accept 90% of rides offered, or they're out of Uber. Uber also doesn't let drivers see the routes they're going to take ahead of time, just where the pickup locations are. Uber also sets prices that the drivers are going to work at.

So going with your analogy, imagine if the agent told the actor, "in order to remain an actor, you're going to work some unknown jobs at specific locations I give you, and I've decided you're going to do this work for 20% less than you received last time, and your only recourse it to quit." It sounds like a W-2 job to me.

Why does it have to be one or the other?

[LogicLoop]

Years ago, I worked for an IT consulting company that gave its workers the option of being full employees (with a standard benefits package including 401K, health insurance, paid time off, etc.) OR contractors who received no benefits, but a significantly higher wage. The client paid the same rate either way, the workers got to choose which arrangement worked best for them, and the consulting company (presumably) got their cut ... a true win-win.

I'm sure the trade-offs with Uber aren't exactly the same, but I still don't see why they can't offer their workers more than one option.