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Uber Appeals Against Ruling that Its UK Drivers Are Workers (theguardian.com)
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, brat has tantrum.
Film at 11.
Specific working conditions define whether a worker is an employee or is a contractor, and the laws governing such are generally pretty straightforward. How Uber thinks it should be exempt from these rules doesn't make any sense.
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.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Gig economy is a social equivalent of dumping toxic waste into a river. Any company that operates like this deserves what they get.
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.
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.
Alternative Right.
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.