If you’ve taken your fair share of Ubers or Lyfts, you know that app-based employees are people from different backgrounds.
They are moms, refugees, college students or former taxi drivers who rely on flexible hours to make a living.
Recently, you may have seen a lot of happy ride-hailing service drivers in “Yes on Prop 22”, advertisements online and on TV and there’s a good reason for that.
Proposition 22 is a ballot measure that would redefine app-based drivers as contractors and their subsequent labor policies initiative.
Ride-hail and delivery apps want to clarify that they are mobile app platforms where software engineers and user experience designers are considered employees, while the people who work as ride-hailing operators are merely app users.
In an Aug. 10 Bloomberg News article, the California Superior Court of San Francisco successfully held Uber and Lyft liable for misclassifying the app-based drivers as gig workers under California’s Assembly Bill 5, which passed Sept. 18, 2019.
California Assembly Bill 5, also called the “gig worker bill,” requires companies to classify independent contractors as employees.
The law went into effect in January, but Uber and Lyft denied that its ride-hailing service drivers were considered employees, meaning the drivers weren’t eligible for protections and benefits, according to an Oct. 16 article by Investopedia, an investing and finance website.
The gig economy, or gig work, refers to intermittent jobs paid hourly, like babysitters, Etsy crafters, nail and eyelash technicians, budding artists, musicians and of course, app-based delivery drivers.
Assembly Bill 5 allows workers to maintain their flexibility and multiple app usage while ensuring workers have benefits. However, this is utter nonsense and a complete contradiction.
The bill states, “the misclassification of workers as independent contractors has been a significant factor in the erosion of the middle class and the rise in income inequality.”
According to a March 27 Forbes article, today’s gig economy allows freelance workers to make money at their own pace.
Many freelance workers enjoy their flexible schedules. “I'm not looking for a boss. If I don't want to work, I don't have to," said retired hair stylist Eugene Gaddy who works as an app-based driver when he isn’t fishing, according to a Jan. 24 Times Union article.
Gig work allows people to make their own hours or supplement their primary incomes.
A June 2, 2019 article by The Guardian said, “unless [the] government defines legitimate gig work more narrowly and provides stronger safety nets for gig workers, gig capitalism cannot endure.”
If Uber were to make its drivers employees, “ride prices would increase as much as 30% in San Francisco,” according to the Bloomberg article.
App-based drivers would lose their flexible schedules to some degree and they’d lose customers when ride prices go up. This hurts drivers and riders who expect rock-bottom prices for basically a taxi service.
The opposition calls out “Yes on Prop 22” ads because big ride-hailing service companies largely fund the effort, and this is true.
Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Instacart each contributed $17.5 million to the “Yes on Prop 22” campaign according to a late contributions report filed on Sept. 4. The late contributions report is a California government form used to file ballot measure contributions over $5,000.
The importance of gig work has grown over the last decade with the Obama administration creating 10 million jobs, 94% of which were temporary positions, according to a Dec. 21, 2016 article by Investing.com, a financial market app and website.
Not allowing ride-hailing service drivers to remain individual contractors further entangles contract workers into a web of bureaucracy that complicates their lives.
The loss of standard 9-to-5 jobs hurts every demographic, but because full-time jobs are dwindling, that does not mean we simply take away other flexible work options.
Those in power should create more meaningful, full-time positions that allow gig workers the freedom to work as they please.
