
NYC sets $17 an hour minimum wage for Uber and Lyft drivers - kapkapkap
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nyc-sets-17-an-hour-minimum-wage-for-uber-and-lyft-ride-hail-drivers/
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eridius
How does an hourly minimum wage work given that Uber and Lyft drivers get paid
for doing trips, not for idling in their car waiting for rides? Does this
minimum wage only apply to times when I have a fare? That would mean the real
hourly minimum wage is less because I wouldn't have a fare 100% of the time.
If it applies when I don't have a fare too, how much idle time between fares
can I have before the minimum wage stops applying? What happens if I'm driving
for both Uber and Lyft, and alternate services on each ride, so my "fare
density" on each service is no more than 50% of each hour?

Edit: Why am I being downvoted? These are legitimate questions. I'm not
criticizing the minimum wage. I'm genuinely curious as to how it actually
works.

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thatoneuser
It’s a fair question. IMHO it absolutely should include if you’re sitting
idle. One of the biggest scams these companies are taking part in wrt labeling
their workers as “contractors” is you have to work the worst hours to hit
metrics. You can’t just go drive 40 hours a week when you want - it has to
fall on busy times and nights. If this doesn’t make them responsible for all
the hours they want people out and available, it doesn’t have much teeth.

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eridius
If a driver accepts every ride the service offers them, then I agree they
should be paid for the idle time in between being offered rides. If they don't
accept every ride offered them (as is their right, as independent
contractors), how do you determine how much idleness is ok? Saying "if you
reject a single ride you lose your minimum wage" doesn't seem ok, because that
punishes them for exercising their right as an independent contractor.

This also still runs into the question of what happens if the driver is
driving for multiple services? They may have relatively little idle time, but
each independent service sees the driver as having a lot of idle time (any
time they're on a competitor's job).

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Traster
I would put it this way: They must be paid for all idle time. If they're on
the app they're considered to be working. It's like the person working at the
McDonalds drive through - if no one pulls up to the drive through that doesn't
mean the person shouldn't be paid. It's then down to Uber or Lyft or whoever
to determine whether they want to engage a contractor whose previous behaviour
includes spending long periods not accepting jobs.

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eridius
The person at a McDonald's drive-thru is an actual employee though, they're
paid for all their time on the job, and they can't just refuse to serve a
given customer. A Lyft or Uber driver is a contractor, and is legally allowed
to refuse any individual ride.

If they couldn't refuse rides, then saying "pay them for all the time they're
in the app" makes sense, but that's not the case. Since they can refuse rides,
it doesn't make sense to say "you must pay them for all the time they're in
the app", especially since a single driver can be active on both Uber and Lyft
at the same time.

One could argue that drivers should be turned into part-time or full-time
employees, at which point yes they'd have to be paid for their idle time, but
that's a different argument.

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mlindner
This is just the process of NYC trying to drive Uber and Lyft out of the city
and to force them to be expensive and bad like the taxis that existed before
them.

After a few years when they get bad enough they can start to blame the poor
quality on "private corporations" and people will eat it up. Then they'll
outright ban them and they'll be back to taxis.

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anoncoward111
Put me in the screencap, because this is how NYC rolls.

If people consume it privately, regulate it until it's so unusable that the
government version is adopted.

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ramenmeal
Why are these industries separate from the standard minimum wage? Honest
question. Is it to include the cost of business?

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obenn
I would assume it's exactly that. A passage from the article below:

"The equivalent wage for drivers, who are considered independent contractors
and have to cover their own expenses, is $17.22."

It's up from 15$ baseline so I assume 2.22$/hr is what they benchmark
fuel/maintenance to cost.

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tjohns
I've seen some other sources mention that the new minimum wage is actually
"$27.86 an hour, which translates to $17.22 after expenses". [1]

What they consider "expenses" there isn't specified, but that would put their
estimate for driver costs at over $10/hour. Which actually seems more
reasonable, given the cost of fuel.

[1]: [https://www.theverge.com/2018/12/4/18125818/uber-lyft-
ride-s...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/12/4/18125818/uber-lyft-ride-share-
new-york-wage-increase-minimum)

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NTDF9
Bureaucracy to solve a problem created by bureaucracy in the first place.

They should really have let the free market play its hand here. To take the
pressure off medallion owners, add some 0.5% tax per ride and use the
collections to buy out some medallions.

Setting a min wage is the wrong way to go about it. The whole point of
progress is to make things cheaper.

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hndamien
Why should medallion owners be protected for their investment decisions? I
thought that was the gripe about the banks to (albeit - the banks are far less
deserving of sympathy).

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rayiner
The medallion system was a bargain: we protect you from competition, and you
agree to price controls and other regulations. Taxis can't do surge pricing,
for example, because the rate regulations don't allow it. So if the government
is going to back out of its end of the bargain, it's not unreasonable to
compensate medallion owners.

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hndamien
Fair.

