
Uber Drivers “Strike” and Switch to Lyft Over Fares and Conditions - smacktoward
http://www.buzzfeed.com/johanabhuiyan/uber-drivers-are-protesting?s=mobile
======
jefflinwood
The really interesting story here is that if drivers are so willing to switch
networks for better opportunities, there isn't a compelling reason for Uber to
have the valuation that they do.

The value of Uber isn't really in the tech or the app - it's in the networks
of riders and drivers in each city. If each of those can be aggregated into
some other kind of service, where Uber, Lyft, etc. are just providers of
payment processing, and possibly some operations expertise, that middleman
network will capture all of the value.

~~~
yumraj
This.

Basically while there are network effects in the sense that any provider
(Uber, Lyft etc.) will need to have some critical mass before there are enough
drivers and enough riders, both can subscribe to multiple providers and there
is no long-term stickiness at the moment.

In other words, this is not a winner take all market with FB/LinkedIn/Twitter
type network stickiness and the overall market is still fair game. The
driver's rating is the only sticky data, and it is unclear in this context as
to how valuable that is as riders are not going to wait an extra 30mins to get
a 5-star driver vs. a 4-star driver.

This should not come as a surprise to anyone since right now most metros have
multiple competing taxi service providers, so it makes sense that that may be
replaced by a similar multiple mobile-app taxi providers.

Also, it is difficult to re-paint your taxi when you move from one traditional
provider to another, in the Uber/Lyft/etc. world, that is no longer required,
so provider switching or aligning with multiple providers is trivial which
will imply that in future the providers' margins will be squeezed out and
riders and drivers will keep the most benefit.

~~~
toomuchtodo
How would you say self-driving vehicles fit into this? Supposedly they're
rolling out in ~3-5 years, and with self-driving vehicles, you no longer need
the middle man managing a fleet of contractors.

EDIT: I'm willing to me a Long Bet [1] with anyone regarding fully autonomous
self driving vehicles in regular use in 6 years.

[1] [http://longbets.org/](http://longbets.org/) ;
[http://longbets.org/rules/](http://longbets.org/rules/)

~~~
esMazer
~3-5 years is way too soon. The technology might be ready but the governments
(think regulations, traffic laws, car insurance companies, car manufacturers,
etc etc etc ) in addition to the public (which is not ready either). Is going
to take at least 10+ years for it to resemble something like you imagine it.

~~~
Dolimiter
The technology is not nearly ready. Not in a city. It's like flying drone
delivery. Easy to demonstrate in a single controlled setting, but nearly
impossible to actually implement in the real world.

~~~
baddox
It's not really like flying drone delivery. Flying drone delivery is far
simpler and far closer than general use self-driving automobiles.

~~~
zobzu
Actually landing UAVs is far harder than automatically parking a car. The
driving vs flying after take off is what is easier. Landing and take off..
nope.

Note that drone could mean a car in this case. UAV being an unmanned aerial
vehicule.

~~~
baddox
With a modest infrastructure of marked landing pads on roofs, I think UAV
landings are easier than automated car parking. If you're expecting delivery
UAVs to fly under the tree line along sidewalks and yards to land directly on
a residential porch, then yes, that's extremely difficult. But I highly doubt
that this is a remotely feasible plan within a decade or so.

------
smacktoward
Update -- Uber reverses policy:
[http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2014/09/12/uber_drivers_...](http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2014/09/12/uber_drivers_strike_they_protested_cheap_uberx_fares_uber_backed_down.html)

~~~
ivraatiems
I'm genuinely surprised. I imagine this is just a policy of minimum
appeasement, but it's very interesting how rapid the change was.

Edit: Also, the strike is going forward - not all of their demands were met.
Maybe this is just so Uber can say "hey, we tried to do what they asked?"

~~~
viscanti
Or maybe the strike is closer to what happened last year in SF, where a bunch
of drivers who were banned from the uber system because of low quality scores
protested for other reasons. Something doesn't add up with the strike anyway
(the threat to leave Uber because some trips might be on uberx, but to go to
lyft where all their trips would be at that level and they'd make less doesn't
make sense). The fact that the strike is still going forward makes it pretty
clear it's not about having to make more money per hour by doing uberx trips.

~~~
modfodder
Or maybe now that a large group of drivers have an impact on Uber, they want
to continue to build muscle. If it was something other than accepting UberX
fares, Uber wouldn't have caved (they're too smart for that). No this points
in at the very least a small shift in negotiating power between Uber and its
drivers. The fact that Uber caved makes it pretty clear Uber knows it was in
the wrong and they are starting to fear a unified group of drivers.

------
ForHackernews
What would it take for somebody to just build a free, open-source matchmaking
service for drivers and riders? It doesn't seem like what Lyft or Uber offer
is very technically demanding (perhaps doing it at scale is), and presumably
you could attract a lot more drivers by offering them the chance to keep ~99%
of the fare.

The existence of Lyft demonstrates that Uber's first-mover advantage isn't
insurmountable, so who's to say the third-mover shouldn't be a free utility
that provides matchmaking at cost?

~~~
calpaterson
Who would provide customer service, sales, marketing, user research and the
other non-technical elements of the business? It's true of many companies that
what they do is not very technically demanding (Amazon, Facebook, eBay, etc)
but that very often means that you _can't_ replicate them by just replicating
the technology - these successful companies are much more than just their
software.

And anyway, I bet there is a surprising level of sophistication to eg: Uber's
software

~~~
ForHackernews
> Who would provide customer service, sales, marketing, user research and the
> other non-technical elements of the business?

Do you need any of those things? How much does Craigslist spend on marketing
and sales?

Operate as a non-profit, compete only on price, and let drivers spread the
word themselves. Imagine if at the end of the ride, your Uber driver told you,
"Hey, next time call me with the CheapRides app and it'll cost you 20% less,
and I'll make more."

------
abalone
This is a much more specific issue than most of the comments here are making
it. People are talking about capitalism, competition, etc...

The problem is simply that a couple weeks ago Uber started sending UberX fares
to Uber black car drivers. Which was a dumb move, because they are
unprofitable and undercut the value of the premium car service. They've now
reversed that dumb move.

~~~
anateus
Exactly. This was a protest over a very specific issue, and Uber ended up
listening.

The article surprisingly doesn't really spin this into generalized
pontificating and really talks about this specific grievance at length. HN
commenters however are responding as if this was a general piece on Uber's
failings as a whole... Strange.

------
seanmccann
It's great to see how easy it is for drivers to switch networks if they are
unhappy, but drivers have to understand that prices are going down and they'll
likely earn less money over time on all networks.

When articles are posted about Uber drivers earning $90k/yr, I'm sure many
folks quit their $40k office job and hit the road. The thing is, driving taxi
is pretty low skilled so the growing supply of drivers will really push down
their income. There's an efficiency problem when an Uber driver "can earn"
more than 75% of Americans, and existing drivers have been reaping the
benefits of those inefficiencies.

~~~
potatolicious
Even if $90K a year is sustainable, driving a taxi is a very high-expense
business. You'll drive your car into the ground far quicker than you did
before, insurance is going to be insanely expensive (an UberX driver I talked
to once told me his insurance is $7K a year), and gasoline isn't free (and
getting less and less free every day).

The take-home from $90K driving taxis is very different than the take-home
from $90K sitting at a desk.

------
SEJeff
This is how capitalism works, survival of the fittest. If someone comes along
that allows the drivers to make more money, prudent drivers will likely switch
to that service.

It is a no brainer.

~~~
mkal_tsr
> This is how capitalism works, survival of the fittest*

* Unless you have enough money to change regulations in your favor, skirt regulations, and so on, in which case it's survival of the financially-backed.

~~~
aeturnum
Access to capital and the political world are part of "fitness" in this
environment. Generally, the companies that are seen as most likely to survive
have easier access to funding than companies that are seen as riskier. The
same can be said of companies that are likely to succeed v.s. simply survive.

~~~
jackpirate
If you're willing to redefine fitness like that, then any economic system is
by definition "survival of the fittest."

------
ChrisAntaki
Lyft drivers are creeped out by Uber. "Operation: Shave the Stache" [1] is one
of the most manipulative business practices I've heard of. Lyft chooses to
invest its money on improving the experience inside the car, and hiring
socially intelligent people, who they then treat like human beings. Uber could
learn a lot from them.

[1] [http://www.theverge.com/2014/8/26/6067663/this-is-ubers-
play...](http://www.theverge.com/2014/8/26/6067663/this-is-ubers-playbook-for-
sabotaging-lyft)

------
pkfrank
I almost hope that Lyft is orchestrating all of this behind the scenes.

It would be such an Uber-move.

~~~
canvia
BuzzFeed is almost entirely "sponsored" content so it wouldn't be too
surprising if this article was a PR move.

~~~
untog
All sponsored content is indicated as such.

------
jbigelow76
_The drivers, who are mostly comprised of SUV and black car drivers, have
planned a protest outside of the Long Island City Uber Office_

I wonder how much good the office protest will do versus just emailing Uber
saying "Adios Uber! I'm headed to Lyft because of..."

The on site picketing made sense for blue collar industrial and government
workers because the switching cost of quitting your job and (hoping) to get
hired at another plant would have been very high. For hire drivers working for
Uber and Lyft essentially have close to zero switching costs. A demonstration
of that would seem more effective than picketing.

~~~
peatmoss
The media attention that drivers get through this action help signal to
consumers that they are moving to a competitor. This might make me (a rider)
more likely to fire up the Lyft app instead of Uber next time I need a ride.

~~~
jbigelow76
True, media attention is important but I wonder if the protest will make it
onto more mainstream channels and not just the tech news/blogosphere.

Local papers in Dallas have been doing quite a bit of coverage as Uber and
Lyft taken on the politically connected taxi industry here. I don't know if
intra-service fighting would get as much attention.

Maybe some HNers in the Long Island area will chime in.

~~~
TillE
> in the Long Island area

Long Island City is right across the river from Manhattan. It's technically on
the Island, but for most people Long Island = Suffolk and Nassau, not Brooklyn
and Queens.

------
loceng
This is how free market capitalism is supposed to work - where mobility
(switching services) is low to non-existent and so then users can migrate en
mass to the ecosystem that is governed better or more in their favour.

------
sprkyco
That's awesome I cancelled my account last month due to the issue of "we are
lowering prices for summer" me thinking naively that this meant eventually
prices would go up after a month or two. However after receiving not only
notification that the prices would not go up further (Houston drivers at a
minimum) but also I would now be required to pay 10 dollars a week to maintain
service. Prior to Uber I was thinking the sharing ecnonomy was an embodiment
of a change in corporate attitudes. F me right?

------
tjbt
The current incarnation of ride shating is fatally flawed. I imagine a
superior model in which there is no direct reward for picking somebody up,
rather a network of normal people, who can submit and receive requests to pick
up. The only compensation would be that in a splitting of gas, which could
potentially be done automatically.

The main difficulty in getting a network like this to succeed is the fact that
there is no incentive for new drivers to join.

Until then, they are just a taxi company with lax employment protocol.

------
ed
I can think of two possible sources of driver lock-in: insurance (on the clock
but between rides) and car financing. Anyone heard of uber or lyft working on
this?

~~~
philiphodgen
There is another reason: employment status and the resulting side-effects.

If you lock in a driver, you start to look like an employer with employees.
This creates enormous payroll tax responsibility, workers comp insurance and
other headaches for Uber/Lyft.

I would bet that Uber/Lyft have burned a metric crapton of lawyer and
accountant brains in an effort to be on the "safe" side of the independent
contractor vs employee fight. They're not going to screw that up.

------
11Blade
Clearly the cracks are starting to show.

If the drivers create the value/provide the service and Uber is facilitating
that by taking a share, it has to make sense for the value-creator/service
provider to continue the relationship. If Uber erodes that margin, the drivers
will leave.

Eventually Uber has to change to benefit their service providers and act a
little more ethically. The drivers know of their underhanded ways with dealing
with Lyft and eventually the public will.

I am an immigrant, I drove a black car in NYC(many years ago), my cousin
drives one now. He is none too happy with the UberX situation right now.

Uber should consider the plight of the drivers and not their 100X VC
overlords. Nobody ever got rich driving a cab, why victimize the drivers?

"Because we can?"

"We are making the market more efficient"

"Frictionless"

It is just at the expense of the drivers. That's your friction point.

Hard working people just want a fair shot, not to be exploited.

Instead of a billion-dollar pay day, why not just a little human decency.

------
Pxtl
I'm going to go ahead and assume there's an app that aggregates
Uber/Lyft/whatever and just gets you the closest driver regardless of network.
Uber's service goes from being a premium product to a replaceable commodity in
a blink.

~~~
aetherson
Well, Uber, Lyft, and whoever will fight such an aggregator for obvious
reasons, and attempt to prevent them from accessing their APIs.

~~~
zorpner
Already happened at least once: [http://techcrunch.com/2013/06/02/corral-
lyft/](http://techcrunch.com/2013/06/02/corral-lyft/)

------
spiritplumber
Excellent, this shifts the balance of power a little. Looks like the whole
"everyone is a free agent" thing has some benefit for the little guys too.

------
stefan_kendall3
Sounds like the market is demanding UberX, and Uber is responding.

I'll keep using UberX in cars that don't need $80/day in gas.

------
gaikokujin
The bottom line is: If you're easily replaceable, you will feel the squeeze
sooner or later.

Been in those kind of jobs myself and the only way out is to upskill until
your value as a worker is high enough that ruthless managers that couldn't
care less about the impact of their decisions on individuals won't get away
with it.

------
jonifico
So they were fine and dandy until a better competition came around. When Lyft
has its rival, same thing will happen.

~~~
viscanti
[http://fortune.com/2014/09/11/uber-vs-lyft-the-credit-
cards-...](http://fortune.com/2014/09/11/uber-vs-lyft-the-credit-cards-dont-
lie/) It doesn't look like a lot of competition honestly. That probably paints
Lyft in the best possible light too because it just takes into account US only
trips (100% of Lyft's business and only a fraction of Uber's). But even then,
that's only competition for the uberx market. These drivers are black car
drivers, where uber has no competition at all.

------
whitej125
Wait, strike? First off...IANAUD. If you become an Uber Driver are you under
any sort of contract? Are you now an employee (W-2) of Uber or free agent
contractor (1099). If drivers think they can get better fares elsewhere... go
nuts and do it. Yay economics!

I feel like I am missing something here.

~~~
viscanti
This. Although I don't understand the argument from the driver's side. They're
upset about sometimes getting trips from uberx (and apparently making more
doing so), so they're going to a place that pays less per trip and per hour?
Something doesn't add up there.

If there was a factual claim here, I have to believe that they'd be sharing
their numbers. It would be trivial for them to show a decrease in earnings
(they can easily calculate gas and wear-and-tear) in the before-and-after
earnings. The fact that that isn't happening makes me believe this is similar
to the protests last year in SF. From the reports back then, it ended up being
mostly drivers who had been banned from the uber platform who were trying to
be reinstated (although that's not what they claimed).

~~~
vertex-four
> They're upset about sometimes getting trips from uberx (and apparently
> making more doing so), so they're going to a place that pays less per trip
> and per hour?

They're trying to convince Uber to stop doing what they don't want (according
to them, they do _not_ make more by accepting UberX fares, no matter what the
company says) by denying them labour. In the meantime, they're doing work
elsewhere, although are hoping not to permanently work there; they're hoping
that Uber will cave in.

Denial of labour ("striking") is a tried-and-tested approach to persuading
companies to do what the labourers want. They can't operate without labour, so
labourers organise to deny them that until they get better working
conditions/better pay/etc.

Assuming enough labourers agree to deny labour, this will work unless (a) what
the labourers want, the company literally cannot provide without going bust,
or (b) there are enough people looking for jobs and willing to put up with the
bad terms that the company can hire them to replace the striking labourers.

This is a relatively simple idea, and has been a thing since the Industrial
Revolution; I'm not really sure what you're not getting.

------
zobzu
Heh they get banned if they accept/deny or plain deny more than 50% of the
requests it says in the article.. that seems legit to me as a customer ;) dont
really want drivers (of uber or any similar company) to accept/refuse my
rides.

------
pptr1
Why not have a social network for professional drivers. Let that network
destroy any type of information withholding that companies like uber do.

Leverage the power of scale. Unions 2.0

------
igl
Followed this Uber thing for a little, Read a few articles from the neo
liberal tech press, specially interesting when Uber was banned in germany.
Initial Reaction to this: haha

------
innguest
Statists, take notice of how improvements in work conditions come from
competition and not from regulation. They're better off now than through the
monopoly of taxi medallions.

~~~
innguest
Why am I being modded down?

~~~
bmcfeeley
I don't yet have down vote privilege, but I have to imagine The GP (your
original comment) got nuked because it is both needlessly inflammatory and
also lacks a substantive argument. As for your response to dragonwriter, you
appear to be talking past one another; of course markets are matchmaking
services for buyers and sellers by definition, but what you've done here is
mistake this specific case of relatively frictionless movement between
employers increasing the surplus of the employees for an indictment of
regulation in general.

This particular case seems to realize said friction (and consequently, the
surplus/benefit for the drivers) precisely because the service itself being
offered by Lyft/Uber is market like, and the end-consumer product is in fact
offered by the drivers themselves. It is not clear to me (or the others
disagreeing with you here evidently) that regulation has any bearing on this
conversation -- in a world where both Lyft and Uber's respective operations
are regulated by the state, the power is still in the drivers' hands because
Lyft and Uber are competing to offer the drivers' services.

This is not exactly the common formula for most employee-employer
relationships, although it may become more common as this business model takes
off. What dragonwriter seems to be saying IMO is that there are certainly
cases that don't fit this mold that are good arguments for state intervention;
among them are cases where there is greater friction for the employees
themselves due to the nature of the business; lack of information about
compensation, working hours, or other metrics to evaluate the given positions;
or, as dragonwriter said, physical proximity to the workplace itself.

If you would be so kind, please elucidate how you feel this particular
seemingly unique scenario is generalizable to regulation in general.

PS: Apologies if this is wordy and difficult to follow, I have a hard time
writing coherently into this tiny box.

~~~
innguest
Thank you for the thoughtful response. I agree with your points, including
your elucidation of dragonwriter's reply.

I'll try to clarify my point: before Uber/Lyft, we had taxis. Just taxis.
Then, the argument went: "Well yes, for taxis we need state intervention
because if the government doesn't regulate cabs then anyone can charge fare
and conditions will deteriorate and it will be inherently less safe and..."

Then Uber/Lyft comes around and all of a sudden the taxi market is "relatively
frictionless" and has other "unique characteristics" that make it so
beneficial to employees.

I'm trying to point out that there is nothing special about taxis. It is not a
special market. I can't deny that one to one business relationships allow for
faster change in the market, as the employee can simply up and leave at any
point.

The taxi market was the furthest thing from frictionless until competition
started. The power will always be in the employees' hands so long as anyone is
free to start competition. We see this with this selfsame example - before
Uber, taxi drivers were basically employees to medallion owners (and taxis
were supposed to be a regulated system for the free enterprise of starting a
one-man cab company, not for the rich to buy all medallions and rent them).
This is an example of failed regulation that allowed the current exploitation
of taxi drivers. Competition is now allowing better conditions for those same
drivers, even though there's no pretense that Lyft drivers own their business.
It's an above-board operation and more moral than before, and not surprising
that it works better for both parties engaged in this.

So what I'm arguing is that whenever we say "but it doesn't apply to
roads/this/that", it's usually because of the blind spots we have from looking
at the system the way it is and being unable to imagine how else it could be.
The roads example is a classic one.

------
drivingmenuts
I thought the whole point of Uber and Lyft was that didn't have to be full-
time occupations.

~~~
eipipuz
That's what I thought, but now it's rare when I see a driver that isn't a
full-timer.

I'm sure the system works better with stability so the incentives push towards
full-timers.

------
omnivore
My ugly questions on this are: What about liability for when an Uber or Lyft
driver kills someone in an accident driving unsafely? Or just murders someone
because they're having a bad day? Or get carjacked? I mean, I guess it's just
one spree away from people doing dangerous things?

~~~
robbyking
The only reason to phrase your question the way you did is to increase the FUD
surrounding car services like Uber and Lyft. The same question could be asked
of any person in any profession.

Regardless, the answer to your question is the first result when you search
Google for "Uber liability coverage":

> Uber holds a commercial insurance policy with $1 million of coverage per
> incident. Drivers’ liability to third parties is covered from the moment a
> driver accepts a trip to its conclusion. This policy is expressly primary to
> any personal auto coverage (However it will not take precedence over any
> commercial auto insurance for the vehicle). We have provided a $1 million
> liability policy since commencing ridesharing in early 2013.

[http://blog.uber.com/ridesharinginsurance](http://blog.uber.com/ridesharinginsurance)

~~~
ColinCera
It's a legitimate question because Uber and Lyft are a "new thing" and they're
international brand names, something that's not true of regular cab services.

If a cab driver in New York City rapes and kills a passenger, it wouldn't make
people distrust all cabs in NYC, much less cabs in other cities; there's no
brand name to be damaged by news coverage, and as a news story it probably
wouldn't even be covered by media outside of the NYC area.

But if an Uber driver rapes and kills a passenger, it will be covered by media
everywhere, because Uber is a newsworthy company and because Uber has a global
presence, and the Uber brand will be damaged worldwide, not just locally.
Because Uber is a "new thing" there will be lots of people/media asking
questions about the safety of Uber (in many cases stupid questions, but
still).

