It seems like you're leaving out a bit about information asymmetry. maybe multi billon dollar companies don't have any extra facts that aren't available to somebody in the 'gig economy' but this [1] keeps ringing a bell.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

Oh totally. Hell, lyft and Uber straight up withhold information for the explicit purpose of coaxing workers to do work they wouldn’t otherwise do.

A hallmark of a scam is unnecessary obfuscation and complexity in the business model (i.e., how you get paid).

It’s not entirely arbitraging labour costs or paying low wages. Look at Uber or Lyft. You can come to work whenever you want, for as long as you want, as often as you want as long as you have a good enough car. The convenience beats working at McDonald’s comfortably. I’m sure some of these companies were working off of new people realising it was a bad deal but there’s no way Uber or Lyft are. People aren’t reliably, exploitable stupid over long time periods.

> People aren’t reliably, exploitable stupid over long time periods.

They don't have to be stupid to be exploitable. They just have to be in a desparate situation.

In England people who claim unemployment benefit (Universal Credit (UC)) will lose that benefit if they refuse to take gig economy jobs. They're forced into these jobs by the state.

And then, because of the way UC works they are forced to work as many hours as possible. The flexible bit doesn't work for them because UC doesn't work well for people doing variable hours part time.

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmwo...

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/mar/25/universal-cr...

https://www.ftadviser.com/protection/2018/03/29/meeting-the-...

https://www.litrg.org.uk/sites/default/files/Gig%20economy%2...

Wowwww. Having to drive lyft or die - sounds like hell.

Conditionality isn't a bad thing. This particular version of conditionality, combined with cuts to housing benefit,combined with the hostile regime around benefits in general, mean people are suffering as a result. Importantly it's not saving any money.

It's not having to drive lyft or die.

It's about being forced to drive for lyft, and still lose your income, and lose your home.

It's not being able to predict your income from one month to the next, which puts you at risk of losing your home because you can't pay rent and the state keeps paying you weird amounts because of the way that benefit works.

We've seen huge rises in street homeless numbers. In 2007 we had about 500 people in the UK sleeping on the street. Today that's over 4,000 people.

In 2017 over 30,000 single parent families (the kind who should benefit most from the flexibility of zero hours and gig economy) were made homeless.

People on unemployment benefit are denied those benefits if they turn down employment?

Oh no!

While I'm not saying these gigs are exactly long term careers it's better for the state and for the person than not working.

In England you can claim UC while working, if you do less than 16 hours per week and less than (I think) £120.50 per week.

This is a route back into employment for people who've spent years out of work. The intent is to provide a ramp from "no work, full benefits", though "some work, some benefits", to "full time paid employment, no benefits". (in fact, with tax credits, many people in full time (over 16 hours per week) work are also getting state benefits).

This ramp is broken by the gig economy because zero-hours contracts make it impossible for the state to know how much top-up benefit to pay month to month. This plunges people into debt and poverty.

The gig economy employers benefit because they don't have to pay a lving wage, they don't need to compete for workers by offering sensible wages.

This is an unintented distortion of the free-market. If you believe in free markets you should wish to see the end of this distortion.

I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have a social safety net, but the “distortion” in the free markets here is the UC benefits, not a contract gig that lets the worker decide whether they want to work 0 hours per week or 100 hours per week or anything in between. That’s pretty free market to my ears, and having a sharp public benefits cliff that starts at 0 hours instead of 16 is the source of the distortion.

Instead of blaming Uber for having work available for people who want to only do a few hours per week (or who can’t do more for whatever reason), why not blame the government for not updating their rules to better fit the actual reality on the ground?

So, a follow up is this court case victory announced today: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-46834533

> Four working single mothers have won a High Court challenge over the government's universal credit scheme.

> They argued a "fundamental problem" with the system meant their monthly payments varied "enormously", leaving them out of pocket and struggling financially

Note that these are working mothers.

Uber can't have it all ways. At the moment Uber are exploiting the market to get paid employees, but without having to offer them the protections they'd normally have, and without all the tax and NI payments either.

US companies really need to understand the English concept of "taking the piss".

No-one expects companies to pay all their tax and obey the law all the time. What they do expect is that companies do not take the piss. Uber is taking the piss, and they're going to be regulated if they don't make changes.

> blame the government for not updating their rules

I'm doing that too.

It is their decision to take advantage of it. Moreover, most of these companies did disseminated and promoted half-truths and falsehood about how much people will earn and what costs are offloaded. When you knowingly manipulate people or lie to them, you have no business to complain when someone else comes in and talks openly about you not being truthful.

People criticising and blaming companies eager for taking advantage of either naive or uninformed people is how the economic system becomes less vulnerable and how people learn what to be careful off. Openly criticizing these companies is how next workers become informed about traps like this.

Interestingly, in India, Uber paid drivers upwards of $1700, in in the initial 1-2 years, as incentives to get them onto the platform. Drivers took loans and mortgages to buy cars which they couldn't pay after the incentives were taken off.

Lot of drivers went into debts and sold away their cars. The market has probably more stabilized now.

But inspite of all the talk of tech, we are still looking at these platforms taking 25%-30%.

It's each individual's own responsibility to consider all information before deciding to partake in any activity. failure to do so is their own fault.

Neither can governments that promotes the uber-economy then. Or, god forbids, they are accomplices ?! /s