Huh? As I understand it Uber/Lyft drivers are not eligible for unemployment benefits (recent laws/court rulings aside). So they don't depend on the safety nets in any way.

edit: Unemployment insurance is paid by companies for their workers who may use it in the future. It's not a shared social obligation from taxes. Nor is everyone eligible to use it merely by existing.

The CARES Act and state-level programs are paying unemployment assistance to contractors and self-employed individuals not usually covered by unemployment [0], [1].

[0] https://www.edd.ca.gov/about_edd/coronavirus-2019/pandemic-u...

[1] https://www.edd.ca.gov/about_edd/coronavirus-2019/cares-act....

Which is a one-off "world is burning down" case which no one planned for or expected. Hardy a long term plan by the VCs to take advantage of everyone else.

I'm guessing unemployment insurance didn't cover a lot of the rest of the unemployed either for COVID (as it ran out due to never being designed for this situation) so it came from taxes. In which case no one paid into the social safety net except through taxes (which Lyft/Uber are not exempt from).

I think we just need a way for unemployment insurance to include independent contractors.

Any remotely competent student of history can foresee occasional economic crises with high unemployment. That’s why we have a national unemployment insurance scheme.

Maybe you don’t foresee a pandemic, but only in the same way that you don’t foresee getting side-swiped when a car passes you while blowing its tire. Or having your house’s roof ripped off by a tornado. Totally unforeseeable events, but somewhat predicable circumstances.

The bailouts in crises are not one off because there’s always going to be another crisis.

Taking care of contractors who work for employers that arbitrage labor protections == corporate bailouts.

I don't know who "we" is in your statement, but unemployment insurance is state by state in the US, not national.

Yes, all of them, literally all 50. No exception.

Do we have public school available nationally?

Your post wasn't clear if that is what you intended to say.

A single "national unemployment insurance scheme" is not at all the same thing as 50 separate state schemes.

>The bailouts in crises are not one off because there’s always going to be another crisis.

Please list the historical unemployment insurance bailouts that covered contractors.

From Lyft itself: https://www.lyft.com/hub/posts/how-the-cares-act-can-help-dr...

Actually what happens is we get lower Uber/Lyft rates for consumers... consumers that may depend on it in low infrastructure areas such as other low income workers.

In a competitive market there is no such thing as “free profit” for companies. Most savings that apply to all market competition across the board transfer to lower prices in the general market.

Uber would only net the profit if for some reason it was the only company that didn’t have to offer those things out of pocket.

And, if those other people did it, then I would be saying this about them.

“That’s how the world works” is the oldest justification for injustice.

If capitalism really is just a spreadsheet feudalism that deprives even the yacht owners of human moral autonomy, then maybe it’s time to burn down the system. NB: I don’t buy it, and I think markets can function alongside patriotic responsibility.

I'm not saying the way thing works is bad... it is how it works and it's the way it should be because it's good.

The gig economy model can be better, but I don't think it's helpful to blame individual companies. It's an entire system at play. Some people are totally happy with earning over a few hours a week. It's not a one size fits all system, so the model needs to be more flexible.

The gig economy exists only because of the rapid advancement in technology. When the law catches up with that maybe it will be fairer. Until then they take and cut corners on whatever the law hasn't caught up with yet.

That's pretty much the total opposite of what's happening right now. Uber (and the recent group of "tech but not really" unicorns in general) have if anything burnt hundreds of billions of VC/PE money thus directly subsidizing the costs of hundreds of millions of users, for very slim profits at best.

Yes, it's because they are expecting future returns on their "burnt" money. But considering the risks, the enormous amounts involved, the meagre margins involved even in a market dominant postion and that there are still no signs of profitability or even positive cash flow, I don't see how this can be seen as just a wealth transfert from society to the wealthy. Even in their best case scenario, they will be able to get meagre returns from perpetually capital intensive, low margin businesses. That's far from obscene wealth extraction imo.

Sure, some early VCs made tons of money off of this new era of unicorns, but that was pretty much all coming from other VC or private equity that have had to keep the money pump going.

What is also less discussed is that (unlike many other tech platforms) Uber/Lyft facilitates wealth transfer in local economies (to some extent) due to how locally it operates.

Uber has claimed that more than 80% of all the fares ever collected has directly gone to drivers. By creating massive demand mostly in the well-off parts of a city, it opens up a channel for one-to-one wealth transfer to the predominantly less well-off drivers.

This is quite different from other platforms that suck up money from local economies and then disburse most of them to the elite few, or park the cash in some offshore accounts.

I think there's a nuance here that is often lost in this kind of discussion about inequality.

Where do you think VC funding comes from?

VC's get their money from everyone else: pension funds, college endowments, charitable foundation endowments, and insurance companies.

It quite literally is a case of our children funding this.

I agree, though that's a whole different subject. VCs are usually a very small share of their portfolios, and I guess the high risks are well known.

But it's true that VCs, private equity and bull markets in general, which people always think of as profiting mostly very rich people are actually essential to fund most retirement plans, pensions and insurances.

Which pension funds are investing in VCs? Pension funds generally prefer less risky investments..

Pension funds have traditionally invested very small parts of their portfolios in riskier investments. It's usually done to slightly enhance yield.

But in the past decade pension funds have increased their "alternative" investments since their traditional bread and butter,bonds and fixed income, have had abysmal yields due to low interest rates. Yet with pension payout obligations having only gotten bigger (especially in europe, with the aging population, the pressure to generate returns is pushing the fund managers to seek out riskier and riskier investments.

So, the folks who make money on this massive arbitrage of the welfare state can feel bad on their yachts and the ones who lost money can feel bad on their slightly smaller yachts.

sounds like you don't know any Uber/Lyft drivers

I think it’s fairly clear I’m referring to the VC and founders who chose a business model that effectively arbitrages others’ belief in an obligation to contribute to the social safety net.

In what situation aren't investors borrowing from the future? That's basically the entire state of our economy right now: that the wealthy older generation invested heavily in the future, and then squandered that investment and stuck the younger generations with the bill.

Now do Amazon.

Amazon pays more in payroll taxes, SUI, and Social Security alone than the entire revenue of the vast majority of any company you could select in the world.

Doesn’t Uber pay all that too? I feel like I’m missing the point.

No, not for its drivers.

If drivers preferred full time employment over flexibility, wouldn't they have joined a traditional taxi/limo service instead of Uber or Lyft?

How are we not paying into the social safety net? That's literally what we as individuals pay for with taxes.

You can want a social safety net and also be upset at the free rider problem

You can also not want a social safety net and also be upset at the free rider problem.

Unless you’re living off returns on capital, your tax dollars and your children’s future tax dollars are keeping Uber/Lyft independent contractors fed and off the streets.

I’m not sure why you’d be more angry at people who don’t want to see homelessness/hunger than at people who are pocketing everything in good times and peaking out in bad times.

Ok I'll bite. Can you point me to something that shows that rideshare drivers would be hungry and homeless were it not for progressive generosity? Literally any sign that they disproportionately rely on public assistance? And to the extent they do, which they don't, did Uber and Lyft create that situation?

What exactly are Uber and Lyft free-riding off of? What public service are they abusing by operating a ride-sharing marketplace? In what way are they avoiding their "fair share" when their employees and investors already shoulder a massive and disproportionate part of the state's tax burden?

We do not let people in the united states die on the street from medical problems. If someone gets ill or is in a catastrophic accident they are brought to an emergency room and cared for. Despite said hospital sending a bill to the impoverished person, they cannot get blood from a stone. The hospitals are supported by the federal government via various programs like the VA, medicare, and medicaid who increase their prices as hospitals need as the government cannot handle them closing.

The free rider issue here is that company's are not paying their employees enough to handle basic maintenance of their bodies, and so public tax dollars are covering their catastrophic care.

Eventually everyone will get sick and need to see a doctor. If a company does not pay enough to their employees to get doctor visits than they are paying the basic maintenance costs, in the same way as a corporate fleet of cars not paying for oil changes is not paying for maintenance.

The difference here is that when a corporate fleet seizes up we let them fail. When citizens get sick and start dieing we, as a society, have decided its unethical to let them die for lack of funds and cover their health care.

Any company who relies on this is a free rider who is making our society pay for their basic maintenance costs

Uber and lyft would still exist without unemployment so how do they depend on them?

If there was no unemployment insurance uber and lyft would still exist and saying that uber and lyft depend on these social safety nets is just dishonest rhetoric.