[jsprogrammer]

The onus of a living wage is always on the consumer. Even if instacart were paying a living wage to the people who perform deliveries, they would need to reflect at least those wages and other expenses in whatever they charge the consumer (unless deliveries are subsidized by VC's or other interested parties).

[bmm6o]

> The onus of a living wage is always on the consumer

In the sense that the money has to come from somewhere, sure. But wages are paid by employers, and it's shitty to underpay your employees under the premise that the customer will make up the difference in tips. If a single customer failing to tip $20 pushes the worker under minimum wage for the day, then the system is broken and the worker is getting screwed, as usual. And make no mistake, this is how it was designed to work - if they actually cared about their workers, they would charge a reasonable delivery fee to the customer and give all of it to the delivery person.

[Jtsummers]

In the restaurant world, the employer would have to make up the difference and ensure their employees make minimum wage if tips aren't enough. While that's still not satisfactory (to me, at least), it at least guarantees that a slow shift, or a lousy-tipping, long-staying, large-group table won't push you down to $2.13/hour level income (though minimum wage doesn't get you much more).

[jsprogrammer]

Of course, the pricing of resources should be complete and incorporate all costs. It is certainly unacceptable for tips to be required to make up a living wage.

However, no one should be under the delusion that the consumer is not responsible for those costs.

[bmm6o]

I'm not sure who in this scenario you think is delusional, or if you're conflating being delusion with being uninformed of the specific employment arrangement between the people you interact with and their employers. Excuse me, they aren't employers anymore, it's a contractor/"logistics match-making company" relationship now.

[jsprogrammer]

It is neither.

Certainly a business should follow the rules of its market, but I think that we agree that the expectation of a consumer is that the price they pay covers all expenses + profit.