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.
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.
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).
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.
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.
I guess most drivers would be fine accepting all offered jobs within a fixed period. For most it's a full time job anyway, the only reason they would refuse jobs in between is because they're not paying well enough or because they got one with a competitor.
From the first paragraph of the linked article: "The city's Taxi and Limousine Commission voted Tuesday to establish a per-minute and per-mile payment formula for Uber, Lyft, Via, Juno and Gett that is supposed to result in drivers earning $17.22 an hour."
So it sounds like this isn't an actual hourly minimum wage, but instead a time/distance-based formula that's supposed to be equivalent. Whether that's based on 100% ridership or past averages isn't specified. Unfortunately the article doesn't link to the actual legislation, nor does any of the other articles I found from a cursory web search, so details seem to be lacking. (I really wish news articles would link to authoritative sources...)
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
Medallion owners were suckered into "investing" in them when law mandated that taxi drivers NEED to buy them. Ideally, they should just have been asked to go through a taxi training program and asked to interview at taxi commpanies and get a job. Much like airline pilots. They are innocent humans and should be reimbursed (maybe with a haircut).
Banks need to suck it up. I don't care about them. They cal lay off some execs to make up that money if they want to.
pretty much proved to not be true or to such a small number that it matters not. it actually tends to free parking as it simply supplements a commute or drive someone would make with their own vehicle.
this is all down to a union exercising its control over city politicians and having them to their bidding by distorting the facts and attacking those facts instead of the truth
They are also providing employment and income to people. So, I wouldn't worry so much about the congestion impact of it. If congestion is too much, they drivers will drive slower and surge pricing will strike causing demand to drop, thus reducing congestion.
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.