[DigitalSea]

A few months ago when I was in Seattle for work, I caught Uber everywhere. I had so many conversations with Uber drivers about why they drove for Uber, how much money they made and why they weren't doing something else.

Needless to say, unless I felt legitimately fearful for my life (which rarely ever happened) I would always rate 5 stars. I realised a lot of these Uber drivers (usually migrants with broken English) probably didn't have many other options to earn money. An almost consistent sentiment amongst those drivers was they were working long hours and support family (not just a wife and children but parents/relatives). My reasoning for this was I am paying like half the cost of what a taxi would cost me, so why not 5 stars?

I think Uber is great for a certain subset of people. While most people who frequent HN on six figure tech salaries would definitely struggle to live on an Uber salary, a lot of people rely on it. In all honesty, I couldn't do it and I have a certain level of respect for those willing to earn so little and work so much to support their families. As a passenger Uber is great, but you can't deny that drivers get absolutely shafted unless they're driving through surge pricing periods and areas. I always rate 5 stars when I get an Uber unless of course the driver is swerving all over the place, speeding or doing dangerous things to endanger my life (which has happened like twice in all of the time I have used Uber).

Aside: Anyone else find the article sporadically refresh? Made it very difficult to read the article.

[guessbest]

> Aside: Anyone else find the article sporadically refresh? Made it very difficult to read the article.

Yes. It did for me in Firefox on the desktop, but not on mobile safari. I thought I was crazy when it did it the first time but the second time, I knew it was the citypaper site.

[justhw]

There's a code that refreshes it every 5 min. https://i.imgur.com/SzFkzdG.png

[perfTerm]

Very strange. For me on mobile safari (iOS 8.whatever's newest) it refreshed six or seven times by the end. Very frustrating. I don't have traffic inspection tools on my iPhone but usually I find weird page refreshes like that are due to advertising.

[xasos]

Same for me on an iOS 8 iPad. I only got the website to stop refreshing by constantly holding down the screen and scrolling

[grrowl]

Must be to boost their ad impressions. Really scummy, and kept interrupting the embedded Uber training video.

[fudgy73]

Ironically, I kept seeing ads at the top from uber.

[saclark11]

Came here to the comments to ask the same question about the page refresh. At one point the page even completely blanked out and served me an error message directly from the server. It wasn't anything particularly sensitive, but an information leak none-the-less.

[zaroth]

> I realised a lot of these Uber drivers (usually migrants with broken English) probably didn't have many other options to earn money.

This is just such a perfect observation. What we are seeing here is an end-run around the minimum wage. The so-called "1099 economy" is increasing employment of unskilled workers who would otherwise be unemployable at the mandatory minimum.

Where else are people going to find a job they can set their own hours, work 12-hours a day, 80 hours a week, making $5/hour sitting down? If the minimum wage weren't so damn high there might be competitive alternatives.

Keep in mind, the goal isn't to "make" $80k, or even $60k, and then lose over half of it to taxes and phased-out benefits. If you're supporting your wife and two kids, the goal is to make about $32k, which on a 1099 will work out to just about maximize your EITC, food stamps, Medi-Cal, etc. and in the end your net value is equivalent to about $100k fully loaded (the employer's fully loaded cost) of regular W-2 employment.

[hackuser]

> If the minimum wage weren't so damn high ...

It's about where it was 50 years ago, measured in real dollars: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/12/04/5-facts-abou...

By other measurements, it's relatively low: http://www.cepr.net/publications/reports/the-minimum-wage-is...

[wutbrodo]

You're talking about something completely different from the comment you're responding to. You're comparing entirely to historical averages (even the "other measurements" link is all about historical levels relative to other indicators). The parent comment appears to be speaking normatively, as in "much higher than it should reasonably be".

[stickfigure]

The article mentions several times that expected wage post-expenses is around $10 per hour, not $5. That difference is material.

[zaroth]

You're right, the article claims OP had 1099 earnings of $9.34/hour assuming expenses of $0.51 per paid mile. But then also goes on to note that other driver's expenses were more like $0.70 per paid mile.

I wonder if she amortized that $100 of tire damage in that $0.51 / mile! Also, what about the unpaid miles getting to a fare in the first place, or getting back home after a fare takes you off the beaten path? I think it's extremely difficult to fully account for all time and expenses in that line of work. Finally, subtract another 7.6% off the top for 1099 vs W2.

[stickfigure]

She also pointed out that her take-home was lower than that of the other drivers she checked against because she did not take full advantage of surge pricing and other "tricks" of experienced drivers. And she pointed out that some drivers' expenses were less than her $0.51.

I suspect $10/hr is a fairly reasonable average. The discussion is interesting enough even without needing to exaggerate that number.

[chrismcb]

I don't plan on taking uber, but if I did, I got average service I would probably dare the driver 3 stars, because that is what 3 stars mean.... Average. And yet I would unknowingly be hurting the driver. And that is just stupid

[carrotleads]

I have come across a startup founder who drives Uber in the evenings to help with cashflow. But he is a unique subset as well. His family lives back in South Africa and this keeps him occupied in the evenings plus he can do a bit of customer validation if occasion presents.

[s73v3r]

"My reasoning for this was I am paying like half the cost of what a taxi would cost me, so why not 5 stars?"

That's true for everyone using Uber. You're not supposed to rate it relative to a taxi, but relative to other Uber drivers.

[BurningFrog]

> you can't deny that drivers get absolutely shafted

Actually you can.

I think the simplest argument is the best one: They choose to do this voluntarily, every single day they drive.

[DigitalSea]

Just like workers in sweatshops and factories in countries like Indonesia and China have a choice to not work for a few dollars per day in dangerous conditions producing textiles for your $200 sneakers and smartphone components for your $1000 iPhone or Android device? The people working in those deplorable conditions are doing so voluntarily, right? Just like the homeless guy digging through the trash on Market St in San Francisco has the choice to not be homeless even though his area is being gentrified and even people on six figure salaries cannot afford to live in a lot of areas of San Francisco. I cannot get on-board with the view that everyone has a choice.

[BurningFrog]

> The people working in those deplorable conditions are doing so voluntarily, right?

They actually are, and if you ask them then can explain why they chose it. These factory jobs are usually very sought after, and has lifted millions from extreme poverty. I suspect you have little idea how harsh third world poverty actually is.

This is a good overview: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/15/opinion/15kristof.html?_r=...

> Just like the homeless guy digging through the trash on Market St in San Francisco has the choice to not be homeless

That's very different. He can choose whether to dig for trash, but not directly whether to be homeless. You can choose your actions, but not end results.

He is also fairly likely to be mentally incapable to make rational decisions. Meanwhile, the Asian factory workers you mention are quite capable and responsible adults. As are the vast majority of American Uber drivers.

[stickfigure]

Another great overview is NPR Planet Money's series on how tshirts are made:

http://apps.npr.org/tshirt/

It includes quite a bit about the lives of people working in the garment factories in Bangladesh. Sweatshops are a major step up from the alternatives - especially for women.

[vacri]

Choosing the frying pan instead of the fire isn't much of an argument in favour of 'choosing voluntarily to work at X'.

Besides, having no better options absolutely does not mean that you're not getting shafted.

[BurningFrog]

The frying pan/fire metaphor implies choosing between equally awful options, but the factory work is substantially better than the alternatives.

Of course, to rich westerners like you and me they are both unfathomably awful, but to the people concerned going from living on the streets to a modest bed indoors can be a huge life changing event.

[pmorici]

I disagree. Uber employs extremely deceptive advertising to recruit drivers and encourages them to do things like buy new cars then turns around and cuts the amount drivers get paid. This has the effect of totally screwing them over. It's a pretty exploitative situation for people who actually rely on it for income to pay their living expenses.

[branchless]

I think people need to ask themselves - if it's half the price of a regular cab how can this be?

Either tax drivers are being exploited by their employers who are pocketing most of the wealth generated, or uber drivers are underpaid. Or taxi firms are insanely inefficient and uber has undercut them with their web 3.0 brilliance.

[khuey]

The correct answer is "all of the above".

[vacri]

Most people have no business training, and don't know about how to look for hidden costs. It's easy enough to think that taxis are that expensive solely due to the overpriced medallion system, which crops up in newspapers every now and again. Most people wouldn't understand that Uber's profit largely comes from shifting the risk from themselves to the drivers.

[BurningFrog]

Can you show some examples of this advertising?

[pmorici]

Facebook ads that say "Make $70k per year driving for Uber" When the reality is you would be hard pressed to make even half of that.

[zaroth]

The article gives some examples.

[zorpner]

The idea of "choice" is significantly more complex than you present it to be, particularly within the context of people providing for themselves and their families, and the information asymmetry Uber leverages in order to convince people to work for them.

[jasonisalive]

So what, some people have urgent needs, different parties in economic transactions have access to different information. Welcome to the free market. They're still choosing to work for Uber. No one is forcing them. Uber isn't forcing them. Uber is just offering an opportunity that they are deciding to accept.

[specialist]

Please tell me more about this free market. Can you point to an example?

[s73v3r]

Doesn't mean they aren't shafting their drivers.

[s73v3r]

Your argument is completely irrelevant. The "its voluntary" thing means absolutely nothing.

[TeMPOraL]

It's not really voluntary if you can either accept a crappy, abusive job or starve to death. People purposefully creating such conditions are doing something incredibly evil to other human beings. Having to "choose" at a gunpoint would probably be more humane.

[icebraining]

So Uber came to give them an option beyond "starve to death"? Seems like they should be praised even more.

[shitlord]

That's interesting, because I have had the opposite experience. The one time I used Uber instead of Lyft in NYC, I got a driver who was most probably a rapist. Whenever we passed a bar or any drunk girls, he would start telling me how he wanted to take advantage of them. Then he started insulting me for some reason.

It was a strange experience, but clearly, the Uber driver pool is merging with the taxi driver pool. And it's bringing the bad elements you'd expect from a typical cabbie.