[jasonisalive]

The entire economic system is built around people trying to get the best deal possible for themselves. You can try and paint that as inhumane and abusive if you're commited to emotionalising economic dynamics, but it really doesn't make any sense. At the end of the day as long as the transactions are consensual, there's no need for this rhetoric of abuse. Uber drivers know the deal and they can take it or leave it. No one's holding a gun to their heads. Likewise, it's not Uber or anyone else's job or responsibility to guarantee anyone or anybody a certain standard of living.

You might as well vilify people for choosing the potatoes which are 10c/kg cheaper at the supermarket, isn't that a case of those wealthy enough to buy potatoes victimising helpless potato farmers?

[TeMPOraL]

> At the end of the day as long as the transactions are consensual, there's no need for this rhetoric of abuse.

That's one of the biggest singular pieces of bullshit I see regurgitated in the discussions about market economy.

For most of the people on this planet, a lot of Uber drivers included, there's little choice. They either have a job, or go hungry and homeless. The power asymmetry between an employer and employee is so big that you may as well enforce that "consent" at gunpoint. There's little practical difference.

[branchless]

What we need is an equitable distribution of wealth starting with equal access to land. These guys can't make a living for themselves because they don't have any land.

That was why they called the USA the land of opportunity. In the expansionary phase people could get land near others and generate wealth from it. Now people must exist in the service economy waiting for trickle-down that isn't going to come, spending most of their wages on rent.

[wutbrodo]

You're missing the point. You're absolutely right that "consent" is only _technically_ present when the alternative is something terrible, but the flaw is in blaming the less-bad alternative.

To use your example, if I force you out of your house at gunpoint and you're forced to live under a freeway, the problem isn't "this overpass isn't a very nice place to live", the problem is _the guy holding you at gunpoint_. (That example is trivially modifiable to describe homelessness: the real problem is the lack of adequate housing provided to those who can't afford it).

In the case of Uber, the problem is not that Uber is provided an alternative means of employment that's suboptimal, it's that people are forced into taking what they can get because our social safety net is such garbage.

[rconti]

What's the idealized world you're comparing this to?

An agrarian economy? Guess what, you either farm and build a shelter, or you go hungry and homeless.

Sure, maybe an agrarian economy is too market-based for you.

Try living on a commune and being the guy who specializes in "doing fuckall". I'm not sure how long you'll be welcome.

I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make, but life isn't free or fair, and it never has been and never will be.

That's not a reason to not even try to make things better, but the tone of the "regurgitated bullshit" comment implies that it's being used to fight against some other, better system.

[TeMPOraL]

I'm not comparing it to any idealized world; my point is that the "voluntary trade" card is being played as justification for all types of abuse in the economy. Because it's not abuse if both participants consented, right? It's also used to support the viewpoint that if only we could further deregulate things, "remove the barriers to voluntary trade", things would be better.

Except that the ideal voluntary trade seldom exists in practice, especially when you're lower or middle class. There is so much power and information imbalance that the employee or customer rarely has any choice but to participate in the trade. Companies like Uber know this and exploit it on purpose.

[hackuser]

> The entire economic system is built around people trying to get the best deal possible for themselves ...

Getting the best deal possible is one factor, but it's not the only one, it's not dogma, and it doesn't justify bad behavior.

I think your post is a simplified approach to a complex world. For example, it assumes that the marketplace is free and fair, which it clearly is not. The powerful often use their power to prevent competition, or even to write the rules (via influence in government) of the 'free' competition. Also, profiting from others' suffering is wrong.

Finally, our economic system, while good relative to most in human history, could be greatly improved. Let's not allow a dogmatic idea that it is ideal stop us from getting better. For one thing, it could be made more free and more fair.

> it's not Uber or anyone else's job or responsibility to guarantee anyone or anybody a certain standard of living.

I strongly disagree. We all have responsibilities to our communities and society; if people didn't meet those responsibilities, the communities and society would fall apart. Those who don't do their part are parasites on those who do, in my humble opinion.

[jasonisalive]

Great, so you're concerned about some people being more competitive than others in the free market. So what's your response? A monopolistic ostenisbly communally-controlled central power to oversee and address alleged abuses? Excellent, you just created a superbly manipulable tool of power for society's most capable individuals to wield. You just made problems of fundamental unfairness much worse, not better.

[piecemeal]

Uber has enough market power that it's often a monopsony, and thus has the power to depress wages more than would happen in a market that didn't have the winner take all dynamics of most app-based businesses.

You can paint it as "natural" for a monopsony buyer to squeeze every possible penny for themselves, but most humans have an emotional reaction to interactions which are perceived as unfair. This isn't irrational or dumb. It's natural and it's part of being a human.

[s73v3r]

"Likewise, it's not Uber or anyone else's job or responsibility to guarantee anyone or anybody a certain standard of living."

Actually, since Uber is the one giving them a job, it IS their responsibility.

[hsod]

why?

[lazaroclapp]

Because we decided as a society that it is. That's why say, the concept of minimum wage exists, and plenty other labor laws. The remaining question, legally, is whether Uber is offering drivers a "job", as opposed to a software platform that they can use to be self-employed as drivers (which is Uber's argument).

If Uber is offering jobs to drivers, then certain standards must be met to avoid illegal employment practices. Then the next question is whether or not Uber actually violates those standards. The answer might be that it doesn't, life can be pretty thought for people in many professions that we have actually deemed 'fair enough' work. But if the answer is that it does, then Uber needs to change.

If 'the sharing economy' is not actually creating employer-employee relations, then it might still need to be regulated (perhaps under different regulations than labor laws), depending what society thinks of the mechanism as a whole. For example, if drivers are self-employed contractors rather than employees, then what gives Uber the rights to fix their wages? Is there such a thing as minimum wage for independent contractors? Who is responsible for things like health insurance for Uber drivers? We have plenty of answers for these questions for the kind of independent contractor that makes $50 an hour, not for the kind that makes $17 a ride. But again, it might well be that the deal as it is can be actually considered fair, compared with for example being a street market vendor or a temp worker at a convenience store. I certainly have met plenty of part-time/retired drivers in the South Bay that consider the deal a fair enough source of extra cash. The point is that we haven't figured out whether or not it is exploitative and that is the sort of question modern developed societies can afford to ask themselves and weight against the benefit of 'it creates some value for some people and pays the bills for some others'.

Edit: I'll add that I use ride-sharing services often, want them to continue to exist in some useful form and am firm believer of 'default allow' as it comes to new business models. But that doesn't mean nobody is allowed to look into whether some new business practices are exploitative or not or that there can be no harm in allowing any voluntary economic transaction.

[dogecoinbase]

The entire economic system is built around people trying to get the best deal possible for themselves. You can try and paint that as inhumane and abusive...

Wow -- you're so damn close to the moment of insight, and yet so far.

[jasonisalive]

And the irony is that people like yourself, chasing phantoms of unfairness in the free market, support the extension and entrenchment of coercive governments, an institution which is and always will be eminently corruptible, an institution whose history is a litany of abuse and overreach.

[Frondo]

You sound like someone who's never actually gotten involved in politics.

Try getting in at the local level--volunteer for a state representative's campaign, or a local city/county commissioner. Get to know people, talk to them, see what it's really like.

What you're characterizing as "eminently corruptible" and full of "abuse and overreach" actually makes a lot more sense when you step out from behind the keyboard (and its steady supply of anti-government, libertarian websites) and get involved.

[haberman]

Absolutism in any direction here is folly. Without antitrust law capitalism becomes oligarchy.