Tag Archives: uber

Murphy Alumni: Organize, Organize, Organize!

Murphy alumni have been gaining some press as of late.

New York Taxi Workers Alliance staffer and Union Semester alum Ryan Richardson joined cab drivers Bill Lindauer, Victor Salazar, and Asim Akhtar as they heckled Uber CEO Travis Kalanick on the set of the Late Show with Stephen Colbert (via NY Daily News.) Meanwhile, another Union Semester alum, Liam Lynch, was featured on KUT.org for NYCOSH‘s work seeking out 9/11 responders and survivors in Texas and beyond.

Here’s to our vibrant and active alumni community!

Prof. Stephanie Luce on the Uber Ruling

In a potentially striking blow to the Uber-ization of the state’s economy, the California Labor Commission declared this week that a San Francisco-based Uber driver is an employee, and not an independent contractor, of the company. The implications of this ruling could be far-reaching, requiring the company to start offering benefits and protections to its drivers — which it has, until now, managed to skirt.

In an article by Amy Langfield on CBSMoneyWatch, Murphy Institute Prof. Stephanie Luce explains:

“Employers have been increasingly shifting the risks of the employment relationship onto workers – whether in the form of classification as independent contractor, or moving to on-call scheduling, shifting from defined benefit to defined contribution pensions (or to no pension at all), and so on […] Workers and worker organizations have been resisting and fighting back – not just in the U.S., but in other parts of the world (similar issues are happening in Europe – and Uber is also engaged in similar legal battles in many other countries).”

“I think the ruling is significant both because of its impact on such a large and growing global company (Uber), but also for the possible spillover effects to so many other industries that have been moving in the same direction of attempting to evade the legal responsibility of the employer/employee relationship[…]”

For the full article, visit CBSMoneyWatch.

Photo by noeltock via flickr (CC-BY-NC).

Uberization and Its Discontents: The On-Demand Economy and the Future of Full-time Work

By Eric Levitz

Even at dinner, Rich Armstead stays on Task. An hour ago, the 32-year-old comedian finished assembling an IKEA bed for a woman in Brooklyn Heights. When he’s done with his cheeseburger, he’ll follow the waitress back into the kitchen of this Chelsea pub, and fix the sink’s leaking drainpipe.

“It’s a hustle, for sure,” he says, scanning his smartphone for future gigs.

Armstead is one of over 30,000 workers who sell their labor via TaskRabbit, an online marketplace where consumers can find a “Tasker” for any small job, from waiting in line to wedding photography. The platform is itself just one of a growing number of all-purpose service apps, including Handy, Fiverr, and Needto, which together make up only one sector of the ever-expanding “on-demand economy.” Continue reading Uberization and Its Discontents: The On-Demand Economy and the Future of Full-time Work