It's all happening in the US. Amazon workers at a warehouse in New York voted to form a union, a first in American history and organised by a grassroots union.
Also in The Big Apple, the NY Taxi Commission has done a deal with the devil, putting the yellow cabs onto Uber's app. Uber gets more supply at a time it desperately needs drivers, and the taxis get access to Uber's customers - but at what price? In San Francisco, where a similar deal is in the making, taxi workers are resisting, saying joining Uber's app will mean their income will fall, while at the same time pricing out traditional customers because of Uber's surge-pricing at peak times.
Meanwhile, Uber and Lyft drivers in the US are quitting in droves, as the surge in fuel costs makes being a 'self-employed' ridehail driver a very expensive business. A survey by TechCrunch found 43% of Uber and Lyft drivers are driving less or have quit altogether, and that's despite a fuel surcharge - an additional fee of $0.45-$.055 per driver per ride - being brought in. One Lyft driver described the surcharge as "an insult to the drivers". Just 28% of drivers said they were satisfied with the surcharge.
In Washington, one union leader is pushing back hard against cosy deal's with Uber and co. Sean O'Brien was sworn in as the Teamsters' new international president last week and immediately moved to have a Bill that had been backed by the local union and Uber and Lyft squashed. The Bill, which has already passed the state's House and Senate, would see private hire drivers remain as independent contractors in return for paid sick leave and a minimum pay rate from pick-up to drop-off.
“Everybody wants to build their membership, everybody wants to represent workers, but this can’t be a money-grabbing association,” said O’Brien, who believes the drivers should have the full rights of employees, and is lobbying Democratic governor Jay Inslee not to sign the Bill.
“We are open to having relationships with anyone,” O’Brien added, “but we’ve got to make sure they’re going to be beneficial to the workers and not be some type of charade to skirt their obligations under the employee relationship.”
This flurry of activity should have us on the other side of the Atlantic sitting up and taking notice. Uber is no longer the great disruptor seeking to smash all before it. It's doing deals with taxi associations and unions because it is now the dominant player in the sector but its model is seriously threatened by surging fuel prices, campaigns for employment status and a persistent lack of profitability, and it thinks taxi associations and unions could now be allies rather than adversaries in coping with those threats. O'Brien has decided he doesn't want the Teamsters' to be any part of it - what will Europe's taxi and union leaders decide?
Ben Wray, Gig Economy Project co-ordinator
