"Minimum wage" is one of those odd concepts that *seems* to have an intuitive definition, but the harder you think about it, the more complicated it gets.
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Anyone else looks at this situation and understands drivers only did this shitty job out of desperation. They had a sum they *needed* every month in order to pay the rent or the grocery bill. They have lots of needs besides those that they would like to fulfill, but not under the shitty gig-work app conditions. The only reason they tolerate a shitty app as their shitty boss at all is that they are desperate, and that desperation gives gig companies power over their workers.
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In other words, Seattle's PayUp "minimum wage" has shifted some of the expense associated with operating a gig platform from workers back onto their bosses. With fewer drivers available on the app, waiting times for customers will necessarily go up. Some of those customers will take the bus, or get a livery cab, or defrost a pizza, or walk to the corner cafe.
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In other words, Seattle's PayUp "minimum wage" has shifted some of the expense associated with operating a gig platform from workers back onto their bosses. With fewer drivers available on the app, waiting times for customers will necessarily go up. Some of those customers will take the bus, or get a livery cab, or defrost a pizza, or walk to the corner cafe.
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For the gig platforms to win those customers back, they will have to reduce waiting times, and the most reliable way to do that is to increase the wages paid to their workers.
So PayUp isn't a wash - it has changed the distributional outcome of the gig-work economy in Seattle.
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When Toronto grappled with the brutal effect gig-work taxis have on the city's world-beatingly bad traffic, Uber promised to pay its drivers "120% of the minimum wage," which would come out to $21.12 per hour. However, the *real* wage Uber was proposing to pay its drivers came out to about *$2.50* per hour:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/29/geometry-hates-uber/#toronto-the-gullible
How to explain the difference? Well, Uber - and its gig-work competitors - only pay drivers while they have a passenger - or an item - in the car.
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@pluralistic which is absurd.
- But not uncommon.
At least in #Germany they've to payvpeople during their working shift at least minimum wage.
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For the gig platforms to win those customers back, they will have to reduce waiting times, and the most reliable way to do that is to increase the wages paid to their workers.
So PayUp isn't a wash - it has changed the distributional outcome of the gig-work economy in Seattle.
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Drivers have clawed back a surplus - time they can spend doing more productive or pleasant things than cruising and waiting for a booking - from their bosses, who now must face lower profits, either from a loss of business from impatient customers, or from a higher wage they must pay to get those wait-times down again.
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Drivers have clawed back a surplus - time they can spend doing more productive or pleasant things than cruising and waiting for a booking - from their bosses, who now must face lower profits, either from a loss of business from impatient customers, or from a higher wage they must pay to get those wait-times down again.
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But if you want to *really* move the needle on gig workers' wages, the answer is simple: pay workers for *all* the hours they put in for their bosses, not just the ones where bosses decide they deserve to get paid for.
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But if you want to *really* move the needle on gig workers' wages, the answer is simple: pay workers for *all* the hours they put in for their bosses, not just the ones where bosses decide they deserve to get paid for.
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Image:
Tobias "ToMar" Maier (modified)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balaclava_3_hole_black.jpgCC BY-SA 3.0
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en--
Jon Feinstein (modified)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/jonfeinstein/186791934/CC BY 2.0
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.eneof/
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However, there *is* an interesting wrinkle in this paper's conclusions. Drivers aren't earning *less* under this system, either. So they're getting paid more for every delivery, but they're not adding more deliveries to their day. In other words, they're doing less work and then clocking off:
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/02/minimum-wages-for-gig-work-cant-work.html
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@pluralistic it's a crime that they don't get paid minimum wage whilst being clocked in…
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"Minimum wage" is one of those odd concepts that *seems* to have an intuitive definition, but the harder you think about it, the more complicated it gets. For example, if you want to work, but can't find a job, then the minimum wage you'll get is zero:
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2026/02/17/no-piecework/#no-justice
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@pluralistic "A neoclassical economist (someone who has experienced a specific form of neurological injury that makes you incapable of perceiving or reasoning about power)"
That is one of the best descriptions I read in a long while.
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That's why politicians like Avi Lewis (who is running for leader of Canada's New Democratic Party) has call for a jobs guarantee: a government guarantee of a good job at a socially inclusive wage for everyone who wants one:
https://lewisforleader.ca/ideas/dignified-work-full-plan
(Disclosure: I have advised the Lewis campaign on technical issues and I have endorsed his candidacy.)
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@pluralistic - Wish I could become an advisor to my local MLAs. I literally have tried, but found no purchase.
They're too stuck in growth economics and trying to coopt the regional conservative power structure as it is lying dormant between the election cycles.
Despite being NDP, they are failing to make good on the support people showed them. They seem more interested in settling in as technocrats than actually effecting socialism.
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"Minimum wage" is one of those odd concepts that *seems* to have an intuitive definition, but the harder you think about it, the more complicated it gets. For example, if you want to work, but can't find a job, then the minimum wage you'll get is zero:
--
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2026/02/17/no-piecework/#no-justice
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This link worked better for me:
"Forget UBI, says an economist: It’s time for universal basic jobs
Economist Pavlina R. Tcherneva, author of 'The Case for a Job Guarantee.'"
By Cory Doctorow
June 24, 2020 7 AMLink around paywall to Los Angeles Times:
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Take gig work: the rise of Uber and its successors created an ever-expanding class of workers, misclassified as independent contractors by employers, seeking to evade unionization, benefits and liability. It's a weird kind of "independent contractor" who gets punished for saying no to lowball offers, has to decorate their personal clothes and/or cars in their "client's" livery, and who has every movement scripted by an app controlled by their "client":
https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/02/upward-redistribution/
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I've long said that UBER is an acronym for Unethical Business Evading Responsibility.
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That's true, but livery cab drivers have lots of ways to influence that number. They can shrewdly choose a good spot to cruise. They can give their cellphone numbers to riders they've established a rapport with in order to win advance bookings. In small towns with just a few drivers - or in cities where drivers are in a co-op - they can spend some of their earnings to advertise the taxi company. Livery drivers can offer discounts to riders going a long way.
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@pluralistic In fairness, I'd suggest there's not much daylight between the two Cab driving was also institutionalized wage-stealing. Really just last generation Uber without the GPS. I mean, renting the cab medallion was a thing. And the cab. Let's see if Uber rolls out car rentals at some point (if they haven't already). Or makes their platform a subscription model for drivers.
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@pluralistic In fairness, I'd suggest there's not much daylight between the two Cab driving was also institutionalized wage-stealing. Really just last generation Uber without the GPS. I mean, renting the cab medallion was a thing. And the cab. Let's see if Uber rolls out car rentals at some point (if they haven't already). Or makes their platform a subscription model for drivers.
@jmcrookston Not every cab network featured or even tolerated medallion rental. Many drivers owned the car and the medallion, and many cab companies were organized as co-ops.
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@jmcrookston Not every cab network featured or even tolerated medallion rental. Many drivers owned the car and the medallion, and many cab companies were organized as co-ops.
@jmcrookston Cabs in Ottawa are all unionized.
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@jmcrookston Cabs in Ottawa are all unionized.
@pluralistic yes, I do recall this now. Are they unionized in all places though? I understood they carried widely. Not all cab companies would behave the same.
Hopefully we will see the same with Uber. Didn't it lose a court case recently about organizing? Or benefits?
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@jmcrookston Not every cab network featured or even tolerated medallion rental. Many drivers owned the car and the medallion, and many cab companies were organized as co-ops.
@pluralistic yes, not all were equal
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