Remember the November election, when app-based delivery companies like Uber and Lyft spent over $200 million convincing California voters that drivers should not be classified as employees? Their talking points went a little something like this: Classifying drivers as employees would mean paying them minimum wage and offering benefits like health insurance sick leave. Basic benefits like these would be so disruptive to the apps’ business models that they might have to leave California, or at least jack up their prices so high that riders couldn’t afford to take Ubers or order food delivery anymore. A vote for Prop. 22 would be a vote to preserve cheap rides, and the companies promised to throw in some watered-down benefits for drivers as part of the package. Fast forward to today, one month after voters sided with the app companies. Surprise! Uber, DoorDash, and Lyft are raising their prices anyway, CNN reports—it’s the cost of doing business, you see. This time, the joke is on California. But the lesson applies to all of us: Maybe letting tech companies regulate themselves isn’t the best way to ensure better lives for drivers or cheaper prices for riders.
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